Testing time for the teachers

As every teacher knows, there are little questions and big questions. After teaching the unit, Strikes in a Democracy, the short-answer questions are:

trace the origins of the strategy;

examine the quality of the press releases;

analyse the composition of the professional leadership;

draw a graph showing the difference if any, between the resolutions passed by the branches and the decisions taken by HQ.

Each question carries 10 marks

Higher-order questions are always more demanding, but any student who wishes to take the honours paper in June or intends being a candidate for a County Council Scholarship or has ambition to become Scholar-of-the-House in Trinity College Dublin should be prepared to deal with the larger, thoughtful, philosophical issues which surface after a topic has been taught.

You will need to have read at least some of the press coverage of the recent ASTI bother. (Patrick Kavanagh, remember, referred to "the Munich bother").

Please complete TWO questions. Number 3 is mandatory.

Some of the larger questions which this unit, Strikes in a Democracy, throws up are:

1. Why does the press opine that it is not a player, merely a reflector of public opinion, when it prides itself as a fearless inquisitor of issues and causes? (20 marks)

2. What is the nature of the contiguity between the press and the Government's position? (20 marks)

3. Why was the press (media, if you like) so seamlessly unquestioning of underlying issues and so narrowly focused on day-to-day happenings? (40 marks)

Prompts for answering the last question:

What do teachers represent in society? Harshness? Cruelty? Continuity with the past? A link with previously religious schools, some with an unhappy association?

What do trade unions represent in society?

Are there any problems in your school which you would like to bring to the notice of the public?

Short answers and essay-type answers on my desk, please, on Tuesday next.