Job of principal ‘untenable due to never-ending workload’

The job of primary school principal is becoming increasingly untenable due to added responsibilities and a “never-ending workload”.

More than 800 delegates attending the INTO annual congress in Kilkenny unanimously passed a motion calling for the establishment of a working group to examine the responsibilities, rights, and workloads of principal teachers. It wants the group to report back on its findings within a year.

Speaking in support of the motion, Emma Dineen, the newly elected vice-president and principal of Cloghroe National School in Cork, said the job of school principal had become untenable.

Ms Dineen said the remuneration was simply not worth it due to the never-ending workload and said the Department of Education needed to realise the professional and human cost of this for principals.

“What is so stressful is the constant reacting to a myriad of situations in the life of a teacher who was trained to teach, wants to teach, but is often not allowed to teach,” she said.

Luke Kilcoyne, from Donegal and a member of the union’s principals and deputy principals committee, said free time from classroom duties was introduced for teaching principals in 2000 but has not been increased since 2002.

“Since 2002, there has been no increase in the number of release days. This might be tolerable if there had been no increase in the workload of school leaders. They are being relentlessly distracted from their core teaching duties and from their leadership role,” he said.

Dublin delegate Valerie Monaghan described the Department of Education as being a bit like the health service — “very hard to get into but a good service when you can finally access it”.

The motion called for the proposed working group to address the management and administration of primary schools, the implementation of the primary school curriculum, the development of positive relationships, the provision of support services, and ongoing professional development for school leaders.

The motion also demanded the lifting of the moratorium on middle management posts in schools to facilitate the sharing of workload.