Teacher decisions ‘not political’

THE decisions on which schools keep some of their language support teachers for newcomer children will not be political, Education Minister Batt O’Keeffe insisted last night despite accusations of a U-turn on how staff will be allocated.

The Irish National Teachers’ Organisation said Mr O’Keeffe had made a double U-turn after he told RTÉ News yesterday he would issue a letter to all schools that would “lay down clearly the parameters within which additional teachers will be allocated”, and later saying that the letter would explain the changes.

It is understood his department will not set any criteria on the number of such pupils which must be enrolled for any exemption from the limit for all schools of two language support teachers, announced in the budget last October.

A spokesperson said many schools with dozens of children whose first language is not English will have applications to keep staff dealt with on a case-by-case basis. “I don’t believe there would be a case where the minister would have to sign off on allocations for individual schools.”

He said the circumstances of any school seeking extra language support staff would be considered, including enrolment patterns. He also repeated the minister’s earlier assertion there would be no political interference.

But INTO general secretary John Carr said teacher allocations should be based on an open and transparent formula. “It will take more than an assurance from Mr O’Keeffe to convince teachers that there will be no politics on the process.”

The restriction to two language support teachers per school, which was only lifted by the department in 2007, is expected to lead to the axing of 500 posts at about 400 schools if there aren’t any extra allocations.