THE DEPARTMENT of Education cannot prevent schools employing unqualified maths teachers, Minister of State Sean Sherlock has said.

He was replying to Fianna Fáil education spokesman Brendan Smith, who asked if he would be in a position to do this when the results of a survey under way became available.

“To give the deputy a straight answer, I am not in a position to do that,” said Mr Sherlock. “As he is well aware, the boards of management of schools have autonomy in respect of who they hire and who they fire.”

Mr Sherlock said he would be cautious regarding the department exercising control over decisions made by individual schools.

Asking Mr Smith to “have faith”, he said his department would analyse the results of the survey and then proceed cautiously. “There must be an outcome which ensures that teachers are properly qualified and that students obtain good results in their examinations,” he added.

They must ensure there was a deeper engagement in respect of the matter, said Mr Sherlock. “We will not turn the ship around overnight; it is going to take some time to do that.”

Mr Sherlock said a teaching council survey of post-primary schools showed that a significant majority of teachers, 68 per cent, teaching maths in 258 schools were fully qualified to do so.

Some 29 per cent had pursued some studies in maths and 2 per cent had not obtained third-level qualifications or pursued studies in the subject.

The council, he added, had asked schools, which had not completed the earlier survey, to do so by next week.

As part of the Government’s overall strategy to improve the teaching and learning of maths in schools, his department was making arrangements for the provision of a new training programme.

“This will provide unqualified maths teachers with the opportunity to upskill their knowledge and to study the strategies best suited to the new Project Maths syllabuses,” Mr Sherlock added.

Mr Smith asked if the Minister of State had faith in the council’s “hastily arranged survey”, adding that he understood only 30 per cent of schools actually responded to it.

Mr Sherlock said he was not satisfied with the rate of reply.

“The schools have until September 26th to provide responses to the survey,” he added.

“I ask the deputy to have forbearance and allow us to assess the position at that point.”

Mr Sherlock said the department and Minister Ruairí Quinn were extremely conscious of the fact that they must grapple with the issue. “We must do so on the basis that we will be provided with a true picture in respect of the actual scenario.”

Proper policy decisions could not be made unless qualitative and quantitative data was forthcoming.

Sinn Féin education spokesman Sean Crowe said concerns had also been expressed by many of the Gaelscoileanna about the competence of some of those teaching through the medium of Irish.

Mr Sherlock said Mr Crowe should table a separate parliamentary question on that matter.