Teacher's pet

An insider's guide to education

A post-Christmas lull has settled on the education sector. After the water rates debacle, the Minister, Mary Hanafin, is keeping a relatively low profile.

Fine Gael spokesman Brian Hayes, meanwhile, is the darling of the Opposition benches because of his ongoing war of attrition with Ms Hanafin, who he has labelled the "Minister for Happiness".

The ever-active Hayes has scored well on water rates, school planning and a range of other issues, both inside the Dáil and in the media.

In the run-in to the key teacher-conference season in March, the Minister will be anxious to regain some lost ground.

In the past three years, she has been enthusiastically received by delegates at all three teacher conferences. It will be fascinating to see how the Hayes effect is playing outside the media and Dáil bubble.

•The Irish Primary Principals' Network (IPPN) has certainly assembled a stellar cast for its annual conference at the end of the month. It has managed to attract the President, Mary McAleese; the Catholic primate, Cardinal Seán Brady, the Minister, Mary Hanafin and Prof Tom Collins, the State's leading educational guru.

The Killarney, Co Kerry conference is set to be dominated by discussions on the kind of school management needed for a New Ireland. Sounds interesting.

The IPPN got into trouble some years ago for asking its delegates to give marks à la Strictly Come Dancing to each conference speaker. We are assured this year's speakers will not be subjected to this indignity.

•Most people agree that Leaving and Junior Cert students should take mock exams at this time of year and have them corrected by an external examiner - but who should pay for this?

These days, many schools farm out the mocks to marking agencies - and ask parents to pick up the tab; it is yet another hidden cost in our "free" education system.

But why not ask teachers to take on this task - at the right price?

Clearly, they should not correct mocks from their own students, but one member of the maths department could take on the work from another class and so on.

And isn't it time that the Department proposed a revised contract for teachers that deals with payment for mocks and other supposed "add-ons" - instead of forcing parents to pay?

•Last week's feature on the popularity of Facebook, the social networking site, in our universities prompted a huge response.

But now comes news of how a Cambridge University admissions tutor has admitted he checks up on students applying to the college by browsing their Facebook profiles.

Memo to all third-level students: be careful out there!