Dear Sir... Readers' Views (15/06/16)
I’m writing concerning a recent newspaper report on students with Irish exemptions taking additional languages. This article and subsequent media commentary was quite misleading and hurtful to students with Irish exemptions. One of our members [of the Dyslexia Association of Ireland] said “the accusation that my daughter is cheating the system just to avoid Irish was very hurtful and shows such a lack of understanding towards children who are struggling with a learning disability”.
Exemption from Irish is not simply a matter of getting a recommendation from a psychologist, as has been implied in recent media commentary. In the case of students with dyslexia, only those with significantly poor literacy skills (in the bottom 10% for their age) qualify for an Irish exemption. While there may always be some who try to play the system, the criteria to get an Irish exemption on the grounds of dyslexia are very stringent. Because foreign languages are optional no exemption procedure exists at second level.
The data in fact shows that only a minority of students with Irish exemptions take other languages, and yet there are many genuine reasons why this may be the case.
We must all be reasonable and measured when reviewing this type of data and should consider the valid and genuine explanatory reasons underlying raw data. Most importantly we need to remember that we are talking about individual students who have learning difficulties which place them under great stress and pressure each day, and especially in exams.
Dyslexia is a specific learning difficulty affecting the acquisition of fluent and accurate reading and spelling skills. Students with dyslexia need additional time and learning support in order to build their literacy skills in their primary language. However, some students with dyslexia have difficulties to such a degree that it is impractical and unfair to require that they continue to struggle with a second language. It is important to note that the majority of students with dyslexia are not exempt from Irish and some complete their schooling through Irish in Gaelscoileanna.
To succeed at learning a second language, one must first have reasonable competence in one’s first language. This does not mean however that learning a second language is not possible at a later stage. Due to the additional support provided in primary level and which parents provide outside of school, some children who are exempt from Irish at age eight or nine may become competent enough in their first language to enable them to take on another language when they enter second level.
The issue of subject options at second level is a significant factor. If a student has an exemption from Irish, and is considering dropping a third language as well, their school may well not offer alternative subjects during those times. That student would be down to five subjects and hugely disadvantaged if they dropped the foreign language; some students therefore have no option but to continue with a foreign language. This will impact most on students who have a late diagnosis of dyslexia during senior cycle.
The complexity of a language is also a major issue. The more transparent an orthography is, the easier that language is to learn. English and Irish are both considered to have complex, deep orthographies with many irregularities. In contrast Spanish, Italian and German have more transparent orthographies and are easier to learn.
Reasonable accommodations (such as language exemptions, accommodations in examinations and the provision of appropriate intensive interventions) are provided on the basis that they attempt to level the playing field and do not confer any unfair advantage.
We must also not overlook how disadvantaged students with dyslexia are in all exam situations. The recent high profile cases where students have had to fight in the courts to get reasonable accommodations in exams shows that the education and exam system in Ireland is far from easy for people with specific learning difficulties.
What is to be done if the UN comments does not wake up the Taoiseach and his slow-moving Dáil allies to the urgent need to repeal the 8th Amendment and to the fact that batting the issue off to a further assembly will impact cruelly on many women in the interim?
Would compensation applications from every woman affected by the amendment to date do the trick?
It took years of lobbying and a finding against Ireland at the UN Committee Against Torture to get Mr Kenny moving on the Magdalene women’s cases. Is he going to step up and get rid of this anti-woman constitutional provision or will Irish women have to go that route again?
As a man I have felt for a long time that the under-representation of women in the decision making forums of what are supposed to be representative democracies to be one of the major faults of democratic rule worldwide.
I think that marginalising the talents, perspectives and interests of such an important and vital majority is not in anyone’s interest.
I am, therefore, totally at a loss when I see Hillary Clinton described in what is supposed to be rational political discourse as a ‘dinosaur’, ‘tarnished’, ‘crooked’ and a ‘feminist nazi’ and these descriptions are unchallenged. I cannot understand why her second attempt to become the first woman to be the most powerful politician in the world is being met with so much opposition — especially from women.
I am even more at a loss when I see the arrogance-will-get-you-everywhere attitude of Donald Trump, her Republican opponent, being praised by commentators.
Emphasising the point is the fact that Trump — a near totalitarian right winger — is described by a learned professor in an article in The New York Times as ‘echoing Europe in the 1930s’.
Hillary Clinton is not without fault but she is an experienced and capable politician representing the mainstream, democratic centre which has kept totalitarian extremes at bay since the Second World War. She is also a part of the majority of the population which has been politically marginalised for centuries.
If Hillary Clinton as representing mainstream democracy, and as a member of the majority of the population that are women, does not become the next president of the US when all she has opposing her is Donald Trump — a representative of the arrogant, patriarchal and near totalitarian right — one would worry for the future of democracy.
Michael Barron claims denominational schools ‘are legally entitled to refuse to admit children from different faiths or none’ (Irish Examiner, Analysis, June 9). He fails to mention that they can only do so when the school is oversubscribed.
We have more than 3,000 primary schools in this country; only a few dozen have to turn away applicants because of a lack of places.
Changing admissions policies will only change the reasons why children are turned away in those particular schools.
What is needed to tackle the problem is more places where they are needed. Were that done then no child need ever be refused a place for any reason.
It is with horror that i read Dr Florence Craven’s letter (Irish Examiner, June 7) with the first line reading ‘don’t waste money on the chronically ill’. Then adding ... We should not spend thousands of euros on medication in preserving the life of a chronically ill person.’
This is eugenics. This is calling for the selection of groups of ill people not to be medically treated. This is what Hitler did in the T4 programme in 1939. He called sick and disabled people ‘useless eaters’. They drained the state coffers. He killed them.
Isn’t this exactly what Dr Craven implies?
Then she mentions those on ‘welfare’ — “Anyone getting social welfare should not expect the State to spend any more money on them.”This is abhorrent. She almost states that those on welfare should NOT be treated medically. Thus tarnishing now, the welfare recipients. Are they now to chose between ‘welfare’ to help them live, or medication to keep them alive?
Those of us who are are ill, disabled and using state public HSE services already know and experience daily how the state view us as ‘too expensive’, not giving us the care, services or treatment. So we know, first-hand that the public purse holders already view us as ‘useless eaters’. We already feel eugenics at our back.
But it is indeed shocking to read such a blatant call for our ‘non-treatment’! It certainly makes you feel that as a sick person our irish citizenship is meaningless.
It shows how the right wing voice sweeping Europe has arrived in Ireland. It is very frightening I indeed.
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