This is the type of person we desperately need in our schools.Passionate.If only Quinn and the other ditherers had a tenth of her passion.

Agreed. It was pointed out in February by the Teaching Unions that education is the way out of this recession. Think about that for a minute. Minister Quinn certainly doesn’t. The teaching profession is a pillar of society and if this country is to get back on its feet then the government must stop fragmenting the profession. Trade with countries such as China is hugely on the agenda for the forthcoming decades and the students and young people who will encounter this need to meet it with an extremely solid and secure education if they are to take us seriously. Schools will eventually stagnate and become dysfunctional if this messing around with teacher’s careers doesn’t stop. Fair play to this young lady, she forfeited a pretentious speech on how proud she is of the system in order to voice her concerns for herself and society and give the Minister a good slap on the face.

Evelyn, What a great speech – it sums up so many of the problems faced by education in Ireland and was delivered with great passion while still keeping to the core issues. Hopefully this will get to the real debate and not the straw man that has been in the media for the past few months.

Accountability by number crunchers is not great in teaching. Imagine league tables. I don’t think they work yet the media love to compile them. They do not take into consideration the type of school, the local demographics regarding population, unemployment rate, extra curricular, pastoral etc. They miss a huge swathe of what is essential in school life and look at the percentage who go on to third level. To get some students to pass LC is a huge achievement, yet certain individuals discount this huge effort and achievement, and look only to those achieving honors. Something seriously wrong here I suggest. We can only debate all of this Evelyn, when teachers reclaim their right as education partners, and not remain on the periphery as pawns in a game. You mention the unions. There is huge dissatisfaction in schools regarding unions. They are detached from their membership and are becoming increasingly so. What is happening in schools today is a disgrace and the unions by and large are ineffective. We need to stand up for ourselves and our students in the face of continuous cutbacks before it is too late and we have no education system left. It’s so sad how the bankers and bondholders come before our children. However the Government have only one agenda, keep cutting until it functions no more, then blame the teachers for not delivering enoujgh!!

Thanks for including my post Evelyn and well done on pointing out the current situation in Irish education. An of course, congrats on your well deserved award!!!

@Benjamin,

Agreed! She’s young, enthusiastic, full of energy. New, modern ideas. I just wish Minister Quinn etc. would take notice.

On another note, Minister Quinn should choose to listen and accept a great idea when it is shown to him and proven that it works. So what if he is seen to be endorsing a product, if it’s Irish and it works, what’s the bloody problem?

I would hope he will! In my view, complexity of being in government aside, if he doesn’t listen to and at least work with people like Evelyn then he’s not doing his job properly. I think his intentions are sound and obviously he’s juggling many different issues which is why I think rather than constantly sniping Ministers as many do we should be cooperating and contributing.

If sometimes we have to be a bit more forceful in “offering :-)” that contribution then so be it but it serves nobody spouting the usual rubbish about how shite the government etc. That simply creates confusion and tension. Someone like Evelyn, with such evident intelligence and experience (also importantly apolitical) could really focus these points into a coherent program. That’s how I see her getting through to the Minister.

@Katie Molloy,

You have two good positive things going for you. 1. Being a woman and 2. Being an Irish woman. No matter how often you feel that you’ve been kicked to the ground. Get up! Wipe yourself down and start again. You have to.

I agree that the unions are absolutely swamped with I’m sure thousands of non-permanent teachers (including me) plaguing them for information, advice and assistance, particularly since the introduction of redeployment. There is no doubt that they are working extremely hard just to man the phones and respond to all the queries. To be fair to the union, they responded swiftly to very single pedantic detailed query I threw at them over the past few months. Ultimately however accepting redeployment compromised the future career of all of us who have fixed term contracts. That is a huge percentage of the overall number of secondary school teachers in Ireland. New entrants are in an even worse position. We may struggle to ever again get any kind of job security. It seems unlikely that we’ll survive the even deeper cuts that are looming so the indefinite future that awaits us is bouncing from school to school, never getting fully established (because it takes 5 years in the one school to get any rights at all) worrying every year about the possibility of someone being redeployed in our position, being constantly on the interview trail and for a lot of passionate teachers in the end giving up on teaching altogether. A depressing reality which in no way takes into account our abilities. I’m not in favor of merit pay, it has failed spectacularly in the UK and the US. But I’d at least like to be able to compete for my job. Finally, I think we all need to avoid the trap of a split between permanent and non-permanent teachers. We need to stand united. It’s in most cases just a quirk of timing which group any of us belong to and what we should all be fighting for together is ALL teachers. This doesn’t appear to have happened. We are the sacrificial lambs. And yes I know this has been the case for years but that doesn’t make it any fairer or any more defensible.

The trouble with not agreeing to redeployment is that the alternative for teachers in over-quota schools is redundancy. Nobody gets redeployed without a rigorous pouring over the detail regarding the school the teacher is leaving and the school to which they are redeployed.
Furthermore without a redeployment scheme the chances of a voluntary redeployment scheme, something I think you’d have benefitted from. The management side are dragging their heels on that, one of very few positives from the Croke Park agreement.
There are many teachers who spend the whole summer waiting for news from their principals, a record number of teachers are being made unemployed this year, young teachers are being victimised with pay cuts that make the job financially less preferable than emigrating.
The CID system rewards a teacher for service almost without fail, and we take many, many appeals every year to make sure teachers get them when they’re due. It may not suit everyone every year, but when you have four years in a school the likeyhood of receiving one is high.
So I’d say take your fight to a branch meeting, get stuck in because otherwise it becomes easy to ignore a single voice.
Keep up the good work Evelyn, You know of old how much I appreciate your help in my English classes.

All fair points Fintan and I think we agree on more than we disagree on. Teaching must remain a profession, not a part-time job. Teachers need to speak out more with passion because we need people to see that we care about doing a good job and we care about the students we teach. It’s sad that instead of following the Finnish example as this government promised they would, they are turning us into the UK and the US even though both systems have alienated and disenfranchised teachers so much that it is no longer in any way an attractive profession and many of those who go into it idealistically end up leaving the profession completely disillusioned as evident here:
http://blogs.ajc.com/get-schooled-blog/2012/06/22/a-teacher-explains-why-she-gave-up-a-career-she-loved/
None of this want this for Ireland. I was asked to be the union rep in our school last year because I am a very vocal person (no shit eh?) but I was told it’s not a good idea for someone who doesn’t yet have any rights to have their contract renewed year on year. If it ever happens, perhaps that’s what I should be doing…

I agree that it is time somebody spoke up on behalf of teachers but I really take issue with the last comment by Kathleen Hayes regarding older teachers. I think all teachers are vulnerable at the moment older and younger, I know many older teachers who have been redeployed basically to try and force them out of the system. Some have been redeployed more than once in recent years and cannot afford to retire. Of course this is forcing younger teachers out of jobs but it is no picnic for a 50 plus year old trying to build up a rapport and reputation with teenagers who perceive them too old in a new school. Also as the salaries are driven down for younger teachers so too are the pensions of older teachers. Everyone is vulnerable in this situation and remember the older teachers and retirees have been through more than one recession, every time things improve they go right back down again. Many have to be seriously concerned about their future security as the already cut pension further stagnates in years to come and not all are on full pension either. Remember as one ages opportunities to maintain income considerably declines It saddens me to see people divided by a manipulative government who have conquered people by the politics of division.

This is not an informed point, it is sensationalist conspiracy theorist nonsense. If you had said that some actors or elements within the private sector were responsible and were helped along by some elements within the public sector you would be presenting a reasonable view. Instead you choose to completely misrepresent the real situation either 1). because you are generally ignorant or 2). because you are using an emotional appeal to the angry and disenfranchised people within society in order to feed some revolutionary hopes you hold. There was huge excess in the public sector. In saying this I’m in no way endorsing the approach our Government have taken to rebalance the sector. Evidently things need to change for the profession of Teaching, but can we not focus on the specifics and seek real solutions instead of launching blanket accustions against what is in your view a capitalist demon like “private sector”. Many millions of good conscientious hard working people cannot be thrown into the same category as a few wayward greedy bank directors and developpers. Look in the mirror next time before you start stiring hate.

@Benjamin Guy Saunders

This teacher is obviously speaking from experience. Why would she say such things and perhaps be punished for speaking up. She won this award because she deserved it. The whole educational system needs looking at and most certainly needs Minister Quinn to get closer to the problem, by visiting many schools that have huge classes with a number of children that need that bit of extra help but can’t get it because teachers like Evelyn O’Connor only have so much time in the day.

She wants equality for her and students, that’s all.

@Sheila Byrne

Of course, I completely agree. This was purely intended in response to gingerman’s comment, I should have made that clearer. See my comment below for my view on the article and situation itself.

Apologies for the confusion. I certainly wasn’t saying this about Ms. O’Connor’s speech.

Thanks Gillian. Seems like it’s hit a chord with lots of people ;-)

One more link that’s highly relevant to this discussion.
What we’re doing wrong and how we can fix it: http://ow.ly/bVGo5

Eh……….what???

First, thanks for the compliments and I think you may have a point about the potential for a cameo in Fair City ;-)

As for ‘bad’ teaching, we are told that the Teaching Council was set up to regulate the profession, bring in a code of conduct and overall ensure that teachers abide by it. It was hoped that they would find a way to get rid of ‘bad’ teachers and I absolutely agree with you on this point. Every single profession needs a way to get rid of people who are professionally incompetent. They appear do have done little in this regard. I have heard of a case however where a person with 20yrs experience in industry working in IT was told by the Teaching Council that he is not qualified to teach IT because it didn’t form a big enough part of his degree. It’s this kind of lunacy, combined with the millions of unspent dues which has led me and I believe a lot of ordinary teachers (but i don’t want to presume to speak for others in my profession) to conclude that the whole thing is a sham exercise in looking like they serve a purpose when actually they seem to spend all of their time telling us how important it is that they exist. Sigh. I remain open to the idea that it is important to have a professional body in place to preserve the status of the profession and the professionalism of it’s members. I am yet to be convinced that they are in any way serving that function.

My main frustration arises from the fact that the ‘bad’ teachers (you say 10%, I say 5%; you say 20%, I say 10% because I have an appreciation of the complexities of the job and the difficulties it presents. And maybe I’m biased in favor of my colleagues…) make up such a small percentage yet get 95% of the media coverage. I wish we could talk about good teaching, find a way to spread good teaching practices, collaborate more etc…

If you look at my speech again, you’ll notice that I said the attack on teacher numbers is an attack on school children. I did not say anything in my speech about teacher’s pay. Also what are the “flaws in the system which benefit teachers?”

I think it’s great these issues are being debated irrespective of whether or not people agree with me.

Think you mean “lone voice of dissent”.

(a) “It is is incredibly naive to ignore the fact that they and their unions have done nothing to help getting the country out of it”. Is that aside from taking a 15%-20% pay cut, increased pension contributions to the fact that the pension fund in the public service now takes in more than it pays out, increased class sizes, longer working hours, holding PT meetings outside of school hours, doing extra-curricular work on a voluntary basis and having close to 3,300 redundancies since Sept 2008?

(b) “Increments continue”: If increments stop, it’s only those on the lower scale who suffer. On the incremental scale, you stop getting an annual increment after 26 years (which is the longest salary scale in the EU). So in real terms, it is the younger and lower paid who will suffer, not the high earners.

(c) Sick leave is being changed and is more in line with private sector practices. Read this if you don’t believe me. http://www.tui.ie/news-events/proposal-to-revise-sick-leave-entitlements-.1863.html

(d) Allowances is a historical title. The term “allowance” actually refers to the part of core salary which is calculated on the basis of a person’s qualification. In the private sector, you have the ability to negotiate your salary on the basis of your experience and qualifications. This is the the way the Dept looks to attract a better candidate for the job. The other “allowances” refer to payment for a promotion within teaching. Extra responsibilities outside of the ordinary teaching work ought to be rewarded with extra pay, should they not? And then there are the “allowances” for being a deputy or a principal. I’m sure you would acknowledge the huge work involved in such roles. In the private sector, it is not unheard of to get a pay increase for moving into a managerial role. Why should teaching be any different?

Please point out which of the above are “shocking”.

Let’s just dissect that silliness: the last benchmarking process awarded teachers nothing, that was pre-bust; increments: red herring, I don’t get one this year or for the next three years and the length of the scale is crazy, shorten it and we’ll talk; sick leave: has changed, catch up, teachers take on average 7sick days a year including maternity; allowances: with every rise and every cut our allowances were considered part of pay, cutting them now is moving the goalposts and a breach of Croke Pk, surely you can’t deny a teacher a credit for being qualified to do the job? And while we’re at it most teachers have no promotional opportunities now that the moritorium on promotion enters its third year.

The last benchmarking exercise awarded nothing to teachers because they were supposed to have ‘enhanced pension benefits’ (this of course was nonsense considering most teachers in the system now will never qualify for a full pension and that they pay in more than they are getting out! BUT of course, since the last benchmarking exercise we ahve had the ‘pension related deduction’ which has nothing to do with pension and is really just tax.

Before jumping at teachers increments, you might consider the bonuses paid ever year in the private sector.

And as a private sector worker you have time to reply here and read the previous comments – something Evelyn would not have time to do in her job. The trough you speak of is not so full as it was in the past – and that’s a good thing – however you have absolutely no right to assume that the job Evelyn does is easy or a cushy number – I take it you have never taught – you should try it for a week and see how you feel about teachers after that!
By the way – she is not whinging about not getting paid for the summer – that old chestnut – or that she is not permanent – what she is arguing if you cared to pay closer attention is that unlike other jobs she is not rewarded for her hard work with a position she deserves – no matter how good at her job she is that is irrelevant – someone else can be slotted in to fill her place. the school needs an English teacher – she is more than adequately fulfilling that role but she will effectively be sacked anyway. I am sad for you – you must have had a pretty poor time at school if you have nothing but bad to say of teachers. for the most part we love our students and our career – it is a vocation – believe me if you did not love the job you could not take the endless stream of abuse that we are subjected to by all and sundry – they have been students in a school therefore they know our job – you have no idea!!! And yes it is a wonderful job, but lots of people have wonderful jobs they love with some great perks, bonuses, staff team-building days, conferences. Rant rant rant – three months holidays – for your information it’s actually a little short of that this year and this morning I spent my holidays researching and paying for resources for next year’s students.
Get over yourself!

Fair play Jack. A lone voice of decency, honesty and common sense in a sea of vastly overpaid, under worked whingers.

Will the cost of living come down in line with those too? Or maybe you’re so caught up with begrudgery you’d like to see front line public servants on the minimum wage!

These teachers and educating our kids, the future work force of this country, future politicans, and the ones who will be taking care of us in the future,

The nurses are currently over-worked, under paid, while working in a health system that is falling apart.

What’s wrong with paying them a decent wage? And as for a sense of entitlement, they deserve a lil sense of it considering how important their damn job is.

Clueless ……….

Oh he’s not clueless. He is hitting the nail right on the head. Time you guys got off your “entitled” asses and worked a full year for a change. Or a full day would be a good start.

The world may not owe her a living, but considering the fact that these are the people educating kids around the country, do you want these people to do it properly or not.

@Jack. You’re right. The world doesn’t owe her a living. Please point out where she says it does. She’s obviously a top class professional, somebody who we should hope to keep in our system and country yet is continuously frustrated in her attempts to provide the best possible service for her students. If she wasn’t doing her job you’d want her removed, if she does it well and shows initiative, you think; “tough luck, move on”. How wonderful it must be to be as wonderful as you. Until you’ve walked a mile in her shoes, try to keep your facetious comments to yourself.

Well said Jack. The part about the Good old times when” you just bided your time and then you got a permanent position” was laughable. In the real world of the private sector you work your a$$ off and then you might if your productivity is high enough be in the running for more. Getting it just because you “bide your time” seems to be the standard in our education system. A system that fights tooth and nail to make sure that actually producing isnt reward and just turning up is rewarded. Its time these “work half a year” headcases realised just how over blessed they are and kept quiet. They are over paid and underworked.

Yawn!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!