Legal limbo worries centres

Insufficient funds, no legal status and delays in the building of new premises were raised as matters of concern by directors of the country's 30 education centres last week. The centres have no legal identity at the moment and the voluntary management committees are not indemnified in terms of insurance. This matter was discussed as an issue of great urgency at a two-day meeting in Galway of representatives of the centres.

"We are concerned that it has taken as long as it has to resolve this issue," says Seamus O Canainn, director of the Blackrock Education Centre "The centres are required to hire staff. If you're not a legal body, you can't offer contracts other than on a short-term basis."

The status of the centres also relates to the signing of leases. "We are concerned that the centres don't have a legal identity," he continues. "You can't open a bank account. In the event of a dispute the individuals on the management committee would be liable."

It was agreed that the local ownership and initiative of centres is the key to the overall responsiveness and success of the centres.

There was an animated debate on the issue of funding to the centres by the Department of Education and Science. The meeting also looked at the issue of delays in the building programme and "more importantly" the omission from the Education Bill of any mention of the centres.

The proposed building programme "is behind schedule," says O Canainn.

It was noted at the meeting that the appointment of 12 new directors to centres last year has stretched resources available for the support of the many initiatives under way in education. All the directors had experienced "a tremendous demand for courses in all areas" of information and communications technology or computer courses. "There was great satisfaction at the level of response of teachers to what were in many cases the first inservice programmes organised by the new directors," he says.

In the future, the existence of an extended network comprising 21 full-time and 9 part-time directors will allow the centres to put forward a profile "as a whole" on an annual basis and work will start straight away on this.