There are many topics discussed in the staffroom over lunch. With most schools opting to start earlier and have a shorter afternoon, the staffroom has become a crowded place to lunch.

It has always been a tradition that the bachelors on the staff went for a good substantial "pub lunch", so that they only had to practice the art of boiling an egg in the evening. Now they have to sample what the local sandwich-maker comes up with, washed down by strong tea in a fancy mug. But what the staffroom lacks in culinary delights it makes up for in banter and topics of interest - such as criticism.

Now criticism is something that the teaching profession can live with. We are fair game for the media, whether it be the latest strike, mid-term breaks, inefficient teachers, or blame for the latest survey on the excesses of teenagers. Teachers have become very wary of moves by the principal to have "get to know you" evenings for first-year parents, or exhibitions of project work for Transition Year parents. They are wary because they know that when a parent gets the ear of a teacher then education must be the topic of conversation. Have you ever sat in a restaurant where there was a group of parents? As the evening progresses, the men talk golf while the ladies swap stories of their offsprings' schools. Gems such as "a whole class left for the local `grind' school after Christmas" can be heard above the raised voices, or "half of the sixthyears who remained are pregnant!"

But the greatest hotbed of gossip about schools is the prerogative of the "ladies who lunch". These are the ladies who are to be seen on every occasion at the school. They are on the sideline at matches, are available to make tea for any meeting, and coerce other parents into buying tickets for the raffle to mend the school gutters.

Soon they start to meet, starting with morning coffee and graduating to lunch. By now they know all the teachers by their first name. "Carmel was telling me that the principal had a few over the limit at the Christmas party!"

"No! never - he always told me he was a teetotaler."

There is no harm in the "ladies who lunch" - maybe a bit of school angels, lunch devils! Let the school down - no, never!