Teachers who want to take part in training for new junior cycle programmes may be blocked by pickets as union leaders seek further changes to reform proposals.

The dispute with Education Minister Jan O’Sullivan over Junior Cert reform will continue into 2016, if she implements her proposals without teacher agreement, the leader of the secondary teachers’ union warned.

The potential for division between the two second-level unions on strategy in relation to junior cycle reforms will be watched closely by the Department of Education this week.

Further strikes or mass demonstrations at the Department of Education could be staged in the next school year if the junior cycle row remains un-resolved, a union leader has warned.

New assessment methods for junior cert students are to be covered in training which Education Minister Jan O’Sullivan plans to take place next month despite an ongoing union ban on 27,000 teachers attending.

A further stalemate looks likely as talks resume today on proposals to resolve the teachers’ dispute over junior cycle reform.

A leading teacher union official says he would have no problem running another ballot of members on Education Minister Jan O’Sullivan’s revised junior cycle reform plans.

Unions are refusing to re-ballot members on revised junior cycle proposals as they force students to stay at home from 720 second-level schools today and threaten a third strike.

No resolution looks likely before Christmas in the teachers’ junior cycle reform dispute as unions plan a third strike early next year if proposed talks do not end in a resolution.

There is no resolution to the teachers’ dispute in sight as Education Minister Jan O’Sullivan insists unions make concessions on assessment before talks on junior cycle reform can resume.

More than 700 schools will close today for the first of two one-day strikes by the teacher's unions in a dispute over reforms of the Junior Cert.

The teachers’ strike, which will cause disruption to hundreds of thousands of students and parents today, looks set to spill into next year with the Government and unions entrenched.

Philip Irwin, president of the Association of Secondary Teachers Ireland, and Jan O'Sullivan, Minister for Education and Skills, debate today's strike action.

The nationwide teachers strike planned for tomorrow has been attacked by ministers.

While the second-level teacher unions are seeking to maintain State certification and external assessment, we are in favour of changes to enhance the Junior Cycle and support the introduction of new forms of assessment, as long as these assessment components are externally marked.

Bodies representing school boards and principals believe the junior cycle reform offer to unions should be enough for them to call off strikes that threaten to close 730 schools from December 2.

To resist unsound changes to the junior cycle being imposed by Government, members of the Association of Secondary Teachers of Ireland (ASTI) and the Teachers Union of Ireland (TUI) have voted overwhelmingly for industrial action.

Teachers say there are wider issues than who mark students behind their opposition to the replacement of the Junior Certificate with a new qualification.

An €88m investment will see 1,700 more teachers and special needs assistants employed in schools next year as the Government tries to keep pace with record pupil increases.

The 17,000 members of the country’s largest second-level teaching union have threatened a campaign of strikes over plans to have members assess their own pupils as part of the new Junior Cycle student award.

World Teachers’ Day has just passed and to mark the occasion we, the leaders of all the teachers’ and lecturers’ unions in Ireland and Great Britain would like to pose three questions:

All three groups representing second-level schools say they support delays to some assessment by teachers of their junior cycle students — to help resolve an ongoing dispute.

A jump in the number of students doing an oral Irish test for the Junior Certificate highlights the need to resolve a teachers’ dispute over junior cycle assessment, a principals’ leader has claimed.

Making the move to secondary school can be a big adjustment. Áilín Quinlan gets some advice on how parents can make the transition easier.

Elected officers of the Association of Secondary Teachers Ireland are to investigate their general secretary’s claim that he was bullied and had a death threat made against him on a website used by some of the union’s members.

The possible withdrawal from teaching of English in their row with Education Minister Ruairi Quinn over the replacement of the Junior Certificate may be put to ASTI members in the autumn.

Teachers decided they would prefer some inspections of their work to continue unannounced than to have the worry of a week’s notice that some of their colleagues were proposing.

ALMOST two-thirds of second-level teachers claim to have been bullied in their schools, and the problem is getting worse, the ASTI conference heard yesterday.

ONE of the country’s largest public service unions has called for the renegotiation of the national pay agreement to make up for losses to rising inflation.