The Minister must transform education and training, says BRIAN MOONEY

GIVEN THE levels of unemployment, the challenge facing the new Minister for Education and Skills Mary Coughlan is a mammoth one. Over the past year there has been a decrease of 127,200 in the number of men in employment, while the number of women in employment has decreased by 39,600. What makes this particularly relevant to the Minister is that the largest decrease in employment was recorded for those aged 20 to 24, many of whom left the education system with just a Leaving Cert.

Now that she has arrived in Marlborough Street, the Minister can set about reshaping how education and training is delivered to the unemployed. And to those who lack the skills required to secure employment in the competitive international labour market.

Her key challenges include

FIRST:reshape the education and training services offered through the VECs, mainly PLC and Youthreach programmes, while cutting back substantially on the number of VECs as recommended by An Bord Snip.

SECOND:reshape the apprenticeship system so that it produces workers skilled in crafts relevant to current and future economic needs, and not those of the 20th century.

THIRD:integrate the restructured VECs, apprenticeship and training services of FÁS, with the 14 ITs to create a seamless education and training service suitable for a 21st century economy.

If, in two years time when the next election comes about, she has made substantial progress on this agenda, and began the process of defusing the largely male youth unemployment time bomb, she will have more than restored her political reputation.

Will the unions cooperate in facilitating the changes?

The task of establishing an education and training system that serves the needs of all learners, across all 10 levels of our national qualifications structure, requires huge political skill on the part of the Minister.

She will need a huge level of cooperation from the public service unions representing the teachers, lecturers and trainers, and from the administrative grades in her Department and FÁS education/training services.

Without an overall agreement at national level with the public service unions, no progress can even start on this agenda.

Nobody questions the fact that if we could improve the skills base of those underemployed or unemployed, we would see a major decrease in unemployment rates. In 2009 the unemployment rate among persons with a third-level honours degree or above was only 6.1 per cent, compared with 8.6 per cent for persons with a third-level non-honours degree and rates of 13.6 per cent or higher among persons with lower levels of educational attainment. The participation rate in the labour market among persons with a third-level honours degree or above was 87.9 per cent, falling to 40.5 per cent for persons with primary level or below as their highest level of education.

It is now up to the Minister to secure the financial resources to reshape our education and training system, and to convince those working in the system to display the flexibility and patriotism necessary to transform the lives of those drifting to the margins of our society.

• Brian Mooney teaches at Oatlands College, Stillorgan, Co Dublin