Batt faces a backlash on cuts

TEACHER'S PET:Batt O'Keeffe says he is pleased with the 3 per cent Budget increase in education spending. But is there real trouble in store? The insensitive manner in which the Budget targeted weaker groups has provoked a storm. And there are other fires raging over class size, special needs and the lack of substitution cover in schools.

There is real, seething anger across the education sector. But most of it has been kept under the radar as the media focus remains on health cuts.

Here's a prediction. The Budget will unleash a winter of discontent across the education sector as the cuts bite.

Batt's first education budget could yet unravel.

• Earlier this year, four Protestant schools successfully challenged the teacher redeployment scheme in the High Court. They include some of the best known schools in Dublin - St Andrew's,Wesley College, Rathdown and St Patrick's Cathedral Grammar School.

The Protestant schools said they were not consulted about the redeployment scheme. They were working to protect their distinct ethos.

But some in the Department of Education were furious, arguing (privately) that the schools were being elitist - as if teachers from the redeployment panel were not good enough for them.

It was a charge the school vigorously contested and one dismissed by the High Court.

This week, the Department delivered a double-whammy to Protestant fee-paying schools. The pupil teacher ratio will increase from 18 to 20. And a range of special-service support grants, received by virtue of their non-Catholic status, are being abolished - bringing a saving of €2 million.

Whatever the rights and wrongs of the redeployment row, Protestant school are entitled to feel angry and resentful.

The Department is vulnerable to the charge it is punishing these schools because of their audacity in mounting a High Court challenge.

• Memo to parents: your children are a step ahead when it comes to controlling your activities on Bebo, MSN and other social network sites.

Last week, one parents' association meeting heard how kids use a special code 999-POS to alert online friends that a Parent is hovering Over their Shoulder.

Bebo, incidentally, claims 31 million members globally, with one million in Ireland.

Got a scandal? E-mail teacherspet@irish-times.ie