Teachers call for cut in teacher training qualification course

Delegates at the ASTI annual convention have urged Minister for Education Norma Foley to reduce the qualification period for becoming a secondary teacher from two years down to one to help address staff shortages in schools.

The conference heard motion proposer, Maireád Bergin from Clare argue the current two year Professional Masters in Education (PME) was proving a deterrent to many entering the profession as it was both costly and time consuming.

The motion contended that in light of the current shortage of teachers at second level the ASTI should “campaign as a matter of urgency to have one year course made available to graduates to provide them with a qualification to teach in second level schools”.

She said that to her it was “just a common sense motion” particularly in light of the recent survey conducted for the ASTI by Red C which found that some 55per cent of school principals reported that their school currently had unfulfilled vacancies due to recruitment difficulties.

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“There’s obviously a huge problem and it’s going to get worse,” said Ms Bergin, adding that while there were other issues such as pay dissuading people from entering the profession, she believed it was obvious many graduates with general degrees don’t want to do the PME.

She said that the two year PME was costing on average €12,000 and added two years to a student’s qualification as a teacher during which time they had to remain in full time education which was an added burden on their parents who had to support them.

Ideally classrooms should be staffed by teachers from diverse backgrounds but becoming a teacher was becoming very expensive and that was going to impact on the type of people who could afford to become teachers, she said.

The other factor was the time obtaining a PME took and there were many one year conversion courses for graduates which could lead to other better paying careers which was impacting on the numbers entering the teaching profession, she said.

The government was doing nothing to “entice people to choose teaching as a career,” she argued and she instanced the case of somebody like an engineer who might want to switch to become a maths teacher only to find a two year obstacle had been put in their way.

Ms Bergin said that a one year course would go a long way towards solving the teacher shortage. People who many people who did the one year Higher Diploma in Education proved to be excellent teachers so a properly designed one year course would work.

Finnish model

Seconding the motion, Jacinta McGarry, also from the Clare Branch, said that the PME was introduced in 2014 to improve teaching in schools and followed the Finnish model but unlike in Finland where the state pays for the course, Irish graduates have to fund it themselves.

Ms McGarry said that she did not believe people needed to do a two year PME to qualify as a teacher and given the urgent shortage of teachers, a one year course would help address shortages in Maths, Irish, French, Spanish, Physics and Home Economics.

Many schools are depending on retired teachers to fill vacancies, said Ms McGarry adding that she knew of one case where a retired teacher ended up effectively subbing for herself when the school was unable to find a replacement teacher for her position.

“While I’m sure the PME is very good, that’s not the point - the point is that there is a shortage of teachers and the system needs an innovative one year diploma fast tracked to solve this problem so I urge you to support our motion.”

However Susie Hall of Dublin North East Branch said that while she accepted that the motion was well intentioned, she might inadvertently end up solving Minister for Education, Norma Foley’s problem for her without addressing the fundamental issue of pay and conditions.

“The shortage of teachers is being caused by most people who want to become teachers not being able to afford it so we are losing thousands of potentially gifted teachers but one way to solve it would be to pay teachers to train as they do in Britain,” she said.

However delegates overwhelmingly backed Ms Bergin’s motion to make a one year training course available for teachers which will now become part of the ASTI policy position and will inform its negotiations with the Department of Education on proposed educational reform.