The Minister for Education and Science, Mr Noel Dempsey, today launched a nationwide consultation process on education in Ireland.
Minister Dempsey said the process, entitled, Your Education System, "looks beyond our traditional focus on education as being school-centered and asks how education will be delivered into the future having regard to issues such as the impact of information and communications technologies (ICT)."
Mr Noel Dempsey, Minister for Education and Science launching Your Education System. Photograph: Cyril Byrne
Public meetings and focused meetings on specific topics are planned. Mr Dempsey said he was not setting the themes for all these meetings now, preferring to see if any common concerns or issues come out of the public meetings.
A public attitudinal survey will also take place to assess what people consider the strengths and weaknesses of the system. Reports on all elements of the process will be carried on the website dedicated to this process. ( www.youreducation.ie)
The minister said results will be drawn together to provide a blueprint for policy makers "now and into the future, while giving the Irish people a standard against which they can measure policy for their education system."
A number of people have been asked to act as trustees or guarantors for the process. Their task is to guarantee to the public that this process allows their views to be fully and fairly reflected.
They are: Dr Garret Fitzgerald, Mr Ned Sullivan, Dame Geraldine Keegan, Ms Catherine Sweeney, Dr Pádraig Hogan, Dr Barry McGaw, Mr John Wilson and Ms Mary Davis.