Want to be a teacher? Why bother!

I love being a teacher. I enjoy almost everything about it - the interactions with my students inside and outside the classroom, the comradery of the staff room, my involvement in school sports, drama & other extracurricular activities. I love my subject (science) and learn something new about it everyday. I love the opportunity my job gives me to explore new ways to teach and I enjoy collaborating with my colleagues to ensure we provide the best education possible in our school. I also enjoy collaborating with like minded teachers on twitter, ensuring my approach to teaching doesn't stay stagnant and constantly keeps evolving to keep up with new technologies and philosophies. In my role as guidance counsellor I get a great sense of satisfaction when speaking to young people about their future careers and helping them develop the tools to deal with personal troubles when they arise.

I'm not rich and I'm not poor. The past number of years have been tough for everyone in Ireland and I am very lucky to be working full time in a wonderful school. However, I have endured a pay reduction of around 15% in that period, through the combined effects of pay cuts and pension levies, and like everyone else things have become much tighter of late. 

But this compares little to the plight of newly qualified teachers - who have endured a cut in pay close to 33%. I simply can't believe that our government has allowed the introduction of this two-tier system through these drastic pay cuts (10% on top of our 15%) as well as the removal of allowances for newly qualified teachers. The starting wage for a full time newly qualified teacher is now just over €27,000. The average industrial wage in Ireland in 2011 was just shy of €36,000 (CSO). 

Let's put that in perspective. Teachers are highly qualified individuals. All must have a three or four year primary degree and a post graduate diploma in education (which will be two years long from 2012). The cost fee alone for the five or six years could top €15,000 and of course there are living costs involved too. (Trainee teachers do not get paid in Ireland). Then, on completion of their training they begin their working life on €27,000. Well not exactly.

University Plans to Down-Grade the Post-Graduate Diploma in Education

Below is a short post from a student teacher, who wished to remain anonymous, on a decision made by our country's universities to down-grade the Post Graduation Diploma in Education (PGDE) from a National Framework of Qualifications (NFQ) Level 9 qualification to a Level 8 (at the same level as a Higher Degree) - without any consultation with the students who have registered and paid for their course. The course is also being renamed a Professional Diploma in Education. This is the final year that the "H-Dip" will be a one year course, being replaced by a two year long course from 2012. It is unclear if the new course will be a NFQ Level 8 or 9.

There has no coverage of this story by any newspaper or online news site, principally because only one university has informed the students on the changes. The student teacher, who has a legal background, outlines the many problems associated with the changes - which appear to me to constitute a breach of contract in the very least with everyone having registered and paid for the course advertised as a NFQ Level 9 qualification. The changes - which have been implemented and not merely suggested - seem outrageous to me, especially considering media outcry on the use of under-qualified individuals in teaching positions. Interestingly, when contacted, the ASTI and the Teaching Council were unaware of the changes and were unable to provide any advice to the student teacher. Anyway, this is what our student teacher has to say, describing the situation as "a real case of more stress and officially less success".

As I sat in my PGDE lecture the other day I was treated at the start to the usual drudgery of announcements, one flippant remark was made as the announcer was about to exit the theatre. It was something along these lines:

Just to let you all know the course has been renamed the Professional Diploma in Education, it has also been downgraded to level 8 from level 9 on the NFQ framework. 

Interesting, I thought, we were told if we had any questions please send an email. Out the announcer waltzed and the lecture started! 

So what does this mean for this year’s PGDE / (PDE!!) students? Well, there are some serious questions which need answering!

1. Is the qualification still internationally recognised? 
2. Are we going to be the only level 8 year? If the course becomes 2 years will the new course be level 8 or 9? 
3. When we are qualified will we be on the same pay scale as teachers with the level 9 qualification? 
4. Has the cost of the course been reduced in line with its downgrade? Will we be getting a refund? 
5. Will students be able to get a grant for the course considering they already have a level 8 qualifications to get on the course? 
6. Will this year’s students be disadvantaged when interviewing for a position against a candidate with a level 9 qualification? 

As it can be seen this change has brought up numerous issues which affect all of this year’s PGDE students, all of whom applied, were accepted, registered and paid for the PGDE not the PDE. On a very simple level this looks to be a cheap shot, a badly disguised austerity measure. What is more frustrating is there has been no communication on the issue, nobody in the School of Education can answer any of these questions as they plainly don’t seem to know. The Teaching Council also didn’t know of this change when contacted. 

Please leave your comments below as I feel this issue of a grave importance. We already have a situation where new entrants into the teaching profession will be paid 10% less than their colleagues, and on a lower pay scale. Another blow such as this is going to detract talented young minds from the teaching profession, causing further problems down the road. Please, pass on this post also.

Guest Post - Teaching Shoos

Ronan Swift is a teacher and a musician. He is also well known for his unusual choice of shoes! In this More Stress Less Success guest post Ronan recalls a particular question posed to him some years ago at the end of a lesson and uses his shoes as a platform for a provocative discussion on imagination, inspiration and creativity in the teaching profession.

“Sir, we were just wondering (giggles); why do your shoes (more giggles)…look like Cornish pasties?” Much giggling.

This little enquiry was a genuine end of class interaction some years ago now and the reason I’ve included it in my post is because it started me on a train of thought that has led me to writing this post.  Today, I’d like to talk to you about shoes.

Well, no what I really want to talk about is not strictly speaking shoes but has more to do with imagination, inspiration and creativity.

When a country decides what to include in the courses it makes for its children’s education it has to include all the building blocks of knowledge that are the basics upon which further learning can blossom. Every school system needs to both provide its young people with fundamental knowledge and equip them with certain skills so they can perform various tasks and so they can do their own learning. On this we all agree. It’s too easy to give out and say that our education system places far too much emphasis on learning facts and stats and not enough on cultivating imagination and creativity. That’s not really what I want to do.

I just would like you to be a bit more aware of the importance of creativity and imagination in making the world a better place and for you to be aware of the potential to be creative that you, that we all have. For me creativity begins with a sort of openness, with allowing thoughts, words or phrases, ideas to enter your mind, to wash over you and to allow your thoughts to roam, to make connections and links that may lead to a spark of something new and different. Certainly you can’t shut yourself off and be ‘closed’.

An Inspirational CESI Conference

Last Saturday morning my colleague Julian Girdham and I set off for Portlaoise College to attend my first (and I believe his second) Computers in Education Society of Ireland Conference (#CESI2011). We had been pencilled in to give a short presentation on “Building & Growing a Subject Blog” in the late afternoon but were also keen to attend several of the other workshops and talks on offer in the impressive itinerary. I, personally, was eager to finally meet all those “tweachers” and edtech tweeps with whom I had been conversing with since I joined Twitter way back in November ‘09. Inspirational figures like @simonmlewis, @rozzlewis, @pajo23, @fintanmurphy, @anseoamhuinteoir, @pizievondust, @fboss, @magsamond and @lismiss (to name but a few) were all in attendance and I was excited to see each of them in the flesh. Needless to say, all were equally as impressive in person.

The day began with an inspiring and motivating presentation from @tombarrett, a powerhouse in the world of educational technology (or simply education in general). Tom spoke passionately about his views on education and offered some simple yet practical advice for getting the most out of our charges. Indeed, Tom was eager for all of us in attendance to contribute too and he asked each of us to write just one simple idea on a post-it. Since then, Tom has collated all those ideas and created a “mosaic” of all our suggestions including my own: Become a Tweacher, Connect on Twitter!

Unfortunately, so many of the presentations I wished to attend conflicted on the timetable (despite some being repeated) but I still got great enjoyment and inspiration from those I did attend, namely the excellent presentation by Ross Mahon from Google (with the guys from Camara) on Google Docs and @pajo23’s superb presentation on “Extreme Twitter”. I wasn’t sure if this was going to involve bungee cords or a parachute but it turned out to be a brilliant talk on using twitter for sharing news and information (or for the occasional treasure hunt) within the school environment – really inspirational stuff!

The day ended with a couple of hundred techie teachers singing in Zulu, all thanks to the inspiring figure of @markpentleton. And I think inspiration is surely the recurring theme of my first trip to a CESI conference. I was frankly astounded by the wealth of talent and enthusiasm amongst the delegates and workshop presenters. I genuinely feel that teachers are often excessively modest and don’t give themselves the credit they deserve, but the teachers I met as #CESI2011 warrant every plaudit. These individuals are experts in their field and in any other profession would be placed on a pedestal and praised from on high. Yet they seek no praise and do what they do, simply from a love of teaching and a willingness to share their passion with others. If that isn’t inspirational, then what is?

To see some photos from this year’s CESI Conference click here. Please leave a comment below if you were at this year’s conference and let me know which workshops you attended and who inspired you!

Relabelling Teachers?

Is it time to relabel the term "teacher"? With everything that goes on in the modern Irish school (both primary and secondary), I often feel like actual classroom "teaching" causes the least amount of stress in my working day. All the other aspects of being a "teacher" seem to be what makes the job so bloody exhausting! So I ask, is it time to relabel the term "teacher" and replace it with a word that more accurately describes the multi-faceted nature of our role?

The last few months I've felt like I've been chasing my tail at work, trying to balance my time and efforts between the classroom and  the other essential roles that "teachers" play in schools. Just some examples of what I need to juggle during my week- JCT rugby coach (and referee), guidance counsellor, house tutor, a bit of TY coordination (my official title is the "Deputy Assistant Coordinator"), maintaining the careers library, local facilitator for agricultural science, frog blogger, tweeter, homework supervision, webmaster for the IASTA.ie website ooh, and science teacher (full time for those who think my guidance role might let me off a few hours). Put simply "teaching" is bloody exhausting, - no wonder so many give it up to become politicians!

So I ask you - is there a need to re-brand the position and call it something new? Should we officially recognise the other aspects of our role in schools (the aspects we rarely get credit for from Joe Public).  Many people still believe we actually work 22 hours a week - I recently clocked up my time and I was working for more than 60 hours a week. Of course teaching is the principle responsibility of the job but it doesn't tell the whole story. Any suggestions?

World Teachers Day 2010

Today is World Teachers' Day, an annual event to celebrate and recognise the work of teachers worldwide. The day is organised by UNESCO and Education International and it is described as a “significant token of the awareness, understanding and appreciation displayed for the vital contribution that teachers make to education and development”. World Teachers’ Day aims to mobilise support for teachers and to ensure that the needs of future generations will continue to be met by teachers. This year's tag line is "Recovery Begins With Teachers" and looks at how the work of teachers can help in alleviating the hardship of social, humanitarian and economic crises worldwide. 

Obviously, as a teacher, I completely support this concept and often feel that the Irish public don’t truly appreciate the work of teachers and the role they can play in bringing Ireland out of recession and build our economy going into the next decade. Saying that, I believe teachers, their unions and the pointless Teaching Council are extremely inept at promoting our profession and the work we do. But today is not about moaning, it’s about patting each other on the back and saying “good job”. It is also a time to remember our 30 million colleagues worldwide, many of whom have to work through hardship and crisis in order to carry out their role as educators. While it's easy to complain about the lack of resources in Irish schools, it is important to remember those that teach without chalk, copies, pens or even classrooms. These are the true teaching heroes. To send an appreciative message to a colleague or teacher you know, why not fill out a E-CARD on the World Teachers’ Day website! Visit http://www.5oct.org/!