Students to wait for news of reforms

Students at half of the country’s second-level schools will probably have to wait until early 2016 to know if they will undergo new school-based assessments in the spring.

It depends on whether their teachers will begin work on a reformed junior cycle to which staff of other schools have already signed up. However, the Association of Secondary Teachers Ireland (ASTI) would almost certainly need another vote from its 17,000 members in order to implement the major reform programme.

ASTI members represent staff of around half all 720 second-level schools and work alongside Teachers’ Union of Ireland (TUI) colleagues at up to 100 others. The ASTI leadership has given schools and local branches a month to let their union know what their main concerns are.