Le Cheile B5 Cover with Spine 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 16:05 Page 1 Issue No. 9
NAPDPRINCIPALS AND DEPUTY PRINCIPALS NAPDPRINCIPALS AND DEPUTY PRINCIPALS Le Chéile Le Chéile Issue No. 9 November 2015 NAPD P ICPL AND RINCIPALS Leadership & Leaders D EPUTY P RINCIPALS Educational Environments
Le Chéile Further Education and Training
Creative Engagement is TEN!
Current Concerns
Spotlight on Leadership November 2015
Issue No. 9 November 2015 JOURNAL OF THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF PRINCIPALS AND DEPUTY PRINCIPALS Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 10:59 Page 1
NAPDPRINCIPALS AND DEPUTY PRINCIPALS Le Chéile
JOURNAL OF THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF PRINCIPALS AND DEPUTY PRINCIPALS
Issue No. 9 November 2015
A publication of NAPD 11 Wentworth, Eblana Villas, Grand Canal Street Lower, Dublin 2, Ireland. Telephone: (01) 662 7025 Fax: (01) 662 7058 Website:www.napd.ie Email: [email protected] Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 10:59 Page 2
NAPD acknowledges the support of the Teacher Education Section of An Roinn Oideachais agus Scileanna for the National Conference, 2014, and the National Symposium, 2015.
Edited by Derek West
Design by Maeve Clancy, Derek West, Mark Daniel
Photography by Dermot Carney, Derek West and Charlie McManus
Printed by CRM Design + Print, Walkinstown, Dublin 12
Disclaimer: Articles reproduced in this publication solely represent the opinions of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of NAPD. Every effort has been made to fulfil requirements with regard to reproducing copyright material. NAPD will gladly rectify any omissions at the earliest opportunity.
Cover illustrations: Front: Addresssing the school leaders, Galway, 2014. Back: Marine scene on the floor of the Blackrock Further Education Institute.
Photographs by Derek West
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NAPDPRINCIPALS AND DEPUTY PRINCIPALS Le Chéile
e Chéile means ‘together’ and this edition of the journal represents a coming together of a host of the influences that have marked the NAPD Lscene over the past year. It has been a year of diversification and travel, with important links forged across Europe – in Helsinki (Andrew Cole and Colin Campbell) Plovdiv (Maria Gaidarova and Michael Schratz) and Berlin (Christian Nitsche). Conversations and presentations from a diverse range of educational experts and leaders have yielded a rich harvest of ideas. Further coverage of these journeys appeared in the NAPD Leader Closer to home, we look at leadership style in two very different boys’ schools – the Cistercian College in Roscrea – an exclusive, fee-paying boarding school – and CBS Synge Street – a multi-cultural, inner-city secondary school. The common thread, apart from their Catholic roots, is the combination of high- mindedness and pragmatism, aspiration and competence, that makes for good school leadership. We look at the physical environment of two schools in Blackrock, Co. Dublin. Seated around the table in the board room of the BFEI (Blackrock Further Education Institute) were school principals, architects and officials of the DES. Together they examine the process of the school-building project. We look, too, at the ideal school design at Kingswood and at the specific contribution that good acoustics can make to the teaching and learning environment. Last year’s NAPD conference yielded some rich material on the theory and nature of leadership, with contributions from Professor Paul Reville, Shirley Kavanagh, Gary Ó Donnchadha and Finn Ó Murchú. Another regular event in the NAPD calendar is the Further Education and Training Conference which included four very useful papers on education and employment – by Tom Hayes, Ray Kelly, Marie Bourke and Ann Forde. This is the tenth anniversary of the establishment of Creative Engagement, the NAPD arts-in-education project. We mark the occasion with a short history of the scheme, an article from the original NAPD policy document ‘The Arts in our Schools’, a keynote address by Mairéad McGuinness delivered at the third annual exhibition at Collins Barracks and poet Theo Dorgan’s lyrical hymn of praise to the arts, which was one of the highlights of the NAPD Conference 2015 in Galway. Through the magic of TED, ten teachers share the books that changed their lives. The final section looks at some immediate topics: Seán McDonagh conducts an in-depth analysis of Leaving Certificate performances in the STEM subjects, Alan J. Kearns outlines five key principles for teachers, Betty McLaughlin makes a strong case for Guidance Counsellors and we close these pages with a reflection by NAPD Director and President of Esha, Clive Byrne. The expansion in 2012 of NAPD publications into the 48-page six-times-a-year Leader has enabled us to disseminate more instructive material, aimed specifically at principals and deputies, and to complement the work of this journal. The web-site provides a wealth of further articles and features. We hope that this service will build the competence and capacity of second-level school leaders in Ireland, now and into the future. Derek West, Editor November 2015 3 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 4
NAPDPRINCIPALS AND DEPUTY PRINCIPALS Le Chéile
Foreword
am happy welcome you to this our ninth edition of Le Chéile. This is a Ipublication which I almost have to put on “short loan” in my office since I first introduced it to a number of the teaching staff in my school some years ago. At the time some of them were studying for either Diplomas or Masters Degrees in Education Management. This little snapshot shows the appetite that exists in schools for the Le Chéile publication outside Principals and Deputy Principals. The topics covered in this edition include looking at leadership and looking at school leaders. It is invaluable to capture the thoughts, views and advice of practicing school leaders and to share them. International best practice in education and education leadership advocates that successful education systems cultivate a practice of collaboration and sharing between educators and education organisations. In the following pages you will see where the NAPD, IPPN and the Department of Education and Skills have put this model of best practice into action with the formation of the Centre for School Leadership. The collaboration and sharing of ideas required, while setting up this body, has been an enriching experience for all three partners involved. Over the past number of years in this publication the need for such a centre has been highlighted many times. We as a body of school leaders look forward to working with Mary Nihill and her team and to being active beneficiaries of the support and training it will provide.
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We are now on the cusp of what we anticipate will be significant educational reform at junior cycle level, where more active teaching, learning and assessment practices will see students become more engaged and self-directed in their learning. Is it time, then, to also to look at how our schools are designed? In Around the Table, 2015, we explore the possibilities for change in school design, through the experience of architects, principals and officials from the DES, looking at two brand-new schools. Recently, as part of my school’s involvement with Creative Engagement, we had enlisted the services of the famous Irish sculptor, Jackie McKenna, to work with both our LCA and TY students. Working in the school’s art room under the direction of Jackie and their teacher, Denise Cassidy, the students have produced the first of five life-size sculptures depicting a representative student from each year in the school. It is easy to appreciate the value of such an exercise, when you can see first-hand the joy and fulfilment these students have experienced through this project. Within the covers of this publication we mark ten years of Creative Engagement with a series of articles that articulate the essential value of the arts-in-education. This issue also examines Further Education and Training, the provision of Guidance and importance of language policies. I am sure that when you find the time to enjoy the content of this year’s publication you will find it as fascinating and as useful a resource as its predecessors. NAPD is committed to improving the quality of leadership in our school communities. It is the one organisation which seeks to promote cooperation and sharing across the different sectors in post-primary education and actively facilitates this by initiatives such as Leading for Learning Workshops. NAPD is also now working in closer co-operation with IPPN and is building strong working relationships with what we can safely say is our sister organisation. Remember that your continuing involvement at both Regional and National level and your insightful contributions to our publications are what make NAPD the successful supportive organisation which it is. Tá súil agam go bhainfaidh sibh taithneamh as na leathanaigh seo leanas, tabhar aire duit féin agus gach duine atá faoi do curaim.
Ar aghaidh le chéile!
Paul Byrne, President, NAPD November 2015
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Contents
NAPDPRINCIPALS AND DEPUTY PRINCIPALS
Leadership and Leaders Introduction 8
Roadblocks to developing the next generation of good school leaders Mary Nihill 9
What will be your legacy as a leader? Shirley Kavanagh 12
Designing 21st Century education systems Paul Reville 25
How effective principals lead change: Lessons from great school leaders Andrew Cole 38
Leading learning through professional collaboration in schools Gary Ó Donnchadha and Finn Ó Murchú 42
Quiet Revolution in the Balkans 52
Developing leaders, building networks, changing schools through system leadership Michael Schratz 56
I’ve just met a girl called Maria 60
Nelson Mandela School, Berlin Principal: Christian Nitsche 63
40,000 Sandwiches and not a single one was thrown out! 76
Makeover at the Monastery Derek West 82
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Educational Environments Dublin 8 – A photographic essay Charlie McManus 88 Around the table, 2015 – school design 95 Don’t ignore the acoustics An interview with Colin Campbell 120 Delivering Further Education and Training Introduction 123 The work of Enterprise Ireland Tom Hayes 124 Work-based learning and the new apprenticeship model Ray Kelly 130 The Expert Group on Future Skills Needs Marie Bourke 137 Developing structures for employer engagement Anne Forde 143 Ten years of Creative Engagement Introduction 145 Release from the Dungeon? Derek West 148 School leadership in the promotion of the arts 151 Creative Engagement 2015 Mairéad McGuinness 157 Experts of the imagination, artists in schools Theo Dorgan 160 Current Issues Introduction 169 Functions of the Guidance Counsellor Betty McLaughlin 170 Stem and Steam Seán McDonagh 176 The 5-C Principles for the School Community Dr. Alan J. Kearns 188 Ten teachers share the books that changed their lives TED 193 Posing questions and ideas to initiate debate Clive Byrne 195
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Examining leadership and looking at leaders
n her Presidential address to Conference this year, Mary Nihill gave an outline of ‘the daily reality’ in the Ilife of a principal. She said, “We wish to be involved in leading the learning of both our staff and students… but I can honestly say that the role of school leader has evolved into one that is hugely challenging and one that is not understood by many people, even those inside the education environment. We all acknowledge that our primary role is that of priomhoide, lead teacher, but few of us, if we’re honest, can say that we spend the major portion – or even a respectable minority – of our time in this role.” Two years ago, Mary kept a diary of her days in the school. The final entry in the sample she presented us with was as follows: “8.30pm: As I leave the school with the list of jobs from the Board meeting, on top of the pile of post that I did not open that day, I write in my diary, ‘What did I do today that could be described as Leading the learning in my school?’” Therefore, the five essays that follow may seem redundant. Each of the writers has attempted to address the theory and best practice of the school leader. Although each one is based on empirical experience, there also a grappling with the abstract concept of leadership. “A waste of time,” you might be inclined to say, “Where in the busy day of fire-fighting and crisis management can we find the time and space to reflect on the ‘abstract concept of leadership’?” Yet NAPD (in planning its conferences, selecting the presenters, arranging the programme) is insisting that this matters hugely. We must make time for it. Leadership is largely about change management, not coping with rumbustious pupils at the local shops, and, as Andrew Cole explained in Helsinki, the leader has to comprehend the purpose of change, have the capacity to picture or envision it and to be able to plan it step by step and to understand his/her role in moving it forward. This requires both intellectual capacity and the time to apply it. Mary Nihill repeated the appeal to the Minister to acknowledge the unrealistic work-load of the school leader and to see leadership, rather than management, as the key activity and there is, at least, one green shoot coming from Jan O’Sullivan, in that she has presided over the establishment of the Centre for School Leadership (CSL). Mary, in her new role as National Director of the CSL takes a realistic look at some of the challenges that face her in developing the next generation of Irish school leaders. Shirley Kavanagh has wide experience of leadership in business and finance, but what she has to say finds a resonance in the educational sphere as well. Paul Reville has researched standards-based reform and the challenges to leadership at the highest administrative level in Massachusetts. Andrew Cole has been involved in developing leadership programmes in education across the United States. Gary Ó Donnchadha and Finn Ó Murchú have facilitated a pilot scheme with a group of Cork schools in developing a form of collaborative leadership for learning. Finally there is a contribution by Michael Schratz, Professor in Education at Innsbruck University, who gave his talk at the World Education Forum conference in Plovdiv (second-largest city in Bulgaria) and focuses on the benefits of ‘system leadership’. His presentation is set in the context of education in Bulgaria and a conference that was held last June in Plovdiv. Maria Gaidarova, principal of a primary school in Plovdiv, burns with a desire to pull the education system in her country out of a conservative inertia and into the 21st century. Christian Nitschke is principal at the Nelson Mandela School in Berlin, a bi-lingual school that caters for a large and diverse school population; Brendan Feehan and Niall McVeigh are working closely as a senior management team to raise the profile and conserve the ethos of the Cistercian College at Roscrea. Michael Minnock has just completed ten years as Principal at Synge Street, a single-sex secondary school in an inner city area that teems with boys from diverse cultural, religious and linguistic backgrounds (on later pages you can enjoy Charlie McManus’s photographic essay on the immediate surroundings of the school);
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Roadblocks to developing the next generation of good school leaders Mary Nihill, National Director of the Centre for School Leadership
Most leading private organisations do things very differently. They prioritise leadership development and succession planning as two of the most critical human resource functions in their organisations. Furthermore what is clear is that transformational school leadership requires an excellent combination of skills that can only be developed through on- the-job experience, high quality training and day-to–day mentorship. If we are serious about placing our highest potential leaders in the most influential roles then we need to prioritise building a much more robust approach to developing them. While there is an acknowledgement that there are some high quality programmes and supports in place, there are deficiencies in the current continuum of supports for school leaders particularly in relation to aspiring school leaders. Current provision is fragmented and, in some Mary Nihill cases, there is a need to bridge theory and practice.
Research confirms that the quality of The decision to establish a Centre for school leadership is a key determinant of School Leadership (CSL) on a partnership school effectiveness and the achievement basis between IPPN and NAPD and the DES of good learning outcomes. It makes sense represents a new departure and presents therefore for our system to make every a unique opportunity for the development effort to identify, encourage and develop of a coherent continuum of professional talented teachers to become school development for school leaders. This leaders. Yet too often our system searches model also recognises the essential roles for school leaders only when vacancies played by the two professional occur rather than cultivating an active organisations in representing school pipeline of well-trained candidates with the leaders and promises to be a very necessary skill set to lead a school worthwhile initiative combining as it does effectively. the legitimate priorities of the DES with the 9 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 10
‘on-the ground knowledge’ of the realities school as part of their school improvement of leading schools. plan. They get to attend management meetings, parent association meetings etc. CSL is currently preparing to tender for an Given that there would be issues around Aspiring Leaders programme to facilitate competition between neighbouring those teachers who wish to improve their schools in the Irish context, the benefits of leadership potential to do so. However prospective leaders gaining a broad there are some significant roadblocks in experience outweigh the efforts needed to our current system that typically stand in make this a possibility the way of developing leaders of the future. Roadblock Number 3 – Stepping- Roadblock Number 1 – stone roles fail to develop We encourage too few high necessary leadership skills performing teachers to pursue Most schools have a variety of positional leadership roles. leadership roles that in theory should serve as stepping-stone roles. These The negative perception of the role of the include most especially Assistant Principal Principal and perhaps the desire of the and Programme Co-ordinator roles. good teacher to stay in the classroom are However the lack of any guiding standards contributing factors here. We as school that define these roles and ensure that leaders need to continue to raise they include meaningful leadership awareness amongst those deciding policy responsibilities, combined with the lack of of the essential role of the school leader in consistency across the sectors in the leading learning and that a move into allocation of time, results in a failure to principalship should in effect provide the offer teachers in these roles the incumbent with a unique opportunity to be opportunity to begin developing the involved in the learning of both staff and capabilities required of a senior school students in the school. We need to leader. Leadership responsibilities such as communicate this aspect of the role to our co-ordinating curriculum, observing and best teachers and to provide opportunities mentoring other teachers, planning of for them to lead teams and pursue school activities, research and data leadership roles outside of the formal and analysis and communicating with parents still quite restricted promotional system are seen as legitimate functions of middle currently available. Principals also need leadership structures elsewhere. Good the organisational structures that enable school leadership requires the them to spend more time mentoring development of key skills and these skills potential leaders within their schools. can only be developed through a mix of on the job experience, high quality training Roadblock Number 2 – The lack of and strong mentorship Our system needs mobility in the system reduces the to move towards a model that provides all three . opportunity to observe other leadership styles Roadblock Number 4 – A lack of a clear vision of what is a good The lack of mobility in our current system school leader in the Irish Context often means that a teacher does not get an opportunity to experience a number of leadership styles. In other jurisdictions, An important step in developing good leadership development programmes school leaders is to create a clear vision of require aspiring school leaders to do a who those leaders should be. What work placement in a school with a different qualities and skills do they need to context or from a different sector. The succeed? Matching a system’s high aspiring school leader may be involved in ambitions for student achievement to an a specific leadership task identified by the equally ambitious set of standards for the 10 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 11
capabilities expected of school leaders learning should be supported by inevitably raises the bar from the fall-back appropriate structures, resources and position of “capable administrator” or “safe processes at national, regional and local pair of hands”. It creates an elevated level. The Centre must also highlight the expectation to put in place leaders of importance of effective leadership at learning in schools. The recent school governance level, in fostering a announcement by the Minister of the culture of professional learning and development of a set of standards and engagement at all levels of school domains for school leadership as part of leadership. the next phase of School Self Evaluation is a welcome step in providing a common Roadblock Number 6 – language that will describe good practice The lack of co-ordination of in this area supports Roadblock Number 5 – The need to value Professional There is a huge need for the co-ordination of existing supports for school leaders. Development for School Leaders Quite frankly, potential school leaders can be overwhelmed with an array of groups All school leaders, including middle sometimes offering exactly the same leaders who display the potential for support. Hopefully, through a process of senior leadership roles, are entitled to genuine collaboration with other dedicated space and time for professional providers, CSL will be able to facilitate a learning and reflection on same, both at reduction in the level of this duplication the individual level and collaboratively. It while at the same time ensuring that is important that structures such as school leaders have a rich programme of sabbaticals or other forms of leave, support that represents best value for whereby school leaders engage in public monies. research, exchange programmes or other We all acknowledge that improving types of professional learning activities, learning outcomes for students requires are facilitated to enable them to grow as both high quality teaching and strategic reflective practitioners. leadership A coordinated effort by those It is critical that the Centre for School involved in developing leaders of the Leadership enables all stakeholders such future to remove some of the roadblocks as management bodies, professional outlined above would in my opinion make organisations and trustees to work an enormous contribution to developing a together to carve out a professional space pool of talented teachers ready and able to within which school leaders’ learning is take on senior leadership roles in schools valued and supported. Professional into the future.
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What will be your legacy as a leader? Shirley Kavanagh
hirley Kavanagh is a transformational Leader with experience in the Private and Public Sectors in Ireland, the UK and internationally. Her core Scompetencies include Building Leadership Capability, Facilitation, Organisation Development, Strategy Design and leading organisations through Change and Transformation. She is a Masters graduate of Trinity College Dublin and the University of Leicester, and an alumnus of Michigan Business School, the Institute of Management Development in Lausanne and Harvard Business School. Shirley began her career working for the AXA Group in a number of senior roles, both strategic and operational. In 1995 she was appointed an Executive Director to the Board, becoming the youngest and first female appointee to a subsidiary Board of this global organisation. In 2000 Shirley embarked on a consulting career, working across cultures internationally. Her client work includes organisations in the pharmaceutical, manufacturing, technology, telecoms and financial services sectors. More recently, from 2012 to 2014, she was Head of Organisation Development and Talent Management at the Central Bank of Ireland and also worked with the European Central Bank in Frankfurt. In her presentation to the 2014 conference [adapted and abbreviated here], Shirley shares her passion for leadership and developing leadership capability, focuses on what leadership means and on the concept of Leadership Legacy. 12 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 13
This [presentation] encompasses two of type of change within other organisations my great passions: one is learning and and industries, but perhaps with fewer sharing my own learning as well; the other constraints than some of the constraints passion is for leadership. My own you experience in your world. background is quite a mix of activity over Reflection is critical for a leader and I the past number of the years. I am one of guarantee that you will not get this time these people who experienced the again when you go back to the school; you recession of the 1980s and although all are unlikely to get time out to think about my lofty ambitions were to stay in the yourself. That’s really what I want you to world of academia, the economics took do now. over and it was very much about getting a job. So I am going to focus on leadership, my experience in leadership and also the I joined a company called Guardian Royal experiences of some other people. People Exchange, which afterwards merged with from different walks of life have very PMPA and then was bought over by the different leadership experiences, but one AXA group in Ireland, and I spent around of the things that I have learned is that about 15 years there. there are huge similarities, things that stay Talking to people who are in the education the same, no matter what world you work sector, it just struck me how much the in, and that the relationships and the world of education and the experience of people, change – that’s going to keep children in education has changed since happening – but there will always be the the time I was in school. With all of the need to communicate and engage people activity that goes on, we can often forget around you, in order to achieve what you just how much progress we have actually need to achieve. made. I have been speaking to kids who So, in all of the activity that surrounds you; were going into their first year in the concerns and the constraints that you secondary school, and it’s a very different have, there are many things you cannot experience that they are having to the control at the moment. I would ask you to experience that I had many years ago, and start thinking about those things that you I just think that’s fantastic. I have worked can control, because there is a great sense with young people who have come out of of gratification out of that. university education and who have joined the world of work. It is a very different environment that they are coming into, “You learn as much from with very different skills. Again, when I young people as you do from reflect on my own experience, how the some of the older people world has changed has been quite that you work with” incredible. I am also working with young people who I was lucky to start my education very I suppose will be the leaders of the future. early, entering University at 16. I started That is always very interesting because school at three [I would like to say that was you learn as much from young people as because I was a highly intelligent child, but you do from some of the older people that I don’t think so; I think it was because my you work with. birthday fell at a certain time in a certain year, which meant I was put into school!] “Reflection is critical for a But that was a great benefit for me leader to do” because I had the ‘steal’ on other people who might have been in my world and who What I want to give you is very much about might have are been trying to establish a reflective experience. I am an observer careers as well. to your world [of education] and it is extraordinary to hear the challenges that “There will always be a need you have, the amount of activity, the pace to communicate and engage of change. If it is any comfort to you there people around you” are a lot people going through the same 13 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 14
I was fortunate enough to work for a Chief and were totally committed, and with a lot Executive who was very innovative, who of hope. was young, who was prepared to take risks, and who, interestingly enough, WHAT IS LEADERSHIP? didn’t come from Ireland. He was very eager to give opportunities to the people I think it might be interesting to think around him, if they wanted to take the about what is leadership. There are opportunity. So for me a kind of perfect multiple definitions of leadership. What I storm was created because I was hugely have tried to do is find some of the simpler ambitious. I was very eager to do well in ones. my career and I was fortunate enough to work in an organisation that was prepared “Leadership is one of the most to take risks with people like myself. observed and least understood phenomena on earth” When I was about 15 years in the [Burns, 1970] organisation and in my early 30’s, I decided it was time to leave. I had Leadership is as simple as being able to achieved most of the things that I wanted identify the role models who can help you. to achieve, but there was a bit of me that That is particularly relevant to newly- was looking for something different, just appointed principals and deputy to stimulate me – that‘s just the type of principals. Your journey is only beginning person that I am, that I need that sort of but if you can find those role models and activity. support networks around you, it just can make that passage a little bit easier. So I decided to work for myself and to see what that would be like. For about 10 If you have been in a leadership position years, in Ireland, the UK, France, and for a longer time, think about what it was Luxemburg I spent a lot of time working like for you when you started off. Maybe on leadership with organisations, working you were very fortunate, that you had role on change, working with management models and people who minded you. teams who were trying to change things Equally, maybe you weren’t so fortunate within their companies. and it was left up to you to make your own way. I would say to you that now you have In 2012 I got the opportunity to join the an opportunity to help the next generation Central Bank and head up the of leaders come through, and that’s what organisational development, which was true leaders do. essentially the change-function within the bank, and to take responsibility for the “Leadership is a relationship leadership-development agenda. The between those who aspire to lead Central Bank has been described as ‘a and those who choose to follow” bruised organisation’ but there were a [Kouzes and Posner, 1990] couple of things that I took from working there – one, when you put effort into For me it is important to think about that something and align people around element of followership, to get an something and if you really engage them, understanding of what is it that people you can turn from being ‘a bruised would follow, what types of people do organisation’ into an organisation that has people follow. I mean, who would you a lot of pride in what it has done. want to be on the desert island with? Who is going to get you off the desert island? The other thing is that, coming from a So who would you want to follow? Indeed, private sector background I had do you want people to follow you? stereotypes in my mind about what it was like to work in the public sector, and those “Leadership is the art of getting myths were blown apart because I met someone else to do things you some really passionate public servants want done because they want who were very clear about the mandate to do it” that they were working towards and who [Dwight D. Eisenhower] had a great sense of what they were about 14 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 15
Very simple, but you might be able to identify with that very quickly, because that is what you do every day: try to influence the people around you.
“If your actions inspire others to learn more, to dream more, to do more and become more, you are a leader” [Quincy Adams]
Dwight D. Eisenhower This is about engaging people, so that people trust you and want to do the things that you want to do. For me there is Quincy Adams something a bit sinister in that, because when you think of leadership and of some For me this has the greatest resonance, leaders who morally cause you difficulty because I know the people that I have [be it current despots or from history] it followed have inspired me. just shows you that the power of leadership can be a negative power. So you So, what do you say about leadership? I got have to be careful with it when it’s a copy of Le Chéile in preparation for this entrusted to you. presentation. One of the most interesting pieces for me was a round table discussion “Leadership is about influence; [among school leaders in Region Two]. nothing more, nothing less” These are some quotes from that article: [John Maxwell]
WHAT YOU SAY ABOUT LEADERSHIP
“Leadership is about “It’s about being a good “Leadership having a calmness listener. You might not is about coping about you, it reassures like all you hear but your with others that you are in staff need somebody change” control” who will listen”
“It’s about being “It’s about staying “It’s about adaptable, about taking calm. Shut the door having an ability charge and about and in your office let to cope with communicating to staff, out that roar!” Pressure. students and parents” Don’t panic everyone!”
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If there is one thing that I have learned learn and the skills you need to develop over my career, it is the importance of further; because once you start getting on communicating, of taking the time out to top of things, you start to develop more do it. You won’t see the dividends confidence in your role. immediately, but over time you will, as There probably is a lot of fire-fighting in people start to trust you and trust your your world, trying to address the problem message. Then, as things might become that comes across the table today and tougher, when you have to send out some some of those problems can be very tough messages, you have people around serious, but it’s so important to carve out you, who are prepared to listen to you and a little time for yourselves, and it will really that is very important. pay dividends. So, whatever the time that It is about being a good listener. How is best for your school, your environment, many times have you talked about the your team and for yourself, find it and issues that are worrying you and felt that start working on those pieces that you nobody was listening? When you really need to work on, in terms of self- need somebody that’s in your world to development. It’s really important. listen to you, and you don’t feel that you’re actually getting that? Leadership is a life-long learning journey You are always learning and you need to ASSUMPTIONS ABOUT LEADERSHIP build your own network of support, not just in the silo of your own school but No “right” leadership style think about the people around you who I have come to the conclusion that there is are in similar size schools, and who maybe no ‘right style’ of leadership. It very much have experiences similar to yours. Build a depends on the situation that you are in. network with them, get some If you think of the people that you interact conversations going. I can guarantee you with, you know that a particular interaction that some of your problems are shared by will work with one person and that, with many other people. The power of somebody else, you have to take a conversation is enormous, just finding out completely different perspective. It’s being that there are other people, who share the able to judge those situations [in same concerns or problems and may have situational leadership] that is so found a solution, which you could use. So important. look for those networks and look for those conversations just to help you on your learning journey. Know your own strengths and limitations It is important to know your strengths, your limitations and to know what you You do not have a monopoly don’t know. If, for instance, you are on new ideas somebody that sees a world around you I’m sure you don’t expect that you do. It is that is driven technologically, and you interesting when you think about decide that this is not something you feel innovation; it can be very easy to think capable of getting really interested in, or about the big idea, the silver bullet that’s knowledgeable about, then you have to going to change everything. [When I was in find the people around you who are AXA] we created something that we called knowledgeable, those who work in your ‘the Mad House’. We asked people who teams and who use this technology. Talk might be interested to come together and to them about it, ask the questions. The spend a little time together, only about an answers to your questions are all around hour, to brainstorm and tell us what ideas you, so when you are a leader, those they come out with. We made the conversations are really important. environment comfortable for them just to Knowing your strengths is particularly let them know that what they were doing relevant to those people who are just was important and that I wanted to hear starting off as a principal or deputy what they had to say. What we did was, we principal. Understand what you need to got these ideas from people and we 16 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 17
created a bit of an event around hearing There are leaders and there are followers about those ideas. So it involved them You have to decide if you want to be one sitting in front of the board, sharing some of those people who have followers. Your of their ideas and thinking about it. Now, behaviour is very critical in all of that. it didn’t really matter about the content of those ideas; what was more important here was we were sending a message out Leadership is about engaging and to people: ‘We want to hear what you have encouraging the heart and the mind to say.’ It wasn’t about the hierarchy, it We are all emotional beings. No matter wasn’t about managers or it wasn’t about how much we don’t want to recognise senior people, it was about anybody in the that, it is a fact of life. The other thing to organisation. So whether you were only in remember is that most people want to for two weeks, three years, if you were one actually come and do a good day’s work of the admin. people as opposed to one of and go home feeling happy. Work is a the very senior managers, it didn’t matter: huge part of our lives, so it is about ‘We want to hear what you have to say.’ engaging the hearts in people as well as That might be worth reflecting on: do you the logical side, having the arguments – I ask enough from people around you for mean in a constructive sense – that we all ideas? Most critically, do you listen to what have in our work environments. comes back? So if you are going to create your own mad house, make sure that you actually do something with the contents Connecting versus Command afterwards. That particular mad house and Control programme, and that whole idea of I was visiting an organisation in the UK innovation within a traditional industry, recently and in the reception area I saw, on ran for two years. With any of these ideas- the wall, a notice saying, “Remember to generation schemes, you need to keep refer to Joe Bloggs”, i.e. don’t try to refreshing them. Two years is a good circumvent the command-and-control that timeline before you move onto something exists. Obviously the culture in that new. organisation was very much about command-and-control, getting people to “There will always be the do things in a militaristic way. What we are need to communicate and finding now - and all of research supports engage people around you, in it – that it is as much about a way of connecting with people as it is about order to achieve what you command-and-control. When you can need to achieve” really connect with people, you don’t actually have to do command-and-control, The big learning for me was the ability of because you have people behind you and people, once you engage them and ask for they want to work with you. ideas, to come up with ideas. There is no shortage of people with ideas. The thing is that you have to manage them, to listen Leaders must be clear and to take something from them that you about their imprint can actually do something with. The other Leaders must be clear about their imprint things I learned are and their legacy. When I started in the Central Bank I wrote out my leadership [i] that innovation is as much about legacy, what I was trying to do. stopping doing things as it is starting to do things and
[ii] innovation is as much about reusing Leadership is a fishbowl ideas that you can get from other Essentially leadership is a fishbowl: people and apply them in your own people look at you and they wonder what environment. It doesn’t have to be the you are doing. If you are in your office silver bullet to make a big difference. and if you are not coming out, they wonder what you are doing in there. 17 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 18
Equally they are probably wondering what Keeping in mind the low level of you are doing here [at the NAPD applications for principal roles, you are the Conference]. I feel you have an obligation, key line of sight for anybody who might when you’ve been away, to go back, get aspire to a principal role. your team together, and share some of the things you’ve been talking about. Intent is not action That’s very inclusive, it’s about making The other thing I would say to you about people feel involved. It doesn’t cost an behaviour is that it is about action, it is not awful lot except time, but the rewards about intent. So, you might think you are and the benefits that you get from that demonstrating real caring or real clarity, type of activity can be much more than but, in fact, your actions can actually you ever imagined. contradict that. So again, if you have a “I was very eager to do well conversation with somebody, if you are in a meeting with some of your people and in my career and I was you walk away from that meeting and say, fortunate enough to work in that just went completely wrong for me, and organisation that was think about why that went completely prepared to take risks with wrong; think about what you were trying to actually do within that meeting and people like myself” what were the trigger points that actually set it off in a wrong direction. Most Performance is contractual; importantly, what would you do differently the next time around? This reflective effort is personal learning is so important to leaders, and it We get paid to do a certain job and we get needs to be immediate. So, you need to paid to perform within that certain job, but take five minutes out, for yourself to say, there is also something called ‘effort’. ‘What would I have done differently now, There are people you’ve worked for and because what happened in there was not for whom you’d go that extra mile, for what I intended to happen.’ whom you’d stay that little bit later. You’d know they might be under pressure and you would be prepared to help them just Sometimes you have to go slow that bit more. That is entirely discretionary to go fast from your perspective, whether you chose Sometimes you have to go slow, in order to do that, or whether you don’t. What we to go a little bit fast. When I started off my find is leaders who are engaging with their career, one of my colleagues, who was people and who are communicating with retiring, gave me a book inscribed with and trusted by their people, find that they festina lente [hasten slowly]. I knew actually do have more discretionary effort exactly why he had given me that book. I surrounding them and people who are had been in the organisation around two willing to do more for them. You create months and the performance- that environment; it doesn’t just happen management system was kicking in, and by mistake. It’s about role models. Think people were getting their bonuses. With of the people for whom you did that bit the arrogance of youth, I was really extra bit. What was it that made you do annoyed that I hadn’t been given a that? How can you be like that person, and performance bonus, because I thought I how can you get other people to give that had done a fantastic job in the two bit extra for you? months that I had been there. My Within your world ‘performance’ is quite colleague was very wise, very calm, and different, from that of management or the he gave me this feedback before he left: private sector. Performance is about ‘I want you to remember this,’ he said, managing the good performance, as much ‘that sometimes you just have to go just as it is managing the people who need to a little bit slowly in order to get to where be developed. One of the roles of a leader you want to get to, and tick off the is finding successors, helping the people progress along the way. Sometimes it can below you to realise what your job is like. take a long time, but give yourself the 18 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 19
credit for the progress that you are the way, because it is from those mistakes actually making on that journey.’ that we learn. “If you can find those role There is a dilemma for people who are models around you and find coping with both management and leadership. I think it is very hard to the support network around separate the two; they are interwoven. I you, it just can make that know there are some managers who are passage a little bit easier” not particularly good leaders [but they actually just get the job done] and there are some leaders who are absolutely great People have to trust the messenger at leadership but not particularly good at before they will trust the message management Trust is a consequence of how you act and This dilemma is complex, but it is essentially how you deal with people, so it is essential about finding a balance and understanding in a leadership role. Do I trust people and when you really need to step into that do people trust me? Sometimes it’s to do leadership role, when everything else has to with us not wanting to delegate things, be parked for the moment. For instance, because we think it would just be better if when there is a lot of change going on, and we hold onto it. Sometimes you have to there are a lot of things disturbing or trust the process and trust that other disrupting people in your team, you have people around you might actually do that got to step into that leadership role and be job - funnily enough – even better than you very forceful about it. do it yourself. What you need to do is guide and coach the people around you. You need to decide when you need to play that leadership role and when you need to play the management role. To take one of Everything’s a theory until you try it the examples there – setting budgets, You have actually got to go out and try setting targets. The leadership here is something, and even make mistakes along about creating the context for people,
THE PRINCIPAL’S DILEMMA – LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT
Management Leadership Coping with complexity Coping with Change
Both necessary for success and must be balanced
Management Leadership Planning & Budgeting Engaging People Deciding what needs l Setting Targets l Generating a Vision to be done l Creating Action Plans l Setting Direction l Allocating Resources l Creating a Purpose & Meaning Creating networks Organising & Staffing Aligning People for people & l Allocating Responsibilities l Communicating Direction relationships that can l l get things done Timetabling Fostering Credibility Ensuring that people Controlling Motivating People l Monoriting Progress l Energising Action do what needs to be l l Encouraging Behaviour done Problem Solving l Fostering Engagement
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explaining why we are actually doing this, Maeve Carton, Finance Director of Cement or that, bringing people along and Roadstone Holdings, probably one of the answering the questions. And if you don’t few female heads of finance in any public have the answer, it’s a matter of putting quoted company globally; Pat Phelan, who your hand up and saying, ‘No, I don’t have featured as a finalist on the EY [Ernst & the answer now,’ and committing to come Young] Entrepreneur of the Year series on back with an answer, or to involve them in RTE in October 2014, and Stephanie finding the solution. Manahan, recently-appointed Chief Executive of the Central Remedial Clinic – I have called it ‘The Principal’s Dilemma’, three very different people. I made contact but it’s a dilemma that is shared by lots of with them and asked if I could have a people in other organisations as well, and conversation about leadership. Each of because we have moved into a trend of these people was eager to be involved. flatter organisations, with fewer management layers, we find that the distinctions between management and leadership are becoming blurred. I recognise that in your world, unlike the private sector, there are numerous constraints and fewer resources. So, let me take you through some other thoughts from other leaders. I talked to
“When I think of Malala Maeve Carton Yousafzai, recent co-winner of Maeve is a very gentle lady, I have to say, the Nobel Peace Prize, with her but obviously very successful in what she utter belief in the power of does. She spoke of when you go into a new education, I become conscious of role and you don’t know it all, you have to how your influence extends from find out about it then and not be afraid to look for help, because it gives you the the micro level right up to the confidence to do things. She gave the greater macro level. You are one example of presentations. She makes of the first critical parts in that some very critical presentations at the chain. Malala said, “One child, moment, and a slip from her lips could one teacher, one pen and one actually have an impact on share prices. She said she used to absolutely dread book can change the world.” presentations because she never felt There’s the living evidence of the particularly comfortable with them. But, as key role that you actually play” soon as she reached out to people and got the help that she needed, life became so much easier after that. She said, ‘It was such an easy learning piece, because the key is practice and preparation. I should have known that myself, but I needed somebody to say that to me and to give me the confidence.’ Coaching, finding people who could actually help her, was really important. So in an educational context, if you are new to your role, find the principals who have the experience and talk to them about it. People like giving advice, people like sharing their experience. Malala Yousafzai 20 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 21
WHAT IS A GOOD LEADER?
Foreword Looking
Courage Integrity Build Trust Knowing Resilient what you don’t know
Being able Engage to inspire People
The other thing she told me about was turmoil inside, it is important to stay calm, getting feedback from people. She has keep your perspective on life and realise been through the 360 Feedback, a that you will find a solution. The solution mechanism whereby feedback from your is always there; if it’s not within yourself, peer colleagues, the people who report to it is within some people around you; you and your boss, is presented to you, believe that you will find the solution. telling you how people see you as a leader. Pat Phelan was completely different. I She said she used to run down the phoned him on a rainy afternoon in corridors all the time, rushing and bustling Dublin. The line was crackly and I asked along. The feedback that she got was, him where he was. ‘I am on 28th Street in ‘Would you ever stop doing that, because New York, having a cup of coffee. The sun it is making all of us really tense. We is shining here in New York. I’m over here always think there is a panic on and it now a couple the months, and I am increases the level of concern around the absolutely loving it!’ Pat went through a place!’ She said she hadn’t even thought very bad period in his life and he came out about that as her impact. the other side of it and he built up a She spoke about ‘calm’. People want company, all about online security. That’s leaders who are assured under pressure. why he is based in New York. There is a Even though you might be absolutely in huge interest in this whole area, and big companies are interested in talking to him. I asked him what the message he would like to give. He said, ‘It’s really simple, it’s about communication. I know what’s going on with my team. I talk to them regularly. I know if somebody is having a really bad time at home and that it’s playing out into workplace, because they are just under such stress. I know about that. I also know that people pay an awful lot of lip service to the whole concept of ‘team’, and I am not prepared to do that. I Pat Phelan will work with my team, I will know my 21 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 22
team, I will know the talented people and I like this before and I know how to get over will give people opportunities.’ this.’” He works in a very dynamic and creative She went in to work the following day and environment, with a lot of innovation she had moved up a number of gears and going on. But he is absolutely crystal clear very quickly she started getting people in that he will not make the mistakes that he line and saying, ‘Look, we’re going to do made in the past; really clear about the this, we’re going to do that…’ things that are important to him, such as So I asked her, “How, in a situation like communication. this, where there is a lot of turbulence, and an organisation that needs to find pride in itself, are you going to start building that pride?” And she said, “I spend my time talking to people, being really clear and really open, so what they get from me is that there is no hidden agenda here.” Stephanie is passionate about her role. That really comes across. She is passionate about public service. And she is clear about who her clients are, who her Stephanie Manahan customers are, who her stakeholders are and she is absolutely sure of what she I went to see Stephanie in the Central wants to deliver. And she said about clarity Remedial Clinic in Clontarf, a big, “It is about being forward-looking. sprawling building. She brought me to her Sometimes when you look forward, there office and, to get there, we had to go is a whole lot of choppy water in front of through a large complex. We turned a you but you have to look over the choppy corner and all of a sudden there was this waters and look at the horizon line.” That enormous splash of colour. I said, ‘What’s is what leaders do. They don’t let the this?’ and she said, ‘That’s the playground choppy water distract them. They decide that’s been lying redundant for the past to swim, to find that strength within to do ten years. For me it was just really that swimming even though sometimes it important to do something with this can be difficult. playground, not only because there are two schools attached to the Clinic, but The other thing which I thought was because I really wanted to send out a interesting: she is going to have ‘the CEO’s message to people that things are Open Office’. Every Friday afternoon her changing.’ office is going to be open. So any of her team can actually just drop in, there is So we sat down in her office and I asked, something I want to say, something I want ‘How long have you been here in this role?’ to discuss. Again, she was saying, I don’t And she said, ‘75 days.’ On her third day, know if anybody is going to come to my she found herself sitting in front of the first Open Office. It’s possible I could be Public Accounts Committee. I asked, ‘How sitting here by myself. But it is about the did you feel in those first few weeks?’ And messages that she is sending out to she said, ‘Overwhelmed – that’s exactly people and about the desire that she has how I felt.’ to lead this organisation from a particular place to a place that is very different and, She said, “I remember going home on one indeed, performs a very important role. of those nights, not having a wink of sleep and being really worried. And then,’ she said, ‘something happened. It was just like 'Authenticity - it is about being a light bulb moment! What I did was I said, true, about living your values, ‘Hang on a second; I have been in these about people being able to trust times before. And what was it I did that got me out of this?’ It was like a light bulb you - so what you see on the tin went on. I remembered: ‘I have done stuff are the ingredients inside' 22 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 23
When I was talking to Maeve Carton we actually to go and get it done. “Going to were sitting down and we started talking the South Pole really marked the journey about our own experiences in school, it that I had been on from zero confidence to was bizarre. And we are talking about the being able to deal with it and move on. principals that we had and remembering You’ve have got to do these things in life what those principals did in our school. I because you never know what will shudder to even think how many years ago happen”. In 2010, a fall paralysed him that was for both of us. But it was from the stomach down, but, undeterred, interesting. That the legacy that was left he has worked tirelessly to through with us. We were talking about our aggressive physical therapy and robotic principals and what we got from our technology, to regain mobility. “I can look schooling. at this in two ways: I can either hope and seek out a cure or I can spend my life So what can we say about leadership now? getting on and living my life….I feel like an You know there are key words above. explorer operating on the frontiers of what There is one phrase that I have not actually is possible”. He is the subject of a used yet and it is that whole piece about documentary film, Unbreakable. being authentic and about authenticity. Again, it is not some magic formula. You I met Mark about eight years ago and we know, it is about being true. It is about were working together in a small village living your values. It is about people being outside Brighton. It was miles away from able to trust you. It is about listening to other people and you being aware of what your impact is. So what you see on the tin are the ingredients inside; that is exactly what you get. I’d like to talk about people who have inspired me and been role models for me. Such a person is Mark Pollock, the Northern Irish adventurer, the first blind man to reach the South Pole. He has influenced a lot of other people and has overcome some extraordinary barriers, demonstrating the strength of Mark Pollock humans to want to do something and SO WHAT CAN WE SAY NOW ABOUT LEADERSHIP
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anywhere and quite a difficult place to Balance and perspective find. We met up there and I said, “Gosh, l Can I look at situations from multiple you know, I am sighted and I barely got viewpoints? here. How on earth did you do it?” And he said. “It is as simple as this, Shirley, I ask l Am I open to challenge? people for help.” Not only does Mark inspire me, but he demonstrates such amazing resilience and that power to make Resilience and self-confidence it happen for yourself that is within the l Can I accept who I am in order to use grasp of everyone. my strengths to best advantage? l Do I accept my development needs and AUTHENTICITY & LEGACY work on improving? A critical factor impacting peoples’ decision to follow is your authenticity as a leader: Genuine humility l The alignment of your actions and l Do I keep my perspective? objectives with your beliefs and values l Do I truly respect and value the l The ability to be resilient and take the roles very seriously – but not yourself contribution of others? l The willingness – as much as the But, I would ask you to think about the ability- to help others to use their legacy you would like to leave as a leader. talent and capability to succeed Just write it down for yourself; you don’t l The willingness to lead with and from have to share it with anybody else, but I the heart recommend that you take it out at intervals and just check if that is what you are doing. Authentic Leaders – Leadership Legacy is how your colleagues, l Display consistency between words your staff, your partners think, feel and and deeds behave as a result of the time they spent l Demonstrate coherence in terms of working with you. It is the model you what’s expected of them create and ‘live’ for how people should react, relate and respond to one another, l Are comfortable with their styles and to problems & opportunities, to successes the actions they take & set-backs, to change & the unknown, to l Are eager to learn about themselves the next new thing and able to use that learning to Before you start to think about your legacy enhance effectiveness statement, a few hints and tips: l It is not as easy as it looks! Personal values and motivational drivers l Focus on behaviours! l What really matters to me? l This is an aspirational statement l What gives me a true sense of purpose l Be challenging and stretching in my work as a leader? l Be as clear and specific as you can but don’t seek perfection! Leadership focus and priorities l Do my commitments match my values? l Does how I spend my time and energy reflect my priorities?
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Designing 21st Century Education Systems Professor Paul Reville
aul Reville is the Francis Keppel Professor of Practice of Educational Policy and Administration at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education P(HGSE). He is the director of HGSE’s Education Redesign Lab and formerly was Secretary of Education for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts [the highest- performing US state in education]. In this article [adapted from his presentation at the 2014 NAPD Conference] he outlines strategies that led to the success and the formidable challenges still remaining in Massachusetts. He discusses the particular role of principals in the framework of standards-based reform and issues some design challenges for a 21st century system of education. 25 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 26
I am a former principal. I have the greatest change, or at least a time of opportunity respect for the work you do. When I was for change. It is a time when I hope that Secretary of Education or Chairman of the voices of the field can be heard more Board in Massachusetts, whenever I visited clearly and more distinctly in the change a great school that had great outcomes process than has typically been the case, and great results, a school that had a great at least in our country, where reform has feeling of the joy of learning for both mostly been done to the field rather than adults and students, invariably there was directed and led by the field. I think we the exceptional principal at the helm. So have got that moment, when principals the work you do is really powerful work. can raise their voices and play a leadership role in reshaping 21st century conceptions I want to share some reflections on a of education. variety of subjects. I approach this with some humility. We have some good So there are three pieces of work that I success stories to tell about Massachusetts want to share with you: One is to give you but I don’t claim to be able to solve the a snapshot of the principalship: what issues that, in your context, you are principals in the US are thinking and addressing. I am not in my USA talking about right at the moment; what environment, but I get the opportunity to are some of the dilemmas we conceive of travel around the world and talk with a lot the principalship and how, as people, we of people, and I always say, we don’t have execute those gruelling duties day-to-day. the answers, but we have a different set of Second, is to talk about Massachusetts, the experiences in the same context, with the leading State in terms of student very similar ideals for what we want to achievement and Massachusetts has achieve and I hope that we will learn from become that over the course of the past 20 one another. years of performance activity. I want to share a little of that story with you, but in I approach this primarily as an education particular, and in the spirit of the humility, policy person – those are the courses I to say, right off the bat, that we didn’t get teach at Harvard, policy and leadership – where we set out to go, in terms of school and I approach it as someone who has had reform. a great deal of experience at the intersection between research policy and So the part I most want to talk about is practice in the context of the United where we need to go in the future, and I States. have some what I call ‘Big Ideas’ about what we need to be thinking about in the I think it is a wonderful moment to be a future, and this, indeed, is what I work on principal. What we have going on is a kind at the Educational Redesign Lab at of thoughtful re-examination of the role of Harvard. the principalship and a larger, broader, thoughtful re-examination of the purpose I am talking at the policy level here, more of education, some of it arising out of than at the practice level, but there is a dissatisfaction with various reforms in tension right now between increasing which we have been engaged over the past centralisation in a country that has grown 20 years, reforms which I view for the education from the bottom up and is most part as being largely successful, but, uncomfortable with centralised power. nonetheless, blunt instruments in some Whether it’s in London or Washington DC, instances. So there is a kind of there is a great scepticism about power re-examination going on in the US right coming from a distance, so we have grown now, in terms of where we are headed in our schools from school districts forward. education and what strategies we are We have 1,400 school districts in the using to get there. United States, serving over 50 million children. But inevitably, over the course of There is a clear perception of increased the past 20 years, with the onset of value in our society: the economic value, standards-based reform, we have had social value, democratic value of more and more power becoming education. Therefore, the importance of centralised, particularly in state our field has grown, so that it is a time of government, and this has come at the 26 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 27
PRINCIPALS HAVE BEEN THRUST So there is that kind of tension INTO THIS ROLE OF THE that is going on simultaneously INSTRUCTIONAL LEADER, WITHOUT in education. NECESSARILY HAVING RECEIVED ANY TRAINING expense of local government. Federal In the past 20 years, with the advent of government recently has pitched in and standards-based reform, instruction has been part of this that. become the core business of education. It’s at the centre of a triangle between At the same time there is a growing teacher and student and curriculum. movement to grant greater and greater Moving the needle in the quality of the autonomy to schools, on the theory of instruction becomes the primary way action, that schools, principals and schools can become successful under the teachers are closest to the clients and each new accountability system. Therefore, context is distinctive and, therefore, we principals have been thrust into the ought to leave as much as possible up to role of instructional leadership, without the discretion of local people in their necessarily having received any training or professional capacity, working with their having been given any background in that own clients. So there is that kind of role. It is a substantial role that competes tension that is going on simultaneously in with the time necessary to perform the education. managerial duties. We are not in a position, at least in our environment, to MIDDLE-MANAGEMENT DILEMMA: ask for more administrators to fulfil the LOTS OF RESPONSIBILITY managerial responsibilities, so as to free (ACCOUNTABILITY), NOT ENOUGH up the principal to do nothing but instructional leadership, but to do AUTHORITY instructional leadership well in most of our There is a middle-manager dilemma that school environments would require a has been the case for the past 25 years in principal to devote almost full time to education, where principals are viewed by those responsibilities. the community, at some level, as CEOs of their schools and yet most of them reside So there is a tension there, and time is of within districts and their power is highly the essence. I have heard that you are as constrained; they don’t have the pressured, under the limited amount of prerogatives that typically CEOs have, but the time available in schools, to get these they have all the accountability that goes jobs done and to get them done well. You along with the CEO role, without sufficient also need the capacity [that is the others authority to do all aspects of the job for on your team], and the support [both which they are being held accountable. inside and outside of the school] to They have this dilemma, between the accomplish the many responsibilities that operational management role of the you are asked to have. schools, and that of instructional leadership. Up until 20-25 years ago in the US, we primarily hired principals for their WHAT IS INSTRUCTIONAL ability to control complex environments, LEADERSHIP? with lots of children, lots of adults, lots of A lot of our principals are sorting through parents and community members who had whether this is a technical question - feelings and interactions with the schools. whether I, as principal, am supposed to It was a complex managerial environment have the technical expertise to inform and and it was quite commonplace in some of develop the practice of each and every one our states that, to be a high school of my teachers. Is that realistic? Or, on the principal, you had to have been a football other hand, am I to be an adaptive leader coach, because you could control that and to organise communities of adult environment; you were the person best learning, of reconceptualising the school, suited to be in control. not just as a place where children learn, but as a place where adults are 27 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 28
continuously learning. And there is some Technology in students’ lives: How that tension in sorting those roles out. Finally, pervades the student culture that exists a variety of technical challenges, which our within our building, and where the principals have to cope with, are arising: boundaries of school and home life begin and end. Unprecedented quantities of data: Enormous new quantities of data, Student engagement: What do we do generated by our accountability and data about motivation in schools, something systems, are coming into schools without policymakers are pretty inept at doing necessarily having a lot of people at the anything about? school-site who have the capacity to Poverty: Last, but certainly not least, what analyse, work with, and strategise from do we do about the problems of poverty? that data. What do we do in our society, where there is growing inequality, to address the Teacher evaluation: There is great issues that arise in the lives of children pressure in our environment on teacher outside of school? evaluation and using data to inform teacher evaluation. MASSACHUSETTS English language learners: There is an Massachusetts embarked on a journey increasing number of English language toward education reform in the early learners in our environment. 1990s, and developed a standards-based framework of standards, assessment and Adapting technology e.g., hybrid accountability. We set high standards and learning, flipped classrooms, on-line we created high stakes for the assessments: Adapting technology, not achievement of those standards, and we only to the management of the school have had extraordinarily strong enterprise, but to the delivery of learning, performances, as this graph (opposite) of hybrid learning, flip classrooms, online our Massachusetts comprehensive assessments. assessment test demonstrates.
Early learning: Incorporating early ACHIEVEMENTS MCAS learning, spreading our schools so that We are proud of that performance and they are serving people at younger ages proud of a number of other indicators we and taking into account how much call the ‘National Report Card’, the NAEP learning children have when they come in [National Assessment of Education the front door of our primary schools. We Progress in the US]. That measures Fourth are under enormous pressure to get and Eighth Grade achievement in reading everyone to reading proficiency by and in math. Through the last four Grade 3 administrations of that test, spanning eight years, (it is administered every Applied learning: One of the explicit couple of years) Massachusetts has been goals now, by federal law, is career- first in both categories at both grade readiness for all our students. So we’re not levels. No other state has done that once; just talking about college-readiness, as we we have done it four times. Even on an once did, but talking about the applied international scale when we are measured learning and getting people ready for as a separate jurisdiction, we have been at careers. or near the top of most of those measures.
21st century skills: Encompassed in that definition is also a notion of 21st century AVERAGES CAN CONCEAL HUGE skills, that include creative thinking, GAPS communication skills, collaboration skills, On the other hand, those measures are which we are supposed to do on top of all based on averages and averages can the tasks that have already been assigned conceal huge gaps. We have those large to schools gaps. 28 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 29
Achievements MCAS
ELA – All tested grades
Mathematics – All tested grades
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DROP-OUT RATES: as All Means All, by which we meant we were going to prepare all of our students Black Males: 5.4% to be successful, and by all we meant all of the students. White Males: 1.8% That was a historically unprecedented step Hispanic Males: 6.8% for us to take as a policy matter. We didn’t fully think through the strategies that we Low-income students are 20% less would need to achieve that very ambitious likely to graduate high school on time goal. Policy makers have an easier time setting goals than they do of actually 31% are less likely to enroll in college conceptualising the practices and strategies that need to be put in place, the In fact, the gaps in Massachusetts, capacity that needs to be built to deliver between our lowest-performing and our on that goal, because heretofore in the US highest-performing students, are as wide it had been enough to educate a few as gaps anywhere in the country. So while people to a high standard so that they we are top in average performance, we are were prepared to be successful and enter at the bottom of the scale in terms of into leadership roles in our society. equality and equity in education, as the graphs [above] of MCAS tests show. You And because of our recognition that, in the will see, for example, the gap between 21st century, in order to be successful in white students and low-income students our society, all students were going to and English language learners in a variety have a modicum of knowledge and skill at of categories. Low-income students are fairly high levels to enter a high-skill, high- 20% less likely to graduate from high knowledge economy, it meant that we school on time and 31% less likely to enrol were now going to have to do for all in college. So, there are wide disparities. students what heretofore we had only done for an elite few. And that was a very These disparities speak to the issue that ambitious proposition. I would submit it I’ve mentioned. When we set out to do was the right proposition, it was the right education reform in Massachusetts, as was goal for us to attain, but it was one that the case in most of the United States, we needed deep thought, in terms of how we set out with rhetoric that defined the goal were exactly going to do it.
Gaps – MCAS Results 2013
Proficient or Higher Grade 3 Grade 5 Grade 8
English Language White: 65% White: 72% White: 84% Arts Low-Income: 34% Low-Income: 46% Low-Income: 61%
English Language Learners: 19%
Mathematics White: 73% White: 67% White: 61%
Low-Income: 49% Low-Income: 41% Low-Income: 34%
English Language Learners: 39%
Science White: 59% White: 46%
Low-Income: 30% Low-Income: 19%
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HISTORICAL ORIGINS OF REFORM Here are some of the strategies in which we engaged: l Budget Pressure/Proposition 2% l Shared Ownership in Building l Court Case Standards l Business Involvement MBAE l High Quality Assessments l Executive and Legislative Leadership l Focus on Building Educator l Grand Bargain Accountability Some of the origins of reform had to do with budget-cutting measures, recession l Strengthening Districts and a court case, in the business l Central Role of Data community taking very active leadership and a strong bipartisan effort, over a long l High Quality Charters and Other period of time, to enact education reform. Innovations But it really was generated from the business community in our context. These l Strengthened Accountability are some of the features of the education system that the business community in the l Expanded Turn-arounds 1980s looked at and found unintelligible: l Limited Attention to Time and Wrap- l How could you operate a sector around without clear goals and performance measures? l Balance on Teacher Evaluation l Without a strong human resource l Race to the Top development system? l Collaboration with Early and Higher l With such uneven rates of Education performance, with people on the frontline who felt largely unsupported? These were important strategies that enabled us to achieve those goals, and yet l With virtually no choice and we still had big challenges on the table competition in the system? [see overleaf]. The reason we have gaps is that the engine that we are working with, So we put together a strong Educational school as we know it in US, is a construct Reform Act that included these three that was built and developed in the early components: Standards, Assessment and 20th century to serve what was then a Accountability. There was a massive society that was rapidly socialising large refinancing of education and reinvestment numbers of immigrants, was rapidly by the state to build the capacity necessary building an industrial economy, based on to achieve those goals and a whole variety routine low-skill, low-knowledge jobs, and of improvements to the education system. doing it all quickly. Naturally, at that time, We had a lot of success with it, because we they adopted a factory model that had strong leadership, and because we consumed a relatively small fraction of a had clear goals that were both excellence- child’s life for a small period of time. At and equity-driven. We had high the beginning of the 20th century only expectations. We did high standards as 10% of people graduated from secondary well as high stakes simultaneously. Some schools in the US. That engine was what states did one or the other but very few did we used throughout the century, until, by both. We had a significant investment in the close, governors and business leaders building the capacity to achieve these around the country began to realise that goals, [not enough, I would argue, but this engine was just not strong enough to more than most states]. We did inclusive get us were we were going, at least at its implementation work, so we tried the do current performance capacity, circa 1990 reform with the field, not to the field. And there was a long term in-depth commitment made to it. 31 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 32
MAJOR CHALLENGES BIG IDEA # 1: l Gap Closing, Sub Groups A felicitous coincidence: l Early Literacy All Means All reflects economic interests converging with moral l Turn-arounds obligations l Career Readiness (STEM Inspiration Gap) The first Big Idea is that in this time in the US [and I suspect it’s also the case here], l Inadequate Time we have a felicitous coincidence between l Problems Associated with Poverty what moral leaders, religious leaders and idealists have been arguing for a long time I have now come to the conclusion, that (that what we should do, and what, as a schools alone can’t do the job. We have hit matter of economic self-interest, if we are the limits of school reform, as enacted in going to prosper economically, and if we the 1990s and in the first decade of the are going to thrive as a democracy in the 21st century; we have hit the limits of what future, we must do) is to educate all our we can get from the standards paradigm. children to their full potential We have taken the old engine of schooling, that one-size-fits-all factory model that we So, there is this coming together of the applied to all children irrespective of the need the educate all of our children to assets and deficits they brought into the high levels, that we have never had before, school, and we set standards; we said, and it constitutes a big opportunity. When ‘Take that engine, and get them all to the we say getting them ready for success, we same place at roughly the same time, in mean getting them ready to get and hold terms of their skills and knowledge’. And a 21st century high-skill, high-knowledge not surprisingly, it’s not getting the job job that will enable them to support done. We have strapped it with standards themselves and a family; to enable them and we have added choice and we have put to engage in active citizenship, as an all kinds of reforms on that old engine, informed citizen and an active leader, and it just isn’t getting the job done. We should they choose to be one; to enable aren’t getting to All Means All. Right goal, them to be heads of families, with all the but wrong engine; we don’t have a character-traits and values we associate powerful enough set of strategies to get with family leadership, and, finally, to there. enable them to be lifelong learners, to solve problems that we as educators can’t even conceive of today. That’s what we THE NEW ENGINE mean by All Means All and getting everybody ready for success. l Drives Achievement of All Means All l Braided Systems l Schools - Expanded, Extended and BIG IDEA # 2: Differentiated Schooling alone is Insufficient l Health and Human Services Schooling alone [six hours a day, 180 days Integrated a year in our environment, which l Out-of-School Learning Accessible constitutes roughly 20% of a child’s waking hours, while they are between the ages of So, I am going to describe what I think that the kindergarten and 12], just isn’t enough new engine needs to look like. Let me give to do it. What is the proof? More of these you Seven Big Ideas that go along with this kinds of numbers [see below]. We have thinking. tried it. We have gone all out. In the top- performing state in the US, we have done everything we could in terms of education reform, invested deeply in it, and we still haven’t gotten close to All Means All. 32 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 33
Massachusetts Fourth Graders Who Scored Below Proficient Reading Level by Family Income
Family Income 2009 2011 2013
Eligible for free/ 77% 75% 75% reduced school lunch Not eligible for 41% 37% 38% free/reduced school lunch
2013 Statewide MCAS Results: Grade 3 English Language Arts - Percentage of students at each Achievement Level
Subgroup Proficient or Higher
All Students 57%
White 65%
Low Income 34%
English Language Learner (ELL) 19%
African American/Black 33%
BIG IDEA # 3: already a deficit accumulated over the first five years of life. And we essentially gave The current system is outmoded them the same treatment from there on and hoped that they’d catch up with the We are asking the current system to do too other kids. It’s like having a hundred-yard much. We haven’t fundamentally dash where we know some people are expanded the time and the capacity of the starting 30 yards from the finish-line, institution of public education for a others are starting 50 yards from the century and yet [as you know better than finish-line. We fire the starting gun at I] we piled more and more responsibilities kindergarten; 13 years later, when they on schools to do, while at the same time graduate from high school, we act asking them to achieve world-class surprised that they don’t finish in the standards in term of students’ academic same place. But we haven’t treated them achievement, and, while we’re at it, to any differently. make them well-rounded and give them 21st century skills…. and on and on the Were we to do in health care what we are list grows. doing in education, it would look like opening a hospital and giving everybody We have taken a one-size-fits-all approach. who walks through the front door the So when I was Secretary of Education in the same treatment and the same length of Commonwealth of Massachusetts, I would stay irrespective of their ailment. You have children coming into the wouldn’t do it in medicine, but we kindergarten with one-third the vocabulary continue to do it in education. And it is not of children they were sitting next to, working. We have kids coming in to middle 33 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 34
schools, high schools, elementary schools utopia’), we need to reconceptualise what in Massachusetts from third-world it takes to deliver on that promise All countries where they have had next-to-no Means All. We need an integrated system education, and our approach for these of child development in education. We children is, immerse them in the need to prepare each and every student for mainstream, give them some support for success, but just to have a school system English language learning but all in the to do it is not enough to get there. So that same amount of time that other kids are brings me to the fourth big idea. We need getting, ask them to catch up in core a new design. subjects, keep pace with the other children There are at least three design principles in those core subjects and oh, while you that I think are critical. I don’t have the are at it, learn English. And then at the end new design (nor am I naive enough to of every year we scratch our heads and think that we’re going to jump to a new say, why do we have achievement gaps design overnight, because we’re very with English language learners? Well, why conservative about education and making wouldn’t we, under the circumstances? change in education), but to develop the So this notion that we can get there with kinds of systems for 21st century an engine, with a strategy that treats education that go beyond ‘just school’ to everybody in the same way, even though Education with a capital ‘E’, to get to All it’s efficient for us to adults to offer it that Means All, we need to think much more way, is not going to work if our goal is to broadly. get to All Means All. This system was designed for another era with another set of goals. Schools on the whole are too BIG IDEA # 5 weak in intervention to do the job we are (FIRST DESIGN PRINCIPLE): asking them to do, to overcome the disadvantages of poverty; although we We need to differentiate; know of many success stories of We need to meet each child where individuals, groups of individuals, families, [s]he is and give him/her the particular classrooms, in some instances, education and support [s]he needs schools, we are not doing it system-wide to be successful at each stage of anywhere in the US. So the intervention is development and ultimately in too weak; the macro data reminds us of college, career, citizenship and life. that every year. The first design principle is that we’re The biggest challenges that we are facing going to have to differentiate between right now, in terms of to getting All Means children coming in (as in the examples I All, are poverty, growing inequality in our gave of kindergarten students with limited society, special needs that children are vocabulary or students who are coming in bringing into school (which are getting from other countries, students who come more complex with advances in medical from backgrounds of poverty). We‘ve got science),immigration and language- to have a system that meets every child acquisition questions. where he or she is and gives that child what he or she needs in order to be successful throughout the trajectory BIG IDEA # 4: through the education system, out We need a new design: integrated through some level of post-secondary systems of child development and education and on into 21st century education employment. That’s what we need to do if we’re going to get to All Means All, and Instead of just trying to optimise the old that means an approach which engine and reform that (strap those differentiates, customises, personalises, standards on, slap on choice, do a little bit becomes much more student-centred than better here incrementally, what the author we’re currently organised to address. David Tyack has called ‘tinkering towards
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BIG IDEA # 6 unless that housing problem is taken care (SECOND DESIGN PRINCIPLE): of, some stability is restored to her life, and the toxic level of stress is removed. We need to braid systems of health, mental health and education while We’ve got to have systems that come building social and emotional together and integrate. The good news is learning and student resiliency. we’re paying for many of those social services but they aren’t organised into a We need to eliminate impediments system of delivery that makes it to students attending school and convenient for families and students to being attentive and supplying take full advantage of them. motivated effort when in school.
The data tells us the story on poverty: BIG IDEA # 7 poverty gets in the way of children being (THIRD DESIGN PRINCIPLE): successful in school. We don’t like to talk We need to increase access to about it because some of our colleagues out-of-school-time learning for say to us, well, you’re saying Demography disadvantaged students: is Destiny, and we’re saying we don’t want The ‘20% - 80% Challenge’ demography to be destiny. Demography isn’t destiny for any particular individual, Level the learning field but if you look at the statistics overall, our education system is best at reproducing The third area that we’ve got to look at, the existing social order so that, at some particularly in a society where inequality is level, demography is destiny. growing, is out-of-school enrichment. We know that affluent parents are spending We need to systematically work on eight to ten times more on out-of-school eliminating the impediments. That’s a big enrichment than poor families are. Poor part of what’s getting in the way of school families are having a harder time than ever being successful for kids who have in getting these opportunities to their substantial challenges outside of school. children. It turns out that the learning that For a long time we, as educators, have happens in the 80% of waking hours that done our best to deal with those problems are spent out of school (between the ages as they present themselves to us in school of five and eighteen) has as much to do but then largely left them to family and with achievement gaps that show up in community to deal with because, frankly, school as anything that happens in the we’ve been overloaded with the schedules, school. responsibilities and accountability that we have in education. We can’t expect a 20% solution to solve 100% of the problem: we’ve got to address We operate in silos now and each silo has the inequalities of enrichment and its own language, history, tradition, stimulating activities outside of school. So authority and resources, but we can’t how do we level the playing field and make afford that luxury any more. That’s not the those kinds of opportunities available? same thing as saying schools have to solve these problems; I’m not expecting the We’ve made great progress in education in teacher, who, on Monday morning, Massachusetts: our lowest-achieving discovers that a little girl in her classroom students are doing better than lower- has gone homeless over the weekend and achieving students anywhere else in the is sleeping in the back seat of a car, to country. Yet if our commitment was to solve that housing problem for that child. achieving All Means All, we’ve failed to get The teacher doesn’t have the expertise to there so far. All Means All is vital to the do it, even if she had the time. But I do prosperity of our society, our way of life, want her to be able to pick up the phone and our notions of democracy. We’ve got and call somebody who can address that to find a way to get there. Nothing is more challenge and deal with it with some central in my view than building an urgency, because we know that teacher is education and child-development system going to unable to reach this student with a capital ‘E’, that is broader and 35 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 36
deeper than what we’ve currently all over our country, but, taken together conceptualised as schooling. they don’t fit together – they aren’t a new plan – and we continue to operate on a I don’t have the exact model but I know system that’s 125 years old and it’s just that if we don’t build a model we will never not strong enough to do the work of the get there, we will continue to tinker. We 21st century. have lots of great reforms in education going on all over the world, and certainly
QUESTIONS FROM THE LEADERS
#1: ASSESSMENT & STANDARDS education providers, if you are at least clear on what you’re hoping they’ll achieve at a QUESTION: We have moved historically minimum. from an elitist education to universal So here’s the problem: we started with education and now we need to move to standards-based reform and we’ll measure individual education - meet the child reading and math and then let schools do where he or she is. But we also seem to whatever else they want to do, in the be locked into this idea of assessment remaining time that they have been allotted. and standards and I think there’s a Our accountability system was basically conflict. If we can get students learning saying, we want you to get all students what they really want to learn, and give proficient in reading and math, when before them the individual creativity to be it would have been acceptable to get some successful, that doesn’t fit in with a rigid students to be proficient. In order to get all assessment system - so how do you students proficient, schools had to use up bring the two together? all the extra time that they had to get all students to that level. That pushed other ANSWER: You’ve put your finger on a topics out of the curriculum because we controversy that’s very active right now in didn’t expand school time. the US. My view is that standards, assessment and the pathway of reform that Part of the notion behind standards-based we’ve been on for the past 20 years are reform was that it no longer would be about necessary but have proved insufficient. a fixed amount of time; that the standard Some of the tools of standards-based would be fixed and time would vary, but we reform have been overused. We’re doing didn’t actually do that. probably too much testing and we’re using I believe that the two aren’t mutually it for purposes for which it really wasn’t exclusive propositions. You can have high intended and which is not valid or standards for performance, but they ought scientifically reliable. For example, we have to be broad enough. In the US now we’re considered using state-wide standardised having a vigorous discussion about including test results to evaluate the performance of indicators about students’ social and teachers in classrooms. That’s a bridge too emotional wellbeing in the standards that far and it’s part of the reason there’s been we are going to measure for accountability such a reaction against standards and systems. I hope we’ll broaden our standards testing in the US. and yet at the same time be spare and economical enough, in putting those I think that in order to allow for the sort of standards out there, that we allow the creativity, personal growth and deeper freedom and the time it takes to use a student-centred learning, one can do that creative approach to learning. in a framework where there are high minimal standards. You can allow a great deal of freedom and autonomy to different sorts of
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#2: RESOURCES #3: TIME IN SCHOOL QUESTION: Would you more in favour QUESTION: Some children need more of resources being pitched directly to time in school; how do you see that in individual schools rather than national concrete terms? strategies aimed at improving things such as literacy, numeracy, access, ANSWER I run the Education Redesign Lab, school completion? and we’re trying to come up with practical models for the kinds of interventions that ANSWER This is one of the most I’m talking about. We’re just at the outset of challenging aspects politically of what we’re this work, thinking about how we are going attempting to do in Massachusetts. If the to take care of the child custodial function challenge of educating children from that we have in our education system, to backgrounds of poverty is larger than that make it feasible for families, schools, of educating affluent students to a given teachers and communities. One of the standard, then we’re going to have spend things that holds our education system in more money on poor children. The general place is that adults rely on the schools to principle here is, meet each child where he keep the children busy, so they can go to or she is and give them what they need. work. That function has to be preserved Some children are going to need more. We somehow; we’ve got to do the design work. developed an education finance system in It’s complicated; from a practical Massachusetts, where our 25% most standpoint, it’s disruptive, which is why we affluent communities are actually spending haven’t done it to date. But I don’t think we less on a per-pupil basis than our 25% can go any longer without grappling with poorest communities, so it is possible to do that. So that’s actually the Number One it. design problem I’m trying to address at the If I had money and to invest right now and Education Redesign Lab. it was limited, it would be in the very earliest I’ll make this the closing comment, which years of childhood education, especially for pertains to the larger challenge about the poorest children in our society. If we school reform. If we do it on islands or in want return on investment, that would be silos, it’s analogous to building a house the place to put the money. Having the without an architectural plan or a general money follow the student is going to be an contractor. It’s just saying to the plumber, important way to think about this. ‘You come up with the best plumbing system you can think of’, and to the roofer, ‘You come up with a great roof’, and the framer, ‘You think of a frame for the house’, the electrician, ‘You do this’, and on a given day we’ll all come together and see if it fits together! So we need a plan. And then if we get an opportunity in society to change the culture and the politics, to allow for a reconceptualised plan for how we rear and educate our children to take hold, we will have a vision for how we get there. Without that we wind up still tinkering.
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How effective principals lead change: lessons from great school leaders Andrew Cole
ndrew currently serves as Senior Consultant with the Wallace Foundation, which aims to ‘foster improvements in learning and enrichment for Adisadvantaged children and the vitality of the arts for everyone.’ He has been working on special projects with an emphasis on work with principal supervisors. He has also served as a lead reviewer for the Wallace Foundation’s National Leadership Pipeline grant program and worked with the New York City Leadership Academy as a learning community facilitator for district partnerships in advanced leadership development which primarily serves principals across the United States. Andrew serves as a reviewer for the Quality Measures process developed by Education Development Center (EDC) to assess the effectiveness of education leadership programs in and across the United States and he was Director of LEAD Fairfax - a Wallace Foundation first generation funded initiative for developing principals within the district, and, most recently, Director of Leadership Development until his retirement in 2010. He was one of the most impressive contributors to the ICP Convention in Helsinki in August 2015. This is an account of his presentation and some reflections on how his wisdom might apply to an Irish context. 38 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 39
Andrew Cole is a proficient Powerpoint we can identify with this, as the mass Man and the slides he used in Helsinki retirements in recent years [a figure of 700 gave structure and clarity to his thoughts in 7 years was quoted at the recent NAPD on effective school leadership. He started Conference] have resulted in many young on a high note, by quoting Michelangelo: and often inexperienced teachers being ‘The greater danger for most of us lies, not propelled into leadership positions with in setting our aim too high and falling minimal preparation or qualification. short, but in setting our aim too low, and The good news is that he identifies the five achieving our mark.’ This thought core competencies that are required and underpins his concept of the ‘Principal asserts that ‘good leaders can be Pipeline’, a linear process that works developed’. through four main stages – the establishment of leader standards, high- quality preparation programmes for Effective principals – aspiring leaders, selecting hiring of l Shape a transformational vision of principals and the follow-up of evaluation academic success for all students and on-the-job support. l Create a hospitable climate For him, this is the foundation for ‘school improvement change efforts’ and the l Manage people, data and processes ‘collaborative change process’, two major l Improve instruction by leading the action that confront Irish school leaders in professional learning community this time of reform, innovation and change. Andrew Cole’s work has been to l Cultivate leadership in others create a systematic approach to this challenge. In support of the feasibility of ‘developing’ leaders, he quotes Preparing School He quoted Jody Spiro, author of Leading Leaders for a Changing World [Linda Change Step-by-Step: Darling-Hammond, et al, Stanford ‘To achieve a sustainable strategy, the University, 2007], which claims that leader must be clear and intentional about graduates of effective programmes are the change process, specific about the better prepared, are able to perform better goals, open to better strategies to achieve in high-needs schools and are twice as the goals – and must continuously likely to become principals. In terms of the reassess al aspects of the change process Irish system, this bolsters the concept of a as the work proceeds. If the change is well Centre for School Leadership and the led, the results should make additional potential is has to effect significant changes necessary – indeed, you will reach change. a series of destinations that lead to further Cole drove the point home by showing a destinations.’ fascinating series of short videos that He goes on to assert that principals are the demonstrate the key competencies. They key to retaining good teachers. This is can be accessed on – based on an assumption of autonomy on http://www.wallacefoundation.org/ view- the part of the principal – the right to hire latest-news/ events-and-presentations/ and fire and to have ‘quality administrative Pages/Schol-Leadership-in-Action- support’, which in turn is one of the main Principals-Practices.aspx incentives for teachers to stay in a school. The Center for Creative Leadership If that is a norm in the US, it is a pipe- [www.ccl.org] – quoted by Cole – lists three dream on this side of the Atlantic! key components for development – However, it does point the direction in Support [creating safety for the risk-taking which the reforms of our leadership and providing the resources necessary for structures might go. success], Assessment [understanding He talks about a ‘shortage of qualified strengths, developmental needs, learning principals’ and the problems styles, context etc.] and Challenge ‘superintendents [Think ETB CEOs] have in [identifying new behaviours and expected finding the ‘leaders they need’. In Ireland outcomes; risk-taking]; when they 39 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 40
converge and interact they result in a MANAGING LEADING ‘developmental experience with lasting impact’. Planning/Budgeting Vision/Direction Organising Setting Controlling Aligning people Staffing Motivating Problem-solving Inspiring Within paradigms Coping with Change Between paradigms Trust
Leading change is a strategic business. The leader must assess the readiness to change by analysing the stakeholders, by minimising resistance and by determining, in advance, the change strategy. As this is about motivation, about bringing people along, it is good strategy to ‘secure an early win’. Assessment of the situation: The leader needs to ask constantly ‘What results do I need achieve? What are the critical behaviours I need to influence? How will I motivate and enable change?’ The leader needs to determine how ready the school is for change – low readiness needs high structure; medium readiness needs moderate structure and with high readiness there is need only for a light Andrew Cole structure. The higher the readiness the more the group can take responsibility for Leadership [again from CCL] requires decisions and actions. Direction [agreement on what the Cole quotes Anais Nin: ‘We don’t see collective is trying to achieve together], things as they are; we see things as we Alignment [effective coordination and are.’ A capacity to change involves going integration of work so that it fits together] beyond this. At best it is a ‘learner- and Commitment [willingness to make the constructive exploration’ for the success of the collective a personal individual; at worst the individual is priority]. These three factors will fail if ‘overwhelmed, withdrawn and there is a lack of momentum, or purpose immobilised’! or coordination. The leader has to comprehend the purpose of change, have the capacity to picture or envision it, to be able to plan it step by step and to understand his/her ONTACTS role in moving it forward. He looks at the ying and yang of leading and managing C Further Information: and sets, side by side, the respective skills www.wallacefoundation.org that each requires: 40 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 41
Cole proposes systematic process for change:
THE EIGHT STEPS
Step Determine Before one can lead change, it your change must be clear what strategy is 1 strategy being pursued.
Step Assess We have learned the hard way readiness that members’ readiness is 2 crucial to the success of the work.
Step Analyse the Stakeholders will often see stakeholders themselves as winners or losers – 3 even after the benefits become apparent.
Step Minimise resistance We were able to determine [and increase what we needed to do to get 4 your resistance the change strategy tolerance] accepted.
Step Secure a It is so important that people see that we small, early are on the road to something – and that it 5 win isn’t going away next year – this demonstrates value and reduces resistance.
Step Engage the Collaborative key players in planning is the 6 planning antidote to Groundhog Day.
Step Scale and sustain Planning for sustainability at the the change beginning of the strategic planning 7 strategy strategy process was the most important thing we could have done.
Step Build in ongoing You need a team of people who monitoring and will continuously assess progress 8 course and share their perceptions and corrections lessons learned.
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Leading learning through Professional Collaboration in Schools:
Reflections from an NAPD Pilot Project on Peer Observation in Six Cork Schools.
This paper was the basis for a presentation made to the NAPD Conference in October 2014 by Gary Ó Donnchadha, Deputy Chief Inspector, and Finn Ó Murchú, Senior Inspector.
1. INTRODUCTION development would have focussed on This paper describes a very innovative equipping principals and deputy principals NAPD-led project that is currently under in evaluation skills relevant to their way in six Cork schools focussing on peer management role in overseeing the quality observation of learning and teaching. The of learning and teaching in the school. project is in its early stages but its Other early conversations focussed on potential, as a process that can impact instructional leadership and how this core really positively on student learning and concept could be supported within a also on the professional efficacy of school-based initiative. teachers and school leaders, is already But the project that is now evolving in the evident. The inspectorate is a support participating schools is shaping itself into partner in the project – we are not leading a much more “ground up” participative - but we provide a resource to the schools initiative involving groups of volunteer working on developing their own teachers inviting peers and members of professional collaboration around school management into their classrooms classroom observation and leading as co-professionals to co-focus on the learning. learning that is taking place. As you will hear shortly, the schools are developing the initiative in different ways suited to 1.1 ORIGINS OF THE PROJECT each individual school and teacher The proposal for a project around context. observation in classrooms was initiated by Clive Byrne on behalf of NAPD a little over two years ago with an invitation to the 1.2 THE CONTEXT FOR Inspectorate to be a supportive partner. In PROFESSIONAL COLLABORATION the early discussions it was envisaged that But before we jump into the deep end of a school-based project might possibly what is happening in the project schools focus on directly up-skilling school leaders we want to set school-based classroom in classroom observation drawing on the observation (peer observation or Inspectorate’s rubrics for observation of professional collaborative review) within learning and teaching. Such professional the wider context of professional 42 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 43
collaboration in schools. This is important considered fairly basic, administrative or because the professional environment for routine. Other teacher engagements are teachers and the nature of the part of the information exchange between collaborative culture within a school teachers that has to happen for orderly provides the unique context within which organisation of classes. A higher order of classroom observations may take place. professional collaboration involves We will look at international evidence cooperative planning and joint around professional collaboration drawing professional review relating to teaching, in particular on the reports from TALIS - student learning and assessment. Probably The OECD Teaching and Learning the deepest and potentially most International Survey (2008 and 2013). We demanding level of professional will also share with you what we are collaboration involves teachers working learning about professional collaboration together in classrooms team teaching, or through the implementation of school self- taking part in teacher professional evaluation (SSE). The outcomes of a major development involving observation of conference on SSE for teachers, school practice and giving and receiving feedback leaders and education partners which the designed to enhance learning. Department of Education and Skills hosted earlier this week 2.1 PROFESSIONAL provides rich learning about the COLLABORATION – challenges and opportunities inherent in professional collaboration RESEARCH FINDINGS (www.schoolself- evaluation.ie). The OECD Teaching and Learning International Surveys (TALIS reports 2009 We will describe what has been happening and 2014) present perspectives from in the NAPD project schools in detail and thousands of teachers and school leaders we will conclude with some implications across 19 countries. (Ireland participated arising from the initiative and some in 2008) The data show that teachers are reflections on further cooperation between much more likely to report involvement in NAPD and the Inspectorate into the future. surface level collaboration such as exchanging teaching materials than in 1.3 OUR PURPOSE more professionally complex collaboration We hope that our presentation will both within classrooms. So de-privatising stimulate reflection and discussion around classroom practice is challenging in the how professional collaboration among Irish context and in all other TALIS teachers can be further promoted in countries. schools, and also encourage you to think TALIS (2012) refers to Hord’s (1997) about the place that shared observations research that defines Professional in classrooms could have in your own Learning Communities (PLCs) as “school- school. wide communities aimed at continuous improvement of teaching practices by 2. THE CONTEXT FOR involving staff in in-depth, systematic, PROFESSIONAL COLLABORATION collaborative activities of professional IN SCHOOLS development at the school level (p. 4)”. As school principals and deputy principals These communities establish a school you are acutely aware of how your school culture that promotes student learning. In works as an organisation - a human TALIS, teachers who participated in enterprise that cannot operate without collaborative professional learning good cooperation, collaboration and activities reported being significantly more communication. You know well that your confident in their own abilities, reported own task as school leaders involves a greater self-efficacy and job satisfaction constant combination and facilitation of and better teacher-student relationships, human interactions so that successful all of which are significant predictors of learning can happen throughout your student achievement. TALIS explains that school. school principals, through the work they do and the relationships that they Some teacher collaboration can be 43 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 44
establish with teachers and students, help projects among teachers; building buy-in; to create a positive, mutually supportive and creating a whole-school purpose school climate. around improvement. One principal described a happy scene early in her SSE 2.2 PROFESSIONAL work where she bounced into the staffroom with her brand new SSE COLLABORATION THROUGH proposals only to reverse back out again SCHOOL SELF-EVALUATION very quickly reading the signs. One One very important context for principal of a community national school considering high-value pedagogical described very impressive work they have collaboration in Ireland is the current begun on Peer Observation (Professional national initiative to build school self- Collaborative Review) across the small evaluation as a powerful school-owned network of community national schools. improvement process in our system. At But building buy-in was carefully nurtured. the SSE seminar (held just prior to the However, professional collaboration 2014 Conference and attended by 270 around learning and teaching can go to teachers and principals) we took stock of the heart of school culture. The internal progress with self-evaluation across responsibility for quality, the internal primary and post-primary schools: we agency for change and the open reviewed what is going well and addressed collaborative approach represents a some of the challenges. The conference culture change for many of us – and one outcomes point to some really important that may be so significant that it will take critical success factors for effective time and support to take root. professional collaboration within SSE that can impact on student learning. The key Being pragmatic and focussing on points align very well with the work of the practice not paperwork: We learned from NAPD pilot schools involved in peer several schools that in the early stages it observation. is about sowing seeds and keeping things simple. So we need to be pragmatic and Unique Context and building on realistic in terms of how we support Strengths: The principals who addressed professional collaboration to work. A lot of the SSE conference, and many others in the good advice emerged: starting with a core audience, emphasised the importance of group in the initial stages, linking with recognising the unique context of the previous work done, keeping the focus school in addressing particular clear, being selective about our objectives, development needs through the SSE taking measured steps, not overwhelming process. John MacBeath, the keynote ourselves with classroom evidence, speaker, cautioned us up front of the need acknowledging progress, and celebrating to adapt criteria and actions to the success. Practice not paperwork was a teachers’ own situations, constraints and really strong message from the schools opportunities. He highlighted the need to and from the keynote speakers. build professional collaboration on the existing and unique strengths of the Keeping student learning as the focus of school: whether that be capitalising on our professional collaboration: There is other projects that enhanced teacher a real awareness that a core focus on professional development in the school; student learning must be at the heart of effective structures and management the work of the school, of professional systems already established; or drawing collaboration and of self-evaluation. I on the particular expertise of individual suppose this was one of the frustrations of teachers or others who could lead or school review in the past with a focus on support school improvement actions. non-core development planning rather than on outcomes for learners. Buy-in, ownership and Culture Change: The exemplars of professional New competences for staff: Achieving collaboration in SSE shared by improvement through self-evaluation practitioners demonstrated how important requires the development of new it is to foster ownership of pedagogical competences among staff and members of 44 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 45
school management: skills required to different approaches and is at different professionally collaborate, data handling points along the continuum of skills, analytical and decision making engagement, it is hoped that this project competence, skills of observation of will facilitate a sharing of learning and learning and teaching, communication resources that can be made available to all skills, project coordination, and people schools. management. Target setting for groups of Our presentation is an interpretation of learners emerged as a really challenging their story to date, and how it draws upon issue. Teachers and principals dismissed a variety of past actions and attends to a some of the current simplistic thinking variety of current and future purposes and about target setting. They warned that a possibilities. narrow focus on percentages can look deadly accurate but fail to capture the significance of the young person who 3.1 THE CONTEXT OF learns to express his or her inner thoughts INSTRUCTIONAL LEADERSHIP in a new way through a poem. The early conversations between the NAPD and the inspectorate about the pilot New competences in implementing initiative focussed on what is meant by improvements in the classroom: A test instructional leadership and in particular of the collaborative work between teachers that dimension of instructional leadership is whether or not it leads to better where the classroom is seen as a site for learning: and better learning cannot come formative learning for the adults as well as about without new or enhanced teaching the students in our schools. Such behaviours in classrooms. But our conversations are in part influenced by the conference agreed that change in teaching increasing interest in team teaching in can involve small subtle incremental some schools, which has highlighted the change over time and this has to be potential benefits that can accrue when recognised and supported. two teachers teach in the same classroom Leadership for Learning and Resilience: at the same time. The SSE conference also learned that As acknowledged earlier, the promotion of facilitating professional collaboration in school self-evaluation has seen school the context of SSE brings a considerable leaders and teachers focus more and more leadership challenge. There was a very on classroom practice, and less on simply clear recognition of the need to support awaiting the inspectorate’s evaluation of school principals and other members of such practice. Similarly, the involvement of the leadership team in schools to develop some school personnel in supporting their capacities, through formal teachers at both the initial and induction professional learning, through linking phases of their career, has heightened an schools for example through NAPD and awareness around the knowledge, skills fostering more professional networking and attitudes required to observe lessons across schools. and provide feedback in a way that is safe, developmental and relevant. 3. THE NAPD PILOT PROJECT ON Other influences on the origins of the LEADING LEARNING project included the increased research on The NAPD-led project is an example of collaborative practice and the multiple professional collaboration with a focus on benefits that can emerge for both teachers leading learning. The project involves six and their students, when professionals self-selected schools within a regional engage collectively to achieve a common division of the NAPD. Currently the goal, or at the very least undertake a inspectorate has two members who work common task. Particular closely with the project schools. The acknowledgements are due to Michael schools represent the various post-primary Fullan and Andy Hargreaves whose sectors and are located in settings best personal interest and advice have assisted described as urban, suburban and rural. the NAPD project and given momentum Although each school has adopted along the way. Schools’ own engagement 45 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 46
with educationalists such as Mike Hughes, Discussion took place on many aspects of Paul Ginnis, and Barrie Bennett also classroom practice such as classroom provided participants with an increased management, pace, differentiation, confidence and language to determine feedback, group work, consolidation, what they understood by concepts such as practice and assessment. Attention was ‘professional collaboration’ and ‘leading given to the concepts of coaching, learning’. mentoring, inspecting, and observing. The TALIS reports referred to earlier tell us As well as teacher actions, attention was that professional collaboration falls into also given to what is understood by two categories, that which happens learning, and by positive learning outside of the classroom and that which experiences for students in our involves engagement within the classrooms. Finally, time was also formally classroom. It is no surprise that devoted to examining the possibilities and collaboration outside the classroom is the pitfalls of the project as perceived by dominant model. However, for the project participants. After considerable discussion schools all roads seemed to lead to the it was agreed that the focus of the project classroom: but it was recognised at an was on leading learning and that this was early stage that such a destination best achieved through collaborative occupied a delicate space. A space which professional dialogue. The shift required framing and reframing. introduced by the project rested in the dialogue being based on teaching and 3.2 FRAMING AND REFRAMING learning observed rather than on just recounted tales of teaching and learning. THE PROJECT This NAPD-led project involved a number of preliminary meetings allowing 3.3 POSITIONS AND DISPOSITIONS: participants to examine what it was they 4 SCHOOLS AND THEIR STORIES wanted to achieve from the project. The 6 In the context of this project each teacher principals and 2 inspectors met on 3-4 and principal and indeed many students occasions in the first year. The project title have their own interpretation of events. altered as emails were shared and reasons Table 1 outlines the numbers involved and for being involved were teased out among the various practices undertaken. The and within the respective schools. Early frequency of in-class engagement is also attention to the inspectors’ involvement, noted. ensured that the role of the inspectorate As is evident from Table 1 (opposite) was clarified. In a similar vein the related schools are at different points of role of the principals/deputy principal was engagement with the project. In the other also clarified - agreeing that they could two schools were the project has stayed in not, and should not, engage as inspectors the preparatory stages, it is evident that in their own classrooms. Consideration teachers and senior management need to was given to what might be focussed on if have a shared clarity around the purpose a lesson was observed and how any of a principal or deputy being in a feedback might be handled. The skills teacher’s classroom. All schools in the required in undertaking such action were initiative are conscious of the importance also discussed. A formal session was of protocols and purposes so that arranged by the NAPD where Graham relational professional trust can be Powell provided an insight into the skills generated as well as called upon to initiate of classroom observation and the coaching and sustain the project. It is also skills required in providing feedback. recognised that each school’s story is A morning meeting of all participants was unique and of equal value to the project. arranged in May 2013 with input from the inspectorate. The 6 schools attended in Those currently in more advanced teams and ranged in personnel from 4-10 positions have adopted different members. Each school and indeed each approaches. Oak speaks of the project teacher had their own understandings, being democratic where teachers and hopes and fears in relation to the project. principals are equal team members, both 46 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 47
School Membership numbers Practices Frequency of P/DP & focus visits
Oak l 8 = principal, deputy, teachers l Reflection sheets agreed for l One observation per term l Focus: student learning, teacher feedback per member of team questioning, student voice l Note taking minimised l Team teaching, 1:1, 2:1 observation. l Equal i.e. all taught/ all observed l Protocols established
Hazel l 7 = principal, deputy, teachers l Principal and deputy observed by l 3 lessons visited by principal l Focus: The learner and the learning engaging as students. and deputy principal before experience l Protocols for observation and summer. More frequent feedback. arrangements since September 2014.
Cedar l 7 = principal, deputy, teachers l All involved in teaching (team l Stop-start-stop beginning but l Focus: Learning rather than teaching, teaching, 1:1). Principal and using subject depts. to advance a conundrum? deputy observing. the project since September l Protocol 2014
Cherry l 6 = principal, deputy and teachers l Drawing on NIPT to assist with l Recent visit by Principal and l Focus: PMEs and NQTs the role of principal and deputy Deputy Principal. as observer and provider of l Drawing on subject expertise feedback to initiate.
Table 1
as observed and observer through a range 3.4 PATTERNS, PRINCIPLES AND of interconnected pairings. POTHOLES1 Hazel has experimented with the observer To date, this project’s journey rests upon as student in that the principal or deputy a number of patterns and principles which partakes in the lesson as one of the are captured by the participants students and then gives feedback to the themselves, and which will assist in teacher. In this context the observer may avoiding most if not all potholes. Not all not have a subject expertise in the lesson patterns and principles have emerged being observed. Cedar school is from any one school and the collated list commencing to advance the programme includes: through a range of practices, with the 1. Safety: It is important that protocols principal engaging in team teaching to are co-designed and that clarity exists ‘put myself out there’ and become as to the reasoning behind the project. positioned in a vulnerable way to reassure others that the focus is on learning 2. Community: The concept of a together as teachers. community of practice or professional Cherry has drawn upon the good work learning community is beginning to involved in promoting the NIPT and emerge among participants as they Droichead. The culture of supporting ‘play’ with pedagogy in the company teachers at initial and newly qualified of their peers. stage has opened up classrooms and teachers to the reciprocal benefits of observing and being observed, of giving 1 Based on Hall, G.E. & Hord, S.M. (2014). and receiving feedback. Implementing change: Patterns, principles and potholes, (4th Ed.). Boston: Pearson. 47 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 48
3. Learning: Teachers are seen as learners by their students and students are responding positively to discussions around how they learn, when they learn best and their contribution to such learning.
4. Instructional Leader(s): Principals are recognising the opportunities that the project provides to gain an insight into “how students learn in my school”. Leadership is seen as distributed among the members of the team, and similarly, instructional practices are shared by all; with each participant a potential instructional leader. Principals and deputies don’t have to do it all.
5. Deeper / more informed conversations: Conversations among Gary Ó Donnchadha teachers are now more pedagogical in focus and more specific in content i.e. an action that assists classroom collaborative possibilities where teams management, rather than vague can co-generate meanings and conversations on classroom understandings of what it means to management. lead learning through professional collaboration. 6. Insights into learners and learning: Observations facilitate opportunities Some potholes that need to be continually to witness how students learn and avoided in the project include the notion don’t learn. Such insights allow for the of teacher appraisal or performance focus of feedback to be about the accountability, which is to miss the origins learner and not just the teacher. and potential of the project. This project is about opening minds as well as 7. Feedback: A central component of any classrooms, it involves being willing to be learning is the quality of feedback. To vulnerable and not rely on having the date feedback has focused on the ‘performance lesson’. Similarly it would positive i.e. protocols that ensure appear that the learning for principals and commentary is restricted to ‘two deputy principals can best emerge in a things I liked and one thing I will try in culture of joint discovery with teachers and my own lesson next time’. Here the students, where teachers and students can observed can take the next step and also learn. add to the conversation. The interplay between the levels of use 8. Peer coaching: Supporting each other and the transfer of learning needs to be with that which each wants to achieve, minded by participants and up-skilling in or as Bruce Joyce more recently the area of observation and practice may described it as ‘cooperative learning be best achieved by making the presence among teachers’ (2014). Such a of another adult in the room more the definition opens up endless norm than the exception. However, a possibilities for teachers who may common language and understandings wish to avail of another colleague’s associated with relational trust, presence in class. trustworthiness and safety need to be attended to at all times. Finally, all 9. You don’t have to go it alone: participants need to remain alert to “Teaching pairs” as well as “observing student achievement as the test of our pairs” opens up a range of endeavours. 48 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 49
3.5 REFLECTION ON THE PROJECT schools it is clear that a very powerful Most of us will have read the myriad of professional growth is happening in many thoughts on professional learning schools in Ireland. Individual teachers, communities, collaborative practices, motivated by their own professional values communities of practice and so much and purposes are showing the way and more. This project gives expression to school principals, despite all of the much that is written and spoken about in demands from different directions pulling the literature. In a ten year study on on them, are making time to support and leadership in three countries Leithwood et further motivate their staff to explore real al (2007) found that the best predictor of value adding collaboration at the heart of student achievement is improving the practice. I think part of the reason for the instructional practices of teachers. The successful beginnings that we have made second most powerful factor, they has to do with the recognition at system, contended is the leadership of the and at school levels, that there is not one principal in facilitating student and teacher single correct way to do professional learning. If this is the case then this collaboration, or SSE or observations in project is in the right space. If in doubt classrooms. The uniqueness of context, of just look at the closing sentence in the the team of staff, of the set of student OECD TALIS report (2014) “An needs all demand a much more flexible International Perspective on Teaching and and authentic collaboration rooted in the Learning” published this year. school’s own situation. Many of the collaborative practices Having said that there is no doubt that we mentioned in TALIS could- and should listen up to some of the critical should- be done at a school level success factors that are emerging across such as observing other teachers schools such as those in Cork which help classes and providing feedback or us to think about how we will move teaching as a team in the same class. forward in our own schools: how we clarify But these activities in particular serve our purpose for collaboration, how we a variety of purposes, such as justify the ask, the way we invite providing professional development involvement of staff and others in our for teachers in the context within community, how we support them, and which they work or offering teachers where we place responsibility in terms of another source of feedback on their managing our programme of school work. Some work needs to be done capacity building. It is also clear that by leaders to make more flexible becoming part of identifiable initiatives time tabling for team teaching, for such as SSE, NAPD Leading Learning, TL21, example, but the benefits are likely Instructional Leadership Programme, and to outweigh any burden. (p. 201-202) others can give us a clear framework and structure within which to work. The trick Congratulations to the NAPD and its is to take leadership control and to adapt, members for their work and for the delete and customise the initiatives to privilege to travel some of the road with ensure that they have a chance of success them. in our own school context.
You will appreciate how daunting and 4. CONCLUSIONS ON LEADING brave a prospect it has been for schools LEARNING THROUGH that have brought professional PROFESSIONAL COLLABORATION collaboration right into the classroom. But It has been a real privilege to engage with the teachers I met were hugely positive the school leaders and teachers involved about the experience and had learned in the NAPD project who are creating new from the mistakes made: with overly and deeper professional engagements complex observation templates and the around learning in their schools. Looking feeling that everything going on the at the learning from the project, even at classroom had to be absorbed and this early stage, and reflecting on the first understood. The Cork project is showing two years of school self-evaluation in all us that framed as a co-professional 49 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 50
conversation focusing on observation of learning under a manageable set of themes with constructive joint review about the lessons observed actually works.
The SSE guidelines (DES, 2012) very usefully deal with Professional Collaborative Review as one source of evidence about school quality that is really close to where student learning happens. Section 5.9 on p. 57 provides a staged approach to professional collaborative review of teaching and learning. This is a very useful place to go for anyone thinking about exploring with staff what we can learn from classrooms. It suggests that self-evaluation and reflection by individual Finn Ó Murchú teachers would be a good place to begin. It also sees collaborative teaching and Inspectorate is committed to helping in review as a good place to start with two any way that we can. We also hope that teachers collaboratively planning and presentations like this from NAPD, NIPT, teaching a number of lessons with Teaching Council, Inspectorate, PDST, subsequent reflection. It also suggests ETBs, Management Authorities and others that teachers may be willing to volunteer that profile the work of innovative schools to invite a colleague into their classroom will encourage you to consider pushing the as has happened in a number of the boat out in your own school to initiate schools in Cork so successfully. Clearly an observation and reflection on learning and agreed school protocol should be worked teaching in practice. There is a lot of out and a relationship based on trust and enthusiasm and really good materials out respect between the two parties is there for your consideration. Indeed the essential. The guide provides advice on sharing of experiences and emerging the development of such a protocol and resources from the six schools should other important points about the integrity prove helpful to assist other schools and confidentiality within the process. become involved in support clusters similar to the one in Cork. The National Induction Programme for Teachers and the Droichead Programme John MacBeath regularly highlights the under the Teaching Council are the two power of the collective in bringing about other very relevant national initiatives that change be that incremental or support co-professional observation of transformative. In that context the NAPD learning and teaching. As you heard one stands out as an organisation that leads of the Cork schools is rooting its peer from the front with a loud professional observation project in the work they are voice about effective leadership for dong with newly qualified teachers under learning in our system. The NAPD Droichead. The approaches the NIPT has leadership are strong advocates for the developed for mentors and NQTs in the capacity building and resources that are area of lesson observations focusing on required to make change initiatives learning within a very well-articulated sustainable. It is the Inspectorate’s hope professional framework will no doubt be a that capacity building among principals fantastic support to schools generally in and deputy principals focusing on leading the future. learning in their schools will be supported and expanded as resources permit. 4.1 SO WHERE TO NEXT? The NAPD project has only just begun to 4.2 A QUESTION FOR NAPD take root so it is at an early stage. I know It is really interesting how the NAPD that the NAPD is committed to sustaining project that is emerging appears to be the momentum in the schools and the rooted in the co-professional peer 50 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 51
observation space. This context for look forward to visiting the schools again observation within classrooms is a really to catch up on developments and to learn powerful one because of its potential to more. I hope that all of you will feel impact on the learning of teachers and encouraged by what is going on in this improved facilitation of learning for area of teacher professional collaboration children and young people. But this and that some of you not already trying context is not the only one in which out some element of peer observation will classroom observation by school consider it as a possibility for your own principals may transact. school. A question for NAPD that does arise is Congratulations to NAPD for leading on whether or not the current collaborative this at system level. We wish you peer observation initiatives are likely to continued success. address the professional development needs of principals and deputy principals REFERENCES in developing their skills of classroom observation? What about situations where Department of Education and Skills (2012). a school principal is visiting a classroom in School Self-Evaluation Guidelines for Post- the context of a teacher competence Primary Schools. Inspectorate: Dublin, Ireland. concern? In such contexts the stakes are Hall, G.E. & Hord, S.M. (2014). Implementing far higher and the engagement and change: Patterns, principles and potholes, feedback may require greater structure. How best might we support you for this (4th Ed.). Boston: Pearson. part of your role? If school principals and deputy principals have a desire to further Hord, S.M. (1997). Professional learning communities: Communities of continuous up skill in more formalised evaluation of inquiry and improvement. Southwest learning and teaching it might be very Educational Laboratory: Austin, Texas. interesting to explore what that might look like. It might, for example be interesting Leithwood, K., Day, C., Sammons, P., Harris, to facilitate joint professional training A., & Hopkins, D. (2006). Seven strong claims around classroom evaluation skills for a about successful school leadership. group of inspectors and school leaders Nottingham, England: National College of School. together. The option of inter-school as well as intra-school engagement may prove OECD (2009). Teaching and Learning beneficial. In any case the Inspectorate is International Survey (TALIS). Paris: OECD. privileged to partner with the NAPD in this area and we look forward to further co- OECD (2014). Teaching and Learning working to our mutual benefit. International Survey (TALIS). Paris: OECD. OECD (2012). Teaching Practices and 4.3 CONCLUSION Pedagogical Innovation: Evidence from TALIS. Paris: OECD I want to conclude by again acknowledging the impressive work of the schools involved in the NAPD pilot in Cork even though things are still at an early stage. I
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Quiet Revolution in the Balkans EDUCATION IN BULGARIA DOESN’T KNOW WHAT’S HIT IT! Derek West
Bulgaria l Sofia
l Plovdiv
he Black Sea marks the eastern boundary of the EU and in early June of this year I attended a remarkable conference in Bulgaria which may, in hindsight, Tmark the start of a seismic change in the education system there. In four years’ time Plovdiv, second city of Bulgaria, will be on the map as it assumes the role of European City of Culture. There’s a perfectly-preserved Roman stadium, discovered beneath a bus station in 1968; there’s a Roman theatre carved into one of Plovdiv’s seven hills, with panoramic views of city and mountains stretching towards the Black Sea; there are the narrow, winding streets of the old town, preserved along with a series of magnificent houses and churches that bear signs of the mingled cultures of the Slav, the Turk, the Orthodox Christian, the Moslem and the Jew. 52 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 53
Out from the centre, the cityscape speaks the joint signatures of Ton Duif and Maria of its more recent past, forty-four years of Gaidarova. communist rule, and, since 2007, a There then followed almost eight hours, somewhat tentative membership of the EU. over two days, of intense engagement in There are cracked pavements, bumpy discussion of key education themes, with roads and grimy tower blocks. The hotel an impressive phalanx of speakers drawn we stay in has a half-finished extension – from the higher echelons of Bulgarian a giant crane [remember those in the Tiger education. days?] looms over an idle site. The economy is waiting for a miracle and in the Apart from those of Austrian Michael meantime farms are deserted, the bright Schratz and the trio of Dutchmen [Ton, young people are fleeing westwards for a Henk and Franz] all the presentations were better life and many have no intentions of in Bulgarian, so, as well as an ear made hot returning. Green shoots are few and far by the headphones, I had a limited between. capacity to catch the finer nuances of what the ‘local’ presenters had to say. But there are important stirrings towards Nevertheless, the major themes were both making a better life for the coming apparent and universal. The conference generations of young Bulgarians and Maria was ostensibly about ‘how leadership Gaidarova sees education as the key. secures access and quality of education’ Singlehandedly, it seems, she has but that title was an inadequate hold-all for embarked on a mission to change the the concerns and aspirations in Bulgaria status quo, not only at a local level, in that emerged: Plovdiv, where she heads a remarkable primary school, but also on the broader l Leadership stage of the World Education Forum [WEF]. l Managing change – in the system, in As Ivan Panayotov, a senior education the classroom, in the running of inspector, said of her, ‘When Maria decides schools to do something, she does it!’ A chance meeting with Ton Duif [former President of l School leaders as managers ESHA, now President of WEF, and its l founding father] inspired her to convene a The culture of schools conference that would raise a new high bar l Innovative methodologies on innovation and change within a national education system that is dyed-in-the-wool l Training for leadership and largely moribund. l Putting the child at the centre of the So her first action at the conference – held learning in Plovdiv on June 4 and 5 – was to l formally, solemnly ratify the establishment The essential role of technology of the new organisation, WEF Bulgaria, with l Recruitment and retention of the best and brightest for teaching and school leadership l Networks, Partnerships – with educational agencies, employers, parents The international perspective was provided by key-note speaker, Professor Michael Schratz from the University of Innsbruck, and a lively workshop from Henk Janssen and Frans Schmidt of WEF, but the focus of Maria’s conference [there can be little doubt that it was ‘her’ conference] was to Ceremonial moment: Maria Gaidarova and Ton draw out responses from the teachers’ Duif sign WEF Bulgaria into existence union, the inspectorate, the Ministry, 53 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 54
academia, and to get some top Bulgaria, which selects and trains new practitioners to nail their innovative recruits to education. While conceding that colours to the mast. ‘nobody can predict success in the workplace’ the course promotes nine The Deputy Mayor of Plovdiv saw the EU competencies [See end of article*] that competing for the hearts and minds of will reduce the unpredictability. young Bulgaria and that a reformed education might be the way to entice them Two representatives of the Inspectorate, to stay at home. Vaska Atanasova and Ivan Panayotov, described the current educational scene in The Chairman of the Bulgarian Teachers Bulgaria, particularly in relation to an Union, Yanka Takeva, described a aging population of teachers, a large profession that was not attracting young proportion of whom have been in situ for graduates and which was blighted by more than 25 years. The Inspectorate has problems. An exhaustive union study had a key task in making education more open identified 14 major issues that were and more efficient, through the promotion affecting – mostly in a negative way – the of a new kind of leader – ‘someone who impulse towards reform. Apart from a has followers; someone who has already suspicion of management, there appeared coped; someone that maximises efforts to to be a culture that was resistant to achieve a goal; a person who interacts with change, an uneasy feeling that innovation others and engages in a professional was disruptive. conversation.’ One such person, Ivan The Deputy Minister for Education, Vanya asserted, is Maria, ‘very daring and very Kastreva, focused on management, as bold.’ opposed to leadership, as an essential part It was notable that each presenter was of the principal’s job. While there might be thanked profusely and conferred with the some overlap between the two roles [an title WEF Ambassador by Maria, which, I idea not supported by Michael Schratz], suspect, carried both a symbolic honorary Vanya seemed keen to portray the school status and an obligation upon them to head as a planner, organiser, decision- provide support and services in the maker, co-ordinator, motivator and mission for change. controller of human resources. He aligned reform with a socio-political imperative. This was a conference about the public building of alliances. Maria distributed Eleonora Lilova, a secondary-school head, praise and appreciation to all the painted a picture of an education world contributors; many of them were personal inhabited by a new style of teacher, and a friends, but I get a sense that she was also more autonomous kind of school, where manoeuvring them, as well as some of her strong leaders, prepared through training potential detractors, onto her side. and armed with new competencies, are necessary; and where the traditional The concise and clear key-note by Michael promotion route of a teacher from the Schratz placed these issues in a global classroom to the principal’s office is no context, with double effect: it gave the longer viable. More is required, as was visitors a sense of the commonality of evident in the aspirational presentations issues across borders and systems; and by Galin Tsokov and Dora Lefterova for the Bulgarian educators, who made up [University of Plovdiv]. They spoke of majority of those in attendance, it offered mentoring, inclusive education, special the parameters of an agenda for change. needs, parental attitudes, children’s rights One of the repeated mantras that emerged and well-being. Their demands were from my interview with Maria [See page positive, inclined towards good practices vv] was that of ‘we have to do better’ and and with a renewed image of the the conference programme gave both a professional teacher ‘as a leader in sense of the enormity of the task ahead society’. and of the encouraging support from many key people in the system. A part of the upskilling process was described by Metodi Terziev, head of a My main motivation in going to Plovdiv commercial foundation, Teach for had been to find out more about the World 54 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 55
Education Forum. I’d seen presentations fund-raising and - to be less flippant – by Ton Duif on a number of occasions and with a clear sense of this being a universal discussed the concept with a number of injustice that needed to be set right. people, but the precise ‘how’ of the But this idea is too big and too diffuse and, implementation of the core principle, anyway, there are lots of these projects Education for All our Children, is still far afoot. I could not see that we needed yet from clear. Ton has said that this is a long- another NGO entering the territory and, term project, twenty years or more, so at while Ton was keen to quantify the success this early stage of its existence it is quite of the project to date, it is still quite tentative. It IS about the 80 million limited. children across the globe who have no education; it is about holding UNICEF to its Maria Gaidarova made some sense of it declared aim of eradicating this by 2015 with her splendid initiative. She pared it [obviously an aim that is far from being back to its essential significance for realised] and it is about being a forum to Bulgaria. She made it a local affair with a discuss and explore ways of implementing potential global connection. A portion of the mission of WEF. those 80 million children are in Bulgaria. Both in terms of access to education and the quality of education, they are being deprived, at worst, or short-changed, at best. Her focus will be on what’s happening in her own back yard and her determination to change it for the better. She will draw support and inspiration from the global educational economy. She knows she needs allies who can offer expertise and exemplars, but who can also endorse what she is doing, often in the face of suspicion or indifference. Perhaps that goes some way to explain why the tiny The packed conference room of the Imperial Hotel, cohort of outsiders – from Holland Plovdiv [mostly], Ireland, Austria and the UK were treated with such magnificent and My first response was to think in neo- generous hospitality. We were welcome, colonial terms of the good white man but in a way, also, it was clear that we were bring succour and enlightenment to our needed. more unfortunate and disadvantaged brethren. We were going to trek into the * Lifelong learning; Emotional intelligence; hills of Tibet or across the African bush Analytical skills; Internal motivation and with resources [both human and material], attitude; Attitude to minorities; Organisational collected through a massive volunteerism, abilities; Capacity to work in a challenging a global network of schools and students environment; Communication skills; inspired with charitable zeal, energetic Leadership potential
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Developing Leaders, Building Networks, Changing Schools through System Leadership Michael Schratz
Michael Schratz
EF Bulgaria was in acute need of an expert to contextualise what they were setting out to do on June 4, and Michael Schratz, Professor in Education Wat Innsbruck University, provided a key-note presentation that achieved just that. He outlined a learned, global context, bringing the accumulated wisdom that gives the impulse to the specific innovation that Maria desires. In less than half-an-hour, he gave an articulate outline of the themes of change, leadership, networks and system leadership, which drew precisely and concisely on a staggering range of educational thinkers. “We normally deal with the visible; changes happen through what’s not visible’. He quoted John Hattie [author of Making Learning Visible] in identifying the conundrum of education systems that are based in a complacent comfort-zone of ‘the visible’ and are very wary of venturing towards ‘what’s not visible’. Such is the situation in Bulgaria, where you have the pull of the revolutionary innovator [Maria] and the resistance of a conservative establishment [‘if it works, why fix it?’] 56 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:00 Page 57
Schratz identified the tensions that exist the work of realising the future can between past, present and future. The past commence. Schatz concurs – this process is knowable, unchangeable, reassuring, is essential for change. Maria concurs. but it has to be subordinate to the ‘here Confronting the future in this way is a and now’ which is going to have the major philosophical issue – What is myself? What influence in shaping the future, ‘who you is my work? What is learning? It entails the will be tomorrow’. choice between reproducing the past and transforming the future. The challenge for educational leaders is to mediate between the school as ‘a What is needed to make the move towards sanctuary of reproduction’ and school as transformation? Schratz identifies three ‘a place of the transformation of society.’ factors:
Later in his presentation Michael Qualification [equipping people with expounded on a diagram, devised by knowledge, skills and dispositions]; this is Scharmer, 2009. It’s in the shape of a easier said than done as ‘the kind of things parabola, that starts with ‘the script of the that are easy to test and teach are past’, reaches a nadir with ‘presencing’ [an disappearing the fastest; open process of self-questioning] and then sweeps upwards and onwards towards an Socialisation [the insertion of ‘newcom- emerging future. ers’ – be they children or people who move from country to another – into existing Essentially this is about letting go of the orders; secure, familiar routines and finding ways of seeing things with fresh eyes – with an Subjectification – becoming the person open mind, an open heart and an open will one can potentially be, through ‘agency’ The big impediment is that ‘people [the personal force an individual can bring appreciate what they know, rather than to bear of a situation] and human freedom. going with an unknown future…. Too often we remain stuck in old patterns of The challenge for the leader is to balance seeing and acting.’ the conflicts and synergies that emerge from the interaction of these three factors Presencing, as Scharmer calls it, is the and to make situative judgements about stage where past and present connect and what is educationally desirable. 57 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:01 Page 58
In the context of Bulgaria, here is a country they will interact [tho’ in the two days that has undergone enormous change in there wasn’t much time for that], if not the past quarter-century [sound familiar?] now, in the future. The seeds of a new but which has an education system that is school culture have been planted, but for unresponsive to that change. Ton Duif had them to grow in each school there needs spoken earlier of the key moment of to be a culture of excellent instruction, a awakening in the life of an individual. culture of trust and shared norms and Bulgaria is at a point of awakening, but values [Schratz quoting Seashore some of the guardians of young people’s Louis/Wahlstrom: Principals as Cultural learning and development are ‘sleeping on Leaders Kappanmagazine, 52/2011, 54f]. the job’. To illustrate this Michael Schratz shows a The change, he asserts, will come through slide of a host of sky-divers, holding hands system leadership. Leaders can and do with each other to form a giant human shape the culture of a school, but culture- circle in the sky, as a metaphor for the change requires a lot more than one collaboration and trust that is necessary. person or a small team. This would appear to be where Maria is at. She is that one He then proceeded to examine leadership person; she has that ‘small team’: the in close detail. It’s hard to define but, ‘like conference has been the attempt to beauty, you know it when you see it’ enlarge the mission into a more inclusive (Warren Bennis); it’s ‘the art of getting task. people to do what they don’t want to do and have them enjoy the experience’ ‘We can only build through the people we (Major Gen. Lewis MacKenzie; it’s ‘the work with’, so Schratz puts forward the capacity of a human community to shape concept of the Professional Learning its future and specifically to sustain the Community, citing the Innsbruck significant processes of change required experience of bringing together over 200 to do so’ (Peter Senge et al) educators, from across the spectrum, to think and work collaboratively. He is very For teacher it’s multi-tasking, with different clear that ‘if you are on your own in your roles overlapping – the teacher works IN the school, you don’t have an effect on the system, the teacher team-member works whole system.’ Maria has built a WITH the system and the teacher-leader microcosm for change within the walls of works ON the system. They have to be her own school, but she has realised the skilled in switching contexts. They function need for feeling ‘it’s not just you’. The simultaneously as role models, as forum [in this case the conference] is in ambassadors, as teachers and as place; Maria has brought a mixed and professionals. These are the four significant ‘cast’ together; the hope is that components that make up the teacher-
Collaboration and trust
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Relationship between Leadership Management l Discovering new possibilities with the and Leadership l Creative capacity to realise them or make them realised problem l Creating a new paradigm solving l Working on the system l Working within a l Enticing and empowering staff to achieve paradigm top performances l Working within the system l Dignity of human l Getting “things” and people into motion, being (trust) methods, techniques, control l Attitude of l The human being as support (aid) “serving” l Attitude of “doing”
The Ying and the Yang of Management Leadership and Management.
leader, in both formal and informal roles. For Hattie, ‘if the teacher’s lens can be The process involves constant self- changed to seeing learning through the questioning and entry into unknown eyes of the students, this would be an territory: You have to be confronted with excellent beginning…’ We have become new challenges in order to be able to grow.’ complacent about the nature of learning, relying on assumptions that are Schatz then moved to distinguish between threadbare, linking it too closely to the leadership and management. He produced facile task of teaching to the test. Schatz a ‘Ying-Yang’ graphic to highlight the quotes Heinz von Forster: ‘Learning is the contrasts between the two. It was notable most personal thing in the world. It is as that the administrative load of school unique as a face or a fingerprint. Even principals in Bulgaria is considerable, more individual than one’s love life.’ [sounds familiar?] creating yet another tension between the two functions they He cites no less an authority than Dennis have to fulfil. the Menace [US version] who said, The trouble with learnin’ is that it’s always Under the mantra of ‘Be mindful of the about somethin’ that you don’t know! learning’ Schatz then proceeded to the Perhaps, he’s hinting at the fact that we’ve demolition of some of the myths that kept the things we don’t know at bay and surround the omnipotence of the old-style relied on the easy and the familiar. He teacher. With John Hattie at his side he saw wants to see the student and learning to the need to break ‘the myth that learning rise; the teacher and the teacher to is the result of teaching’, that ‘what is become subordinate. taught is what is learned’. These are the comfort blankets of traditional teaching. That’s a tall order for Michael Schatz and Hattie says that change ‘requires openness for Maria Gaydarova and for us. We may be … and a willingness to seek a better some distance from the final view alternative to what the teacher is currently expressed, that of Gaston Bachelard: ‘Even doing… Adopting any innovations means a minor event in the life of a child is an discontinuing the use of familiar learning’. event of that child’s world and thus a [Sounds familiar?] This is certainly what is world event.’ at the root of the malaise in the Bulgarian education system. 59 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:01 Page 60
I’ve just met a girl called Maria The Story of an Astonishing Leader
Maria Gaidarova 086
aria Gaidarova is diminutive, soft-spoken, self-effacing, with a kind of ‘butter wouldn’t melt’ expression on her face, but she is acutely political Mand everything she does so determinedly has a purpose. “My belief that education is most important for our children. I’d like our children to have a successful life here in our country and to support our economy, not to go abroad.” There are multiple challenges to the present system, as she explained at the outset of the conference – aggression, poor motivation, external assessments, results not growing, inputs not good enough, education not in tune with the needs of today, school heads buried in administrative activities, high drop-out levels and emigration. A lot of young people are leaving Bulgaria. She agrees that it is a ‘brain drain’ – ‘absolutely’ – and the additional tragic element is that ‘they don’t like to come back.’ 60 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:01 Page 61
From what Maria says, it would appear that She is deeply preoccupied with the notion Bulgaria, freed from communist of change; to change the point of view of domination in 1989, has not yet managed her colleagues. ‘It is difficult to do; it takes to benefit sufficiently from EU much more time, I think.’ She worked membership, to develop the conditions intensively at this initiative – she wrote for the professional development of its personally to each of the delegates, young people, or to shake off closed-mind, explaining her aims, her motivation, her conservative attitudes that oblige many mission. She has confidence in this people to continue ‘living in the wrong approach: ‘I am honest and open, and then way.’ they come.’ The approach seemed to work: the conference was well attended, This is reflected in an education system with participants from more than 40 towns that is suspicious of innovation, around Bulgaria, and well received. She collaborative working, team-work, new was particularly attentive to the visitors, ideas and open mindedness. These are the anxious to ensure that we enjoyed our stay positive values that Maria has tried to in Plovdiv. encourage in the Rayna Knyaginya School [830 pupils, ranging in age from 7 – 14; So organising a conference can only be a 70 staff members] that she has headed beginning. I want to know what comes since 1998. The suspicion is exemplified next. Maria has her answers ready. She will by the number of inspections the school rest, she will analyse ‘what happened and has undergone [14] in the last year! She is how happened’, she will see how many immensely proud of her school. ‘It is the new partnerships have emerged and she best one in Plovdiv’. It is innovative, the will proceed with a series of follow-up teachers work as a team. I ask her if she activities, always thinking positively. She had a ‘say’ in the appointments. She will organise conferences, promote the laughs gently. Did she get all the ones she ‘professional conversation through round wanted? ‘Uh… huh…’ and a giggle. ‘I try tables and master classes and make the not to make mistakes.’ The school has most of many media to promote her ideas very good results and it is well resourced. – website, radio, TV, papers. ‘I have had to fight for the resources.’ [She The fledgling organisation is not the only laughs again.] one in Bulgaria that represents head teachers. There are at least two others and ‘A very hard fight.’ [More laughter] they present a significant challenge, both ‘You’re a fighter?’ in terms of power and opinion. ‘I think we have different point of view,’ she says, ‘it ‘Yes, I’m a fighter and I would like to will take some time, but we’ll probably change things here. I think it is our start working together.’ She knows the mission because we are educators. We union from the inside, she was Deputy need real leaders leading the change.’’ President, and she is concerned that it is She blushes when I suggest she is a role imperative, very destructive and not model [‘Oh thank you.’] but she doesn’t democratic. ‘Now I try to change the way disagree. of the organisation, using new methods’. It may take time – more than she originally Maria believes it is crucial to change the anticipated – but Maria is for the long haul, system now; that many people think the if that’s what it takes. same way, but ‘they don’t know how.’ A chance meeting with Ton Duif, President Bulgaria shares its Black Sea coastline with of the World Education Forum, in Plovdiv, Ukraine. This part of the world is still which involved talking and talking and rooted in a post-Communist era. When the talking, and her involvement with Esha Russian influence was removed in 1989, [she drove alone over 800 km from Plovdiv Bulgaria endured an upsurge in crime to Dubrovnik to attend last October’s perpetrated by its own ‘Mafia’, causing conference there.] ‘Step by step, I realised many people to regret the change. Some I can trust Ton, find many friends, and I of those regrets and misgivings still can work with them in a team, to change infiltrate the thinking in Bulgaria and may the situation here for the better.’ well account in part for the stubborn 61 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:01 Page 62
‘The Classroom’ from a museum – formerly a school – near Plovdiv
conservatism that holds onto the Working together, enlarging the concept education system with an iron fist. of the team from the individual school to the system at large is her goal. ‘We are Maria is trying to prise open the fingers of stronger when we are together.’ She is that fist. She has the influential Mayor of determined to do this and you’d better Plovdiv on side. The municipal authority believe her! was a major sponsor of the conference. The central Minister of Education has been Maria sees WEF as a building block that will supportive, and demonstrated this by enable her to spearhead reform in Bulgaria having two high-ranking members of the ‘We have many national tasks’. The focus inspectorate on the panel of speakers. is on what needs to be done in the here and now. ‘I’m optimist,’ proclaims Maria, ‘I believe that when people realise that they would be part of this organisation, WEF, and that they agree with the aims, they will come.’
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Nelson Mandela School, Berlin
16 DECEMBER 2014: DIVIDED BERLIN I’ve crossed Berlin, by tram [Metro] and Berlin has always had this situation of Underground [U-Bahn], cutting a diagonal being a metropolis, with lots of things from the North-East, where I stay for part going on but surrounded by a sort of a of the year, to the South-West, where I’m wasteland. There‘s nothing much around visiting the Nelson Mandela School and it and that has always kept it in some way meeting the Principal, Christian Nitsche. at a provincial level. There’s a famous quotation by Kurt Tucholsky, one of the It’s an interesting journey [it takes about icons of Berlin literature, who said, more 45 minutes], not only because it than a hundred years ago that Berlin corresponds to that taken by my grand- combines the disadvantage of the city with daughter, a First Year student, but because the disadvantage of the countryside.” it is indicative of the special status of the school in Berlin, drawing its students from The division and subsequent reunification right across the city. The Nelson Mandela of Berlin created its own unique problems. was set up nearly sixteen years ago to There was a will to make it happen without cater specifically for the children of the harming anyone – nothing was taken away ‘highly mobiles’, mainly Germans, whose from the western parts and nothing was work takes them backwards and forwards changed too much for the eastern part. across the globe, to and from Berlin, and “That didn’t help exactly: there was a who are looking for some educational certain stubbornness and narrow stability amidst a pattern of constant mindedness. If you‘re positive you call it movement. “It’s really for people who tongue-in-cheek but it could be a certain come here for a certain time,” Christian roughness in the communication.” But, explains, “or for people who have been in over the last 10, 15, 20 years, the city has different places and now need to transition changed enormously. Even after 25 years back into the German program, or vice the old divisions are still palpable, but versa, and that’s basically the core part of Berlin is much more international – more what the school is.’ people, more languages. Berlin people 63 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:01 Page 64
couldn’t help but change. There are new Originally Christian Nitsche wanted to divisions, no longer east-west. Certain become a musician. He played the parts of the city are less advanced or are trombone but he had some health in a different position. If you’re talking problems in his final year at school and about the centre then some of the hipper that put an end to the possibility of and more vibrant areas are definitely the pursuing music professionally. He took a eastern areas rather than the western surprising leap from music to banking areas. If you look at Charlottenburg it’s [‘Just because I didn’t want to go from one probably more sedate and more provincial, school to the next’] training for two years in comparison to other parts of the inner and, having completed a degree in German city. With prices, rents and the cost of and English, staying with that bank for living all rising it’s a bit like New York at a more than ten years. much lower scale. Neighbourhoods that Within his qualification was a teaching used to be no-go areas are suddenly degree. He spent a year in Münster and a become interesting and affordable. couple of years in Hamburg, usually teaching in bilingual schools. Four years CHRISTIAN into his career he became a vice-principal, Christian inhabits a typical principal’s lair, and then, he says, ‘a really incredible just off the main entrance hall to the opportunity, to be head of the German school. He has a cluttered desk and a six- school in Boston, arose. With the city of seat meeting table, where we sit. As I Boston being so attractive, many people arrive he’s finishing a conversation with a applied and I was just lucky to get the Year Head; as we end there’s a knock on position. So I went over there, as part of his door. In the intervening hour-and-a-half the German School Abroad programme. It he is generous with his time and forthright was a small school in the process of being in his answering. He is tall and trim, with built up. When I came there, we were only spectacles and a good head of sandy- into 8th grade and when I left we had the coloured hair. He dresses in slacks, first graduation with a bilingual section.’ pullover and open-necked shirt, smartly There is quite a large German community casual. He seems to wear lightly the in Boston. However, for financial reasons responsibility for running one of Berlin’s many of the German children who are major schools. there cannot attend the school. It’s essentially a private school, but it’s The Nelson Mandela is a bilingual school subsidised by the German Government, [on entry, children are expected to have a and it’s relatively inexpensive compared to proficiency in both English and German; the private schools in the Boston area, lessons are taught in both languages, where many schools can cost $30,000 – although, at the moment, English $35,000, but still for the research fellows predominates] in a city that is teeming [who make up a considerable proportion with a growing multi-cultural population. of the German community in Boston] this The devastation of buildings and infra- was unattainable. structure that marked the end of World War 2, the partition by ‘The Wall’, and its fall 25 years ago, the re-location of the AUTONOMY capital of the re-united FDR from Bonn to In this job Christian enjoyed a Berlin – are all features of a vibrant considerable degree of autonomy, but with metropolis where change and renewal are that came problems. The school was ‘in the order of the day. wobbly shape’. There were conflicts, insecurity and uncertainties about its I want to know what it’s like to lead a survival. The school had a Board of school that embraces this diversity and Directors, ‘but they were all voluntary and change and to see how the work of a did not have a financial commitment, in principal compares to that of a school contrast to many of the private schools leader in the Irish second-level system, there, where the first point of becoming a which, in its own way, is also coming to director is usually to make a contribution. terms with diversity and change. That wasn’t the case with us.’ But he had 64 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:01 Page 65
the support of two of the founding fathers collaboration. They tried what they could of the school, one in his early 80s and one do at their end but they trusted me and in his mid-70s. basically I could do what I thought was right. Then we would talk it through, but “Apart from that it was basically the faculty there wasn’t really any holding back!” and I doing it. We had to renovate the When the governance issues and the inside of the building almost completely building issues were settled, he was able and also to find the sponsors to finance it.” to turn to the bilingual programmes and He found it ‘pretty brutal’ and was on the the teaching staff [hiring and firing], “so brink of leaving Boston, but he persevered. everything was basically in my hands, “It was a very challenging situation for me, which was useful.” because I felt here was a school that after a lot of work and the initial conflicts needed to be appeased. It took me almost RETURN TO GERMANY a year, so I could basically do everything I At the end of six years [the maximum wanted in terms of using the budget in a amount of time one is allowed to hold a way I thought was useful.” visa] he was obliged to return to Germany. Essentially he had been there on Christian enjoyed this sense of autonomy. secondment, so he was entitled to a post For me it was reminiscent of the early as principal or deputy, but not necessarily stages of free education in Ireland, when at the same school as he had worked in the principals of the new community and before. That wasn’t what he wanted comprehensive schools, in particular, had anyway, and so he made the move from to grapple with the physical and Hamburg to Berlin for both professional educational environments, as well as the and family reasons. His time abroad had politics, surrounding the establishment of given him a level of autonomy and the new schools, as well as the curriculum. responsibility that he was reluctant to “Once the Board had changed and we had relinquish. He didn’t relish the move from full mutual trust it was really a great “being a person who has everything under 65 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:01 Page 66
his belt to someone who is part of a very need to ‘catch up’ in one language or the bureaucratic administration.’ other. Six years in Boston and a year in Bath had This is an issue that is currently under given him a taste for working within an discussion in the school and it illustrates international community and an the multiplicity of concerns that lie on a enthusiasm for bilingual education, so he principal’s desk at any one time and the looked around carefully for his next complexities entailed in prioritising them. posting. “I know Berlin hasn’t a great name Christian explains: “The school is fully for being a dynamic player on the school built now, but we had to move several front, but I found a school, the Nelson times and sort out issues [around Mandela, which, to my knowledge, is the accommodation: the divided campus was only state school with an International a considerable cause of controversy] that Baccalaureate [IB] programme in the whole took away a lot of energy and potential.” of Northern Germany, catering for a He skates lightly over this point, but it has community that was up and coming in been difficult, with three different school Berlin as a capital and an international sites that house a primary school and a city.” It was an opportunity not to be lower secondary wing. Now, however, he missed, a post that had become available feels he is in a better position to tackle the for the first time in 14 years. He explains: curriculum. “It’s the question of what do “That’s how old the school is, because my we mean if we say it’s a bilingual predecessor was the first principal, the programme or a bilingual school and in my founding father.” opinion it needs to be more balanced, so that both German and English are taught MULTIPLICITY OF CONCERNS at first language level, in contrast to what we call Secondary Language Acquisition An international school can be a very [with French and Spanish and perhaps interesting place, but also problematic. other languages].” Children can be more disturbed than their parents might realise by that ‘high So the prime aim is to have students mobility.’ After all, the move to work graduating from the school with a well- abroad is usually the parents’ decision, or rounded education programme [an aim that of their employers, and the children that virtually all schools would have in just have to follow. Christian feels that it common] and the ‘added asset’, as is one that can be managed. “It definitely Christian calls it, of a really strong is an issue. We count almost 60 different proficiency in the two core languages. And nations represented here but that is that’s not as simple as it might appear at counter-balanced by a fairly constant share first glance: the school has to factor in [i] of the local population. For example, last the students’ ‘entry state’ - how good they year we had a graduation of a group [20- are at the languages when they enter the 25% of the whole class] that went all the school; [ii] the likelihood that, given the way from 1st Grade through 13th Grade proportion of ‘highly mobiles’ that they and that has been a stabilising factor for won’t all be entering together at the start the school.” of First Year; [iii] their existing ‘educational history’. At present, English is the dominant language at Nelson Mandela, although Christian attempts to sum up the Christian would prefer an even balance particular identity of the school: between the two. Something strikes me ‘interesting, ambiguous, ambivalent’. On here: What we would have called ‘special the one hand as a ‘school type’, Nelson education’ in the Irish context is dealing Mandela is an Integrierte Sekundarschule, with children who have academic which is basically a comprehensive [along disability; we have a non-selective entry so the lines of the original English model]; on we have a very wide range of abilities. the other hand it occupies a specific and Nelson Mandela is selective on the basis of unique niche in Berlin education. The language proficiency and it is within this bilingual dimension and the priority given context that the school identifies the to the ‘highly mobiles’, impose limitations. special needs of those children who may Christian: “Basically it should be 66 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:01 Page 67
non-selective in that respect but it is l Not really. With German history being selective in terms of – all over the place and Germany not even being one country, the idea of l Where do you come from? federalism is still very much alive. l Are you highly mobile or not? Probably the most important area that the individual states have is education l Do you have the language capacities? and policing, so they both are with the Because, if we have kids, even when they individual states rather than with the enter at First Grade and they have no federal state, but we also have a English at all, then that’s a problem. We general committee, the Standing are not a school for parents who just want Conference of the Secretaries for their kids to be raised bilingually.” Culture & Education, and they make basic decisions of benchmarks and There’s a familiar ring to this, for Irish certain things that all schools, or all principals who have wrestled with states, need to comply with. But every Admissions Policies. The specifics may be state has its own organisation. In some different but the challenge is to parts it’s a blessing but in many encapsulate the aims of the school in clear respects it’s just holding things back and unambiguous terms. Christian because it’s coming with a lot of extra identifies a further complication with the cost, a lot of extra ideas and different Admissions Policy: “Ours is not even our processes. For example, if you think of own: it’s collaboration between the Berlin publishing houses, they can’t just have Senat and us. There is a provision just for one math book, they have to have 16, our school that has to do with how we sometimes 16 editions to cater for the define the ‘highly mobiles’ and the make- different individual states, so we have a up of the classes, and how the state like Bremen with 500,000 people percentages from the four groups - the and you have to have your own version German, the English, the ‘highly mobiles’ for the handful of kids. and the local elements - are determined. WELLBEING AND WORKLOAD GOVERNANCE Christian trained as a teacher of English This leads us to the details of the and now finds himself leading a complex governance of the school and how issues organisation, a completely different job of are debated. The School Conference is the a principal. He had seen the preliminary highest authority group in the school next results from the Well-Being Survey in the to the principal. This Conference has all NAPD Leader, November 2014, and that stakeholders at one table - the students resonated with him. As in Ireland, it’s still [4], the parents [4] and the teachers [4] - a lot to do with being thrown in at the and, in addition to that, the head of deep end but things have improved as school. That leads to the following regards the preparation of school leaders. exchange between us: I wonder how he manages the workload l So this is a democracy in action in the [that word also resonates with him] and he governance of the school? paints a rather gloomy picture of the lot of the school leader: “The way things are l Yes, although as far as the Admissions organised, very often some of the Policy is concerned the final decision is unpleasant responsibilities are just taken by the superintendents or the City delegated down to the heads of schools of Berlin. and they need to deal with them. This has l So you are an international school, you led to a situation in many districts and are a bilingual school, with language cities that nobody wants to do this job proficiency as an entry criterion, you anymore. So many people fail because are a comprehensive school in nature they just can’t do this marathon; they are and you are under the auspices of the completely exhausted. They [the City-State of Berlin. And are you authorities] have to realise that they need answerable in some way to the overall, to prepare teachers better if they want the federal educational machine? them to become principals.” He touches on 67 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:02 Page 68
pay, which offers little or no incentive, and practical reasons. I felt that the teaching on the intractable problem of under- was getting a little boring after a while. performing teachers. It’s no cakewalk; yet With Math and German, you are caught up Christian was keen to persevere. in corrections and grading and I didn’t find that very rewarding. I needed something TRAINING FOR LEADING that allows for more creativity and more room for manoeuvre. I like to do things, to Formal training for principals and aspiring shape things, to organise and to principals is a relatively new concept in communicate. So the system needs so Germany. Christian was fortunate to much shaping and massaging and growing receive training in Hamburg, which. at that and development.” time, was one of ‘the pioneer places’. He had a 9-module preparation over two I wonder if among teachers there are years. It covered a lot of the aspects that always those, on the one hand, who want we needed and it also brought people to take on that responsibility, to take on together and created a network. “It the leadership and being creative, and, on widened the perspective, because it the other, those who are happy to remain included teachers from all sorts of schools, teaching? Christian is inclined to agree. “I which we found bizarre to begin with.” just didn’t find teaching challenging Now the practice of providing such enough and at the end of the day you need courses, geared towards those who want to find your niche, what you really want to to work in an administrative position, has do. I have high respect for people who spread to other places, including Berlin. have made a teaching career, who have They have to be advertised because there stayed in teaching. It is just everybody are still not enough people opting for needs to find their own motivation.” school leadership. EXPANDING THE PROFESSIONAL WHY DO YOU WANT TO BE DIALOGUE – MORE REHEARSALS A PRINCIPAL? AND FEWER CONCERTS Christian was eager to do it and he felt His motivation is towards joined-up that his other work experiences, in thinking. He is engaged in a project to banking, at university and in managing the develop a network of like-minded schools complete budget of the school in Boston, in Berlin, to initiate dialogue. “The equipped him well for the task. I press him question is how can we enable people to to explain his motivation for taking on this feel more of their own efficiency and the tough professional path. “There were very impact that they actually have?” 68 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:02 Page 69
His view is that happiness, in this context, attractive for many reasons – the building, comes about if you can work and feel that instability, security and so on - so it didn’t you are making a difference. That’s very really attract those people who wanted a difficult for teachers because of the way cosy little position, ‘and you feel that very schools are organised, with people strongly when you are here’. He also isolated in individual rooms, teaching their believes that the mixture of nationalities classes, and being almost scared of on the staff - one half German-speaking collaboration or letting others in. In and the other international, from all over Boston, he had been part of a programme, the place, from different systems and Instructional Grounds, which was different backgrounds, from Australia to promoted by Harvard and entailed a China to Brazil - helps enormously. They professional dialogue between peers don’t have narrow-minded or rigid about teaching, as continual part of their structures because people do things professional work. differently – there’s no one ‘right way’ and that’s another hurdle. He sees the He drew an analogy between the work of bilingual programme as an important teachers and that of an orchestra. platform to allow teachers gain a common “Teaching is organised in our state, as if perspective, to think about the how and we were only to give concerts, without any the why, and to make sure that people who rehearsal time. So we have 26 hours a are joining the school get a quicker week, in secondary school that is like 26 understanding of what is needed. concerts per week. We need to reflect more on that and in order to do this successfully we need professional time for RECRUITMENT collaboration that is counted as part of our The recruitment is important and it is contracted hours.” played out against a background of teacher shortages. He learned in Boston to In Boston, where Christian had a lot of be bluntly outspoken when recruiting autonomy, he was able to allow the time teachers. “When you hire them we tell or raise money or earmark funds for that them ‘This is what we do’ and if they seem purpose. Berlin has a very meticulous doubtful we say, ‘Perhaps it is not your cup system of figuring everything out, so all of tea, then don’t drink it.’ But if they are the activities of a teacher are accounted positive about the offer of something for, within the one [old] framework. He is ‘different from just being in your own silo desperate to change this. He wants to and doing what you do and that’s it’, he think outside that framework: “I’m more holds out the possibility of a new kind of interested in having a new framework that professionalism. He is eager to develop is not only to do with time, but also with this and plans to apply with the European the aspect of being proud professionals. Union for support for our project idea. We should be thinking together with other professionals about our practice, in a Normally a position is advertised to be constant dialogue, because there are so followed by a pre-selection process many challenges in the teaching followed by interviews with short-listed profession and if we could deal with this candidates, which involve Christian and a together as a group, and tap into the panel [representatives from the unions, different qualifications and skills that some teachers]. “So in most cases we have come with a large faculty, that would be a quite an influence on whom we hire.” much better position for everybody to be in and it would increase the motivation of In other instances, however, there is a kind teachers.” of hiring fair, or lottery, shared by 40-50 school heads, where up to 30 candidates Christian has people on his staff who will make five-minute presentations, and then buy into his ideas very quickly, particularly the heads haggle about who gets whom. those that have been recruited by him. I “It’s basically hit and miss! In the past wonder if he also has some ‘resisters’ on month I’ve been at four of those events his staff. He feels that he’s been and for the first three events we didn’t get ‘comparatively lucky’. It’s a fairly new a single teacher. Once we got one but he school and at the beginning it wasn’t very then declined. This time we found three 69 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:02 Page 70
Saturday afternoon in the Nelson Mandela gymnasium. Parents and students are running a pre- Christmas fund-raiser. I’m there as Granddad; Christian Nitsche is there to circulate and make himself available to the parents.
and I’m having my first real interviews with for either the summer or winter semester them tomorrow and the day after. I feel and normally that would be that. At Nelson quite optimistic because I thought those Mandela, however, there is a constant flow two people made a really good impression, and influx of people and there’s a but, as we know, that might change.” considerable amount of work involved in checking their backgrounds, determining the supports they need, organising them SUPPORTS and seeking the necessary funding.. Christian is supported in his administrative work by a structure that is similar to the There are 2.5 secretaries [“We had a Posts of Responsibility in Irish schools. He situation where one fell ill and we didn’t has an assistant head, a head for the have anybody to replace her”]. On a elementary school and a series of positive note, the Berlin Senate decided coordinators [for the middle school, the IB that 35 of the very big schools, including programme, the Arbitur programme and Nelson Mandela, would be given an heads of departments. He is quite satisfied administrative assistant. [The person with the structure, but it’s not enough. It’s should have started as of August 1st, and basically designed for a standard German I just got word yesterday – December 15 - school and does not take into account the that the person might start in January”]. additional needs of the bilingual school. The level of recompense for teachers is The school relies heavily on the parents. determined by the different posts – they “They understand that this is a State may involve payment [usually negligible] school but it’s so different that they really and/or a reduction of teaching hours need to help us make it a good place. So at many different levels, they support us He gives the example of the admissions with money, but also with their skills and procedure. At most schools people apply energy, their time and commitment. For 70 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:02 Page 71
instance, two of the parents organise a really difficult. “I can’t do justice to them, weekly ‘buzz’. They collect and collate all to be there as much as they would like me the materials. I’ve just published holiday to be there.” He is left with a sense of guilt greetings from the head. Occasionally, if about it. he is ‘squished for time’, one of the parents will translate an item for him and The working day: From his account, it then put it on the website and in the buzz. sounds as though Christian works for between 50 and 60 hours a week. “I usually start at eight or a little earlier and COMMUNICATIONS then on a normal day I leave the school Christian is the head of a complex between sort of five and seven. Once or organisation, involving a staff of over 140. twice a week you have things that go on I want to know how he manages to stay in till 9:00 or 9:30. Then sometimes at the touch with them. His reply is candid: “I weekend you have appointments where struggle with that quite a bit.” He has to you just have to be there, but it doesn’t satisfy a wide range of constituencies and really feel like your personal time. I try to many individuals. He has to prioritise and be very strict about not to staying longer ration his time. than six or 6:30, because I feel that adding another hour or so does not pay off, Managing the expectations: Sometimes because the next day you feel less parents make high demands on the energetic. I try to cut things for the school; some people think it is a private weekend down to a minimum or to do the school [or at least they would like it to be things you feel you can do better at home: one], and they have expectations that they one or two little projects, usually more really cannot fulfil. They write about ‘little conceptual, where you feel you need a things’, in individual letters, or e-mails, to little peace and quiet to think about them.” Christian, expecting him to meet them and discuss this at length. “That’s impossible. The tyranny of the computer: Christian I have to really focus on that.” has overcome the urge that haunts many principals, to keep totally up to date with Meeting the teachers: “There are teachers e-mails. “I refuse to answer e-mails over that I only see two or three times a year. I the weekend. When I started I was used to am trying to have a system where I working down my e-mail account to zero encourage them to take the initiative, to and now sometimes I have 500 unread come and see me, even if it’s nothing e-mails in the account. So you have to serious. He wants people to ‘choose their learn to live with that.” moment’ to have a private conversation, but he cannot schedule everyone to meet It’s about self-preservation. He sees his him on a regular basis. He does make job, not as a sprint, but a marathon, where himself available for ‘certain consultation you have to conserve energy. “If I’m hours’ every week at each of the three exploiting myself, that won’t serve campuses, where people can just come to anybody in the long run. You need to keep see him. your flexibility. When I found this concept in the materials given to you as a head, I The ‘walking principal’: I recall a running just smiled at the whole thing. Now I’ve debate I had with one of the Year Heads in changed my mind and realise that it has to my last school, about my presence, or lack be taken seriously, because so quickly you of it, on the school corridors. It’s still a can be blown away with things. I see this source of regret to me, that I found it very with many colleagues who have just hard to meet that expectation. Christian exploited themselves, and you can see seems to understand what I’m driving at. that, after 10 years or 15 years, they’re He sees that gap between what people burnt out, down to a situation that’s really expect a head of school to do, and what unpleasant and where it’s hard for them to they can actually do, ‘because people trudge on.” don’t’ realise that.’ He would like to have time, an hour or two a day to go around Leading 4 Learning: I introduce the the school, to meet people, to observe concept of LEADING 4 LEARNING and the things, to be available, but he finds that need to cater for all the diversity in the 71 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:02 Page 72
school. Christian is finding that aspect of lazy bones’. Then there was the PISA shock the school easier after the first year and he in 2000, which didn’t exactly help. is drawing a lot on his Boston experiences. He is working on a project called Teacher- Since then things have changed, in terms Leader-Innovator, based on the concept of of qualifications, organisation and building the efficiency and impact of the increased efforts to improve results. The individual teacher. image of teachers has benefited from some recent TV documentaries that “If we can manage to have teachers followed teachers over three months and understand themselves as professionals – showed the public the teacher’s life. So there’s the teacher part in me – but I’m now, says Christian, ‘there is more also a leader, in terms of the things that I understanding that this is not an easy job. do in the whole complex of the school and The impression is still very much divided: hopefully I’m being effective there. That is some people feel that teachers are really also to do with innovation: I’m reflecting giving their best and doing a terrific job on my work and having a professional but that there’s still the view that there’s a dialogue of some sort, and then I’m considerable residue in the teaching body reflecting on my practice, on what I do. I‘m of people who have opted for this really interested in how we can have profession for the wrong reasons.’ structures to enable that. That’s one thing. “The second is creating a culture where It is difficult to change a system that is so making mistakes or trying things out, is to rigid, but with the overall fall in student be embraced. Teachers are so reluctant to numbers combined with a large number of make mistakes or to accept mistakes. We retirements the situation is evolving. There are so focused on the deficits in our will be a need for fewer teachers, but right perspective on students that it impedes now there is a shortfall. “The profession any kind of constructive process.” has got old. They were hired at the same time and now are going to retire.” He is trying to change the overall structure so that teachers feel supported in taking The school is in an awkward position. the initiative [‘Grab it!] Do something with While there are a lot of teachers coming it!”] without the fear of making mistakes into the profession, [including [“Make mistakes – we can learn from seiteneinsteiger [lateral entrants; those them”]. There are now many small groups entering the profession through the back in the teaching faculty at Nelson Mandela door; people who were not trained as who are active. In Berlin there are schools teachers are being retrained, for better or that are still dormant, struggling with the worse]. It undermines the idea that only structures at an operational level and people with the top grades can get into the getting stuck there. But there are other profession because now the demand is schools that feel that this is something great. Christian has some reservations that they would like to do and this is what about changes that have been made to the this network of schools is encouraging. qualifications for teaching, whereby the level and depth of the primary degree, in “Many people see that if we bring the specific subjects, has been compromised profession to where people are enjoying in favour of a teaching diploma, ‘a what they’re doing, in spite of the slimmed down version’. pressures and the workload, that that would be a wonderful tool to change Christian gives an example that things.” encapsulates his concerns: “If you want to be a historian, you would follow a different TEACHER SELF-ESTEEM track. Germany was known for having teachers who, in terms of their subject I ask Christian where German teachers knowledge, were really highly qualified, stand in terms of self-esteem. Ten years but very often they didn‘t have a clue ago it was low. The public viewed teachers about how to teach. That was the problem. as being highly privileged, well paid, with But now you’re basically lowering that long holidays and short working days. A base. There’s been a much greater focus former Chancellor called them ‘a bunch of on methods and on didactics and those 72 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:02 Page 73
things and they play a bigger role. I would happens in that time – it isn’t have preferred a system where even if you schooling but it’s learning – has every find out at the end of your course that you bit as much to do with achievement do or don’t want to be a teacher, that it gaps that show up in school as remains possible. But now you make this anything that happens in school. decision when you enter your degree So we can’t expect a 20% solution to programme. I don’t know why that has to solve 100% of the problem, we’ve got be that way. It’s just making it a shorter to address the inequalities and level course, less expensive and quicker, but the playing field in what children have I’m not so sure whether that’s a real an opportunity to do by way of asset.” enrichment and stimulating activities outside of school. OUT-OF-SCHOOL ENRICHMENT We move on to consider this quote from I note that in Nelson Mandela there is an Paul Reville [Professor of Practice of ambitious programme of activities Educational Policy and Administration at incorporated into the school day. Most Harvard University’s Graduate School of German second-level schools finish at Education, speaking at recent NAPD lunchtime and leave the sporting and Conference]: cultural activities to other agencies. In a society [US] where inequality is Christian explains: “It’s basically part of a growing, we know, that affluent decision that every school has to take, parents are spending something like whether it wants to be what we call a eight to ten times more on out-of- half-day school, an optional full-day school enrichment than our poor programme or an obligatory full-day families are. Poor families are having programme. This school has opted for the a harder time than ever before in obligatory full programme. Around 2004, getting out-of-school enrichment there a big shift of the paradigm in the opportunities to their children, and it sense of the central government deciding turns out that the learning that’s that they wanted to move towards full-day happening again in the 80% of waking school. They felt that, with the people’s hours that are spent out of school, demands on time, or family’s demands, between the ages of kindergarten, age also in terms of the results of the PISA five and age 18, the learning that study, that it would be a good idea.”
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There have been inducements [€4 billion It’s early days, just in its second quarter, was given to schools that opted for this experiment that has echoes of the training themselves into whole-day Transition Year. They use existing school schools] as part of a move to level the resources and the personnel who are playing field in education. Reville had available. It gives teachers the opportunity pinpointed the inequality of opportunities to “do something different, something in education; likewise in Germany, they really like, and not necessarily as part Christian says, “those kids with a more of any curriculum.” affluent background are still much better Dare I mention assessment? “They get a off.” So many schools have gone over to certificate of participation, basically with the full day. four stamps, one for each quarter of the One exception is that many grammar year. We don’t want to grade that, but the schools, which take a more traditional view course leaders are allowed to qualify it and of education. “Within the system of say, ‘With great success’, or something half-day schools, we have had sports clubs like that. But we don’t want to grade it and activities in the afternoon. In because it would blur this distinction Germany, if you wanted to be on a team between ordinary lessons and what we call doing football or soccer, music, or workshops.” whatever, then you would do that outside school.”
So the Nelson Mandela has started to be a THE STUDENTS full-day school, incorporating a whole Christian wants to say a word about the range of activities into the programme: students. He refers to his motivation for sports, music, theatre, art, a big chess working in Nelson Mandela. “I think one of school, a newspaper group and some the really rewarding things is our students, scientific. Christian felt that 38-39 the mix that we have, the effect that ordinary school periods were far too much. comes from a situation where people come He wanted more balance in the curriculum, and go and how they’re accepted here in “so I’ve been cutting back some of the the community. They see things in various general lessons and bringing in other ways, which helps them to hold back on things like workshops, and short courses, value judgments. I find that a great asset with different content, different activities, that they have, that they can be neutral different ways of learning.” and observe things. Nothing is normal. If 74 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:02 Page 75
someone is doing it in a different way, it’s THE MANDELA LEGACY not automatically a question of better or Newer schools in Berlin have taken the worse, but it’s a question of, ‘Uh, OK, names of iconic figures from recent history that’s how you do it’. That creates a – John Lennon, John F. Kennedy, Hannah certain open mindedness, I find that great. Arendt. I want to know how important the There is great interest in topics like politics Nelson Mandela legacy is to the ethos of and to do with the UNESCO idea of the school. How much does that infuse the helping, being aware, starting initiatives. I daily life of the school? think that’s great, and we could do probably even better in fostering that and supporting that as a school but I think that’s a reality here.
Christian: “Enormously, I think. It’s part of the daily lives of the students, so it’s really at the heart of the school. That’s what makes it such an interesting place. Our namesake has been sort of a fabulous namesake, because as a person he is so accessible for everybody, for all students. We don’t have to teach anything about Nelson Mandela, he teaches himself or he speaks for himself. When he died a year – I mean everybody was aware that the day would come – but then it happens and on the spur of the moment we organised an assembly. There was such a heartfelt outpouring of gratitude. We didn’t really have to organise anything, it was just there. We handed out coloured paper slips. People wrote down their thoughts and we had the entire school entrance hall filled with 800 notes of students’ thoughts and emotions. Within 10 minutes they were all filled out and then we pinned them up. It’s just one example of how this name is really a point of identification for everybody. With all the difficulty we have with the fluctuation, with people coming from different places and so on, he is an anchor point. The name of Nelson Mandela has had such a unifying effect and such benignity in its impact, that I think the school couldn’t have had a better person to get its name.”
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40,000 Sandwiches – and not a single one thrown out!
On 31 August 2015, Michael Minnock stepped down as Principal of the Christian Brothers’ School in Synge Street in Dublin, having brought it from the verge of extinction to a viable educational entity. This article examines his leadership skill an priorities.
Michael Minnock
his statistic is as good a way as any it exposed a poverty that was having a into the remarkable story of Michael serious impact on the learning experience TMinnock’s decade at Synge Street. of the boys. Since this intervention the It’s an entry point to the life of the school average CAO points in the school went up leader in an inner-city boys’ school in by 50% and there was a similarly dramatic 2015. The sandwiches in question have rise in the numbers of students going to been distributed to Sixth Years in the third level. It may not all be down to the school at little break over the past five provision of the break-time snack, but years. It may have begun as a measure to Michael is convinced of the value of the prevent the ‘fellows absconding from exercise. He had to raise €11,500 a year school to buy food’, but, at a deeper level, to fund the Breakfast Club. Between 76 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:03 Page 77
personal donations, the assistance of the They converge from a wide diaspora. In ‘Friends of Synger’ and a neglected most cases the boys were born in Ireland, Diocesan Trust Fund, the money was but do not necessarily identify with the found. There was no assistance from the country. Many of them [up to one-third] DES: Synge Street was too far down the are Moslem. They study alongside more alphabetical list to make the cut for DEIS traditional Dubliners, many of whom are school-lunch funding [the injustice of the children of lone parents. which is still a source of anger for Are there tensions between these groups? Michael], so this, like so many other items Michael gives a short answer: ‘No.’ The in the school, had to be provided by uniting force is that they all want to do ingenuity and initiative from within the well and, with the exception of a small school community. disruptive cohort, their attendance and Michael is OK with that: ‘I am from Offaly, retention rates are exceptionally high, as so I like a challenge,’ he told me, and is their motivation to succeed. Michael certainly for the last ten years he has been believes that schools, particularly those in challenged. Synge Street is one of the last the inner city, will come out inner-city boys’ post-primary schools in extraordinarily well in the social history of Dublin. When Michael took over in 2010, these times. student numbers were already on an Under Michael’s principalship a very old inexorable downwards slide, from an school has transmogrified itself into early-90s peak of 700. There had been a catering for this vibrant, multi-cultural number of principals in the years community. As leader Michael has immediately prior to Michael’s arrival, mobilised an array of positive energies – there had been some issues around the the loyalty of past-pupils, the deep school property and people were commitment of the staff, his own talents predicting he wouldn’t be able to keep the and experiences – all of which are an school open for more than five years. But organic part of the school itself rather than the Offaly man rose to the challenge. state provision. ‘Synger’ is still there and this year they were expecting numbers to reach 270, a For him, the most profound influence on financially viable number. the positive self-image of the students, and on the ethos of the school, has been The school’s will to survive and evolve the Con Creedon Trust. Named after a coincides with the continuing, radical successful past-pupil who made a massive alteration within the catchment area. The donation (‘a truly stunning gift’) to the changes were already under way ten years school, the Trust enables Synge Street to ago. Camden Street and the area around support its alumni in their third-level and the South Circular Road is the first port of further education. Since 2008, the Trust call in Dublin for immigrants, many of has given away €350,000, in grants whom do not speak English, but who are ranging from €500 to €1,200, to carry looking for a school that would suit their past pupils right through their further sons. studies. Last year €60,000 was distributed to 82 students and, Michael says with evident pride, ‘the trust Fund is intact, in spite of all the disbursements from it.’ The name of Con Creedon resonates through the school: the beneficiaries attend the annual school mass, they underpin the PPU [Past Pupils’ Union] and they contribute time and energy to the school [20 of them came back to coach students in their preparations for the 2015 BT Young Scientists’ Competition.]
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STUDENTS DISCOMFORT AND CHALLENGE Michael thinks very highly of his students: Yet they have their work cut out. In spite ‘There are a lot of very capable young of all the talk of high motivation, there’s a people in this area, born and reared within counter tendency - with the boys inclined a stone’s throw of the school. I don’t think to ‘drift down to the lowest level they feel we should forget that.’ There’s a comfortable at.’ Michael and the staff determination to succeed, in spite of the exert will-power to create a sense of many things stacked against them. If many discomfort and challenge, not allowing of them struggle with English, they can them to take Ordinary or Foundation level. compensate by their proficiency in other It’s a kind of tough love campaign fought tongues, turning disadvantage to definite for, rather than against, them, with several advantage. cunning ploys being brought into play: l There is enhanced career guidance [‘a TEACHERS blitzkrieg’] aimed at the younger He is also immensely proud of his levels; teachers. He gives them unqualified praise l Michael refuses to remit to the DES the – ‘The staff are where it begins and ends. students’ choices of levels for Junior If they’re not prepared to take on the Certificate, until the last moment; he challenge it can’t happen. I think they’re regards it as socially divisive [and does quite remarkable. I have to say that.’ He is not care if that inconveniences the particularly impressed by the younger printers of the papers – his priority is teachers - highly qualified, capable of to meet the genuine needs of the getting jobs elsewhere - who have come to students!]; work at Synge Street and stayed. ‘There’s zero staff turnover – nobody leaves’. He l He refuses to order Ordinary level maintains that the students adore their papers for the Mocks; teachers; they know that the teachers are l He has made his exam timetable on their side. Last June, the NAPD Leader favour Higher level papers; featured an article about the phenomenal successes in science in the school, due in l No-one is allowed to slip out of house large part to the dedication of one teacher, exams before the time is up. [He Jim Cooke. wishes he could impose the same rule in the state exams].
HIGH PRIORITY ON GUIDANCE It is only since the recent 2016 budget that Guidance Counselling has been partially restored to the status is enjoyed before the recession took it back into the teacher quota. Ahead of that Michael took a lead with the human resources that he had to hand. He had had responsibility at his previous school for guidance. He looked for volunteers among the teachers and ‘hit gold’: two of them have a Masters in Guidance, so they, along with a small number of volunteers and the deputy principal, formed a team that pushed a guidance programme at every opportunity. They prepared some basic presentations that were brought into play, whenever students had a ‘free’ class. He saw it as an essential task – ‘My belief – if you’re not Jim Cooke influencing people for the better in your 78 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:03 Page 79
classroom, what ARE you doing? Is it not fund-raising and are drawn back to school your role? To encourage people to achieve events [such as the Young Scientist]. Some the highest level the can achieve?’ members don’t become active in the Union until they’ve been out of school for fifteen However, there were background factors years or so; there is still a question as to that tempered the intensity of this whether the cohort of international boys crusade. Older ‘hands’ on the staff spoke will become as involved, but, as the book of ‘an ingrained fear of suicide’ in the area [published on the occasion of the 150th and the insistence by some of the more anniversary of the school] testifies, there insecure single mothers of not having their is a strong and abiding love of the old precious sons made to do anything they alma mater. didn’t want to do. This has required a delicate balancing act – pressure and encouragement; compassion without pity. PARENTS On the other hand, the Parents’ Association is ‘very difficult to maintain’. Parental contributions remain low; many parents are reluctant to cross the threshold, whether through a lingering memory of their own unhappy schooldays, or language difficulties. Getting to the school in the evening can be problematic, especially for the one-third of families scattered over a wide area beyond Synge Street.
FINANCE Finances are a constant concern. ‘Paying the bills in a school like this,’ says Michael ‘is a constant juggling act.’ They have to EXAMINATION CULTURE raise at least 40% of the cost of running The examination culture features high on the school and he has some fears that it is Michael’s agenda. He has worked a struggle they will lose. Michael came late ceaselessly to raise the bar of student to teaching, after a period of running his thinking, to aspire to higher levels. He is own business, but he brings the skills and wary of the reformed junior cycle. He the experience gained then to the current believes absolutely in the intrinsic value of task. He has ‘at my disposal’ a small group having a certificate ‘with the harp on it.’ of philanthropists, people who will This is about students bettering intervene with a donation in the event of a themselves and the increasing take-up of crisis. He puts a lot of personal energy into higher and further education, aided in the fund-raising. But this is not sustainable: most practical and generous manner by his contacts and his own energies will be the Con Creedon Trust is the route that gone with his retirement. Michael wants to see his students follow. ‘In 150 years… there’s never been a time in the history of Synge Street when so LEADERSHIP many are going on to Higher and Further Michael has very strong views about education, as there are now.’ school leadership. He came into it after 25 years as a teacher of St. David’s CBS, Artane. There was no pre-service training, PAST PUPILS no preparation, just the deep end. ‘On my The Past Pupil’s Union underpins the first day at Synge Street, I was faced with a school in both financial terms and in bill for €70,000 and I wasn’t even a maintaining a band of loyal supporters. signatory on the cheque book!’ He is not Beneficiaries of the Creedon Trust are ashamed to say that it took him a long automatically signed up for direct-debit time to get to grips with how the school subscriptions. They become involved in was functioning. 79 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:04 Page 80
they were. The security of an adequate remuneration and secure property ownership is not there. No senior executive of a large enterprise [and that’s how he regards a school] would expect to go for eight years with no pay-rise. As he hands over to Clare Catterson, his DP who is now Acting Principal, Michael would like to have a formalised opportunity to pass on the benefits of his hard-won experience to others. Perhaps he could have a role in the Centre for School Leadership, which will be striving to meet some of needs he has identified. It was all too haphazard for Michael. ‘The Coming to school leadership after decades most important preparation I had was in the classroom and a spell as an from running my own company – nothing entrepreneur, Michael brought a unique to do with education.’ He feels that there skill-set to a challenging situation. The is a lot to be learned from the business inner city school faces the rapid transition model. He would like to see an investment from monocultural to multicultural society of time and resources in school leadership. perhaps more intensely that those in rural He was aware that within the Edmund Rice or provincial settings. That calls for a Trust (which has overall responsibility for capacity to multitask and to think on one’s Christian Brothers’ schools), there was a feet. high failure rate among principals. That could be avoided by taking steps such as Michael Second Breakfast Club is a good a year-long overlap between the retiring example of responsive flexibility. He principals and his/her successor. He also perceived a real need and moved to € feels that there has to be an ‘alternative address it. 11.5k is ‘a lot to raise’ – three location’ for the principals who find times the entire parental contribution, or themselves overwhelmed by the task. He less than the expense of running a State points out that, unlike, for instance, the car [look at it whichever way you like]. For principal in an ETB college, the voluntary Michael the push to raise that money is secondary school principal is expected ‘to worth it – every cent – because it comes be superhuman’, with responsibility for, down to his Number One Priority – the well, ‘everything’. welfare of his students.
‘The most important preparation I had was from running my own company – nothing to do with education.’
For someone appointed in their thirties, this can mean a thirty-year sentence. ‘With the best will in the world, they cannot have accumulated enough wisdom or experience. A long spell as principal is not possible without it scarring you or your family. It takes a huge toll on energy. There is a real fear of burn-out’. He fears that the prospects for principals being appointed now are not as rosy as 80 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:04 Page 81
ayy In SSynnger: NeverNever A DDullulullll DDay In Synger: 150 Years of Synge Street CBS 1864 - 2014
Edited by Michaele Minnock and Sean Ryan
This book, jointly edited by Michael Minnock and Seán Ryan (a past pupil of the school and formerly a sports writer for The Irish Independent) speaks through the voices of the boys who have passed through the school, many of who have gone on to have distinguished careers in multiple facets of Irish life. Perfect bound copies are available from the school for €15, post and packaging is a further €7.50. There is a limited edition hard-back copy at €50, including post and packaging. The first run is entirely sponsored by Brian McElroy, a past pupil of the school. This means that ALL proceeds go directly to the school. The school phone number is (01) 478 3998 and the address, in full, is: Synge Street CBS, Synge Street, Dublin 8.
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Makeover at the Monastery
Winter at Roscrea College – the choristers make their way to the chapel.
wo and a half miles outside But even a gated community such as this the town of Roscrea lies Mount St. is not immune to the changes that have TJoseph Abbey, a Cistercian reverberated through every aspect of Irish monastery, set in wooded countryside, life. In their determination, both to with a farm of 360 hectares and, on thirty conserve a highly valued ethos and to acres of grounds and sports fields, adapt to the demands of the twenty-first Roscrea College, a Catholic boys’ seven- century, the community at Roscrea has day boarding school. set out to reform and revitalise the institution. On the chilly day in January, when I step down from the bus in the centre of Roscrea, to visit the College, the contrast TWO AMBITIOUS EDUCATIONAL between town [still in recession, with its PROFESSIONALS closed hotel, darkened shops and absent To accomplish this, the Board has brought taxi rank], and gown is accentuated by the in two ambitious educational warmth of the welcome I receive from professionals – Brendan Feehan and Niall Brendan Feehan, principal and president McVeigh, ‘new men’ in an old setting. and Niall McVeigh, the vice-president. They see themselves both as custodians of a hallowed and revered institution, and CONSERVING AND ADAPTING forces for a carefully-managed renewal. Founded in 1905 [27 years after the They are both highly qualified: Brendan monks settled there], the College has started his university career studying stood for the liberation that followed in accounting; Niall was taking law at the the wake of Catholic emancipation; it has University of Ulster. Each of them decided witnessed the political upheaval and early on to switch to teaching, convinced emergence of the Irish state; it has that the new direction was the way to go. maintained stability and tradition through the last three decades of innovation and For Niall it was a simple question: ‘Do I do reform in the education system. my accountancy exams and go into the 82 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:05 Page 83
banks and move up that way, or do I role I am more definite that it is actually actually do something else? And if I’m the right job for me. I felt I could do that going to do that, I need to do it now.” on a bigger scale, as a principal; that Each of them has continued as both whilst I had very good skills in the learner and teacher, combining their classroom, I think that my values and my professional duties with study, first at skill-set were transferable to a whole- Masters level, and latterly at Ph.D. school community. People have said to me that you can see a principal’s TRANSLATING THE VALUES OF personality in every school. I’d very much like to pass on my values and my skills to THE MISSION STATEMENT INTO other generations, to ‘make a difference’”. PRACTICE Niall’s area of study was particularly Both Brendan and Niall are comfortable appropriate: “I had a piece of work that with a continual process of reflection, was looking at the whole area of analysis, definition and redefinition that translating the values from a mission they are applying rigorously to every statement into practice, and the aspect of the life of the school. challenges presented with that, particularly for principals of Catholic ESSENTIAL ROLE OF ETHOS voluntary schools in Ireland.” The ethos of the school plays an essential They are bringing academic objectivity, role in the formation process. The energy and commitment to Roscrea. As education offered is both holistic and they build personal and academic holy. The Church calendar, liturgy and capacity they ‘want to make a difference.’ ceremony are woven into the life of the They demand a lot of themselves as well school. But Niall, whose particular area of as of others. responsibility this is, sees that it is important to adopt an approach that is contemporary and empathetic to adolescent faith. “I found myself very much involved at one stage in the whole redevelopment of the ethos of the college and trying to translate that for staff and for different stakeholders - students and, indeed, parents. That gave me a real flavour, then, of one aspect of being involved at a leadership level, despite the fact that I was still a recently-appointed member of staff.” Brendan Feehan
Their leadership is rooted in the classroom. Both assert their enjoyment of teaching. Brendan says, “I absolutely loved teaching, I loved the rapport with the kids, I loved building up a relationship with them and being someone really important to them.”
A BIGGER SCALE However, his ambitions and perspectives stretch further: “Everyone was saying to me, principalship is a tough job, are you sure you’d like to do it? And I was absolutely confident. Since I took up this Niall McVeigh 83 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:05 Page 84
FORMATION some of the negative influences in the Brendan and Niall see huge opportunities outside world that bombard young for the positive formation of the students, people. who are in their care 24/7, throughout the school year. The stated objective is BENCHMARKING that the ‘College will be a leading Catholic Niall says, “We work very hard on that. educator in the Cistercian/Benedictine Brendan and I have been appointed to this tradition, developing empowered, hard- role and we were looking actively to what working young men of integrity who are do we benchmark ourselves against, resilient, motivated, empathetic and particularly in a boarding school context. conscientious in their pursuit of Standards are very important to us in that excellence.’ regard. So we looked at the UK Boarding School Association and ironically in BOARDING IS KEY January of 2013, the Association The full-time residential boarding is key established 20 standards, ranging from to the achievement of this objective. Niall induction through to complaints, child explains: “Residential staff are very protection, recreation of the school important to us because they are really provision, management, for all [member] shaping the attitudes and dispositions boarding schools. So, we took those that these young men have, in not only standards and adapted them for our creating that atmosphere, that climate, as environment. In our interactions, in our we call it, but particularly in creating a strategic planning we use those standards synergy between the home environment as our benchmark.” and the school environment that the boys While both Niall and Brendan assert their are going into. The fact that virtually all respect for the parent as the prime students are boarders [only the sons of educator of the child, they are actively teachers are permitted to be day pupils] engaged in complementing that role means that periods of supervised study comprehensively by providing a are an integral part of school life. They protective, structured, Catholic see time as one of the great luxuries at environment for their students. Nothing is their disposal and that whole-time left to chance. They are custodians – they communal living in a boarding school is both have an eye for detail that extends fundamentally about character formation. beyond a very specific, exacting Code of From the experience of communal living Behaviour to consideration and analysis, they learn values; they develop a sense of as Brendan says, ‘… of every aspect of the collegiality that, with a certain amount of routines of this college, from the food social engineering, stretches to a rapport that the boys get, the dormitories that with past pupils. The whole-school life is they live in, the standard of teaching and there to counteract the challenges from learning that’s taking place, our communication with the various stakeholders in the college, to ensure that we are putting our best foot forward. We talk about the pursuit of excellence, that’s not just for our students but it’s, indeed, in terms of all our directions. So we’re always asking the question of ourselves.’ The statement of ethos and educational policy is broad and humanitarian in its scope, but is suffused with the ideology of Christianity – particularly Catholicism – and monasticism. ‘Cistercian College Roscrea strives to be a Catholic Community of learning, in which the students, committed to its care, live Enda Kenny joins in with the Roscrea choristers 84 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:05 Page 85
and pray, study and play and seek the on liturgy, allowing them to reinforce the truth in harmony and mutual positive aspects of Irish Catholicism and, responsibility.’ above all, the opportunity to be engaged in a continual conversation with students, CHANGING PERCEPTIONS between staff members, slowly building a strong relationship, shaping attitudes and For Brendan “…the key priorities are to dispositions. respect the tradition that’s here already. The boarding school of 2015 is not what a boarding school was like in the ‘60s or THE PRINCIPLE OF CHOICE ‘70s. So it’s maybe challenging people’s The gift of time, the strong sense of perceptions of what boarding schools are community, the rapport between pupils actually like. That comes down to the past and present – all these offer a experience of the students. What’s structured environment around study and different from a day-school is that the recreation. This is what parents buy in to students build up a rapport with teachers – at a cost of €13,000 a year - many of during the day, but they’re here in the them making significant sacrifices in evening as well. It’s my job and Niall’s to order to afford it. Brendan is conscious of make sure that they’re as comfortable and the new diversity in Irish society, but he is as safe in that environment as they also a firm upholder of the principle of possibly can be. The first priority for me choice. is very much around the experience of the students, both of the fact that they’re Niall is very clear about it: “We offer a living here and the experience and choice within that diversity of society that interactions between themselves, myself we now live in. From my perspective, we and my colleagues, and that it is caring, are custodians of an institution that was that it is homely and that they learn a founded over 100 years ago, at a time in certain set of values and they get to Irish society that education was largely experience everything that the boarding delivered through the hedges in our school offers by way of the academics, the towns and our villages. So there were study, everything that comes with being great visionaries at that time who built an in a school 24/7.” establishment that has served education and young people in Ireland well.” While they both carry an enormous respect for the tradition of the schools Apart from tapping into a past-pupil they are bringing fresh eyes to the network and running information perception of the modern boarding evenings, they encourage parents and school. They offer a kind of wrap-around pupils to carefully consider whether experience that encompasses the boarding-school life suits them. traditional curriculum, a whole range of One of the experiences they have before co-curricular activity, a specific emphasis they come is an ‘open weekend’, where they can come on a Friday night for a kind of ‘school sleep-over’, you know, and experience ‘a day in the life’ that gives them an idea of what boarding school is actually like.
CAREFULLY AND CLEARLY BRANDED Roscrea is both spiritual and street-wise. With the assistance of the professional skills of a PR company it presents a polished and positive image to the outside world. Roscrea has been carefully and clearly branded and, through radio Full steam ahead to victory in Leinster rugby and print media, is working hard to 85 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:05 Page 86
enormous faith in the capacity of the individual members of the community to uphold and develop the ethos. In this day and age, it is not practical for one person to carry all the responsibility; it is not practical for him to be a ‘walking principal’, a constant presence on the corridors. The email is a constant contender for his time. That’s one of the prices you pay. So leadership must be shared, spread, distributed. Brendan learnt of this particularly at St. Mary’s, Rathmines, where he taught under three There’s great pride in the achievements different principals [Clive Byrne, Liam of the students Norton and Denis Murphy] ‘who were very much au fait with distributing leadership. ensure that what the school has on offer I was able to build capacity there very, is widely known. very quickly. They allowed me. If I went in with an initiative, they were absolutely supportive’. LEARNING AND TEACHING The learning and teaching are of Both are firm upholders of mobility and enormous importance. Niall explains: “For change within the teaching profession. our generation, particularly with the Brendan maintains it’s good and it’s Teaching Council and the regulation of healthy. “I know there may have been a Continuing Professional Development tradition in Irish schools, where you start (CPD), there’s a standard now in Irish teaching there when you’re 22 and you education, an expectation of teachers move up the ladder and then you get a coming into the system, that they will be nice piece of crystal when you’re 65, when at a certain standard or a certain level of you leave the school. I don’t think it’s qualification.” healthy for schools. I think staff turnover is very healthy. I think it’s a very good The core curriculum is augmented by a sign that people would move up the diversity of pursuits that fill the rest of the ladder and then move on and transfer the students’ waking time. Roscrea was skills that they learned from you as honoured in 2015 as the Leinster Rugby principal and actually put that into other School of the Year, with four players schools.” singled out as ‘outstanding’; the school choir and orchestra featured at So he maintains that the responsibility lies prestigious events at the Royal Irish with the whole community – not just the Academy and the University of Limerick teachers in the classrooms – and he Concert Hall. Debating, drama and media strives to engage the residential staff, the studies provide further opportunities for cleaners, the caterers, the caretakers. students and the school to shine. “Whilst there may not be official staff This is not about turning a school around; meetings [with them] I have gone down it is about ensuring that, in a time of and held meetings with the support staff. enormous change, it is fit for purpose and They are a fundamental part of the that it grows. The Cistercian College is college, because they are the people who sure of its values and its philosophy. The have an awful lot of interaction with the role of the senior management team is to boys in our care. So, if you’re the dinner translate the values and the ethos from a lady or you’re the cleaner, they would mission statement into practice. often be the people who would come to us and say, ‘Look, you know, Johnny was looking a bit sad,’ and we would follow it DISTRIBUTED LEADERSHIP up. So they are important to us as a Brendan holds that it is a lot to do with community as we all work here with the distributed leadership. There has to be goal of actually making the experience of 86 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:06 Page 87
Brendan and Niall – the new men in a traditional setting.
the child better. So we communicate with That is achieved mostly by subtle, almost them on a daily basis. We have a policy imperceptible methods. Brendan is not where, for example, agreed reports of the one to make ‘grand statements’ to the board meetings will go up in the staff assembled staff. The process is one of room, the residency room and also down constant communication, a conversation to the support staff as well. I’d be very that runs through the building and slow to differentiate between teachers through the day. Affirmation, and cleaners, they all have a role to play commendation and appreciation are not and I think support staff, who are actually so much in the breaking of bread as in the here 24 hours a day, can have a cutting of cakes – in the staff room and in fundamental role to play as regards the kitchens. looking after boys in our care.”
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Educational Environments
s Ireland emerges from recession there is a small revolution going on in the built Aenvironment – new schools are springing up, to cope with the expanding population of students, old schools are either being refurbished or totally demolished. There is a new landscape of user-friendly buildings and, as you will see in the pages that follow, there is a conscious will to make these buildings not only fit for the multiple purposes of the 21st Century curriculum, but to make them into places that are warm, comfortable and welcoming for those who come to learn. The term ‘wellness’ has been introduced into the thinking about the classroom – the focus is not only on how the student learns but on how the student feels about it. The main feature in this section is about two ‘builds’ – one an entirely new school; the other an intricate and respectful adaptation of a multi-purpose conserved structure. There is openness in the discussion and a strong sense of design, with an emphasis on both utility and flexibility. A school build can take an age. Both the projects in the main article were subject to delays, crises, change of principal, not to mention the ebb and flow of the economy which put budgets and contractors at risk. The recorded conversations plot some of these vicissitudes, but it is heartening to know that there are happy endings to both the Newpark and the BFEI stories. Cheering, too, realise, too, that there are many similar enterprises afoot around the country. We take a brief visual glance at the plans for the school at Kingswood, which is seen as the trend- setter in high-quality school design. Then we look – or rather, listen – to an expert on acoustics in education. Colin Campbell demonstrates how important the sound quality of a classroom can be – not only for the hard of hearing, but for the well-being of all and the clarity of the multiple communications that now reverberate through most lessons. But we start Educational Environments where we left the previous section – in Synge Street in the heart of Dublin. Since retiring as Principal of Ringsend Technical Institute four years ago, Charlie McManus has had more time to pursue one of his keen interests, photography. He has completed many commissions for the Leader and also produced the 2015 NAPD Calendar. A perfectionist with a keen eye for colour and texture and lay-out, he responded with enormous enthusiasm to the brief to document the colourful and cosmopolitan streets in Dublin 8 which go a long way to define the new student population at ‘Synger’.
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Dublin 8 A photographic essay by Charlie McManus
Looking down Harrington Street at the Synge Street school building
This feature looks at a corner of contemporary Dublin through the lens of Charlie’s camera, but also sets the social context of Synge Street CBS, a secondary school for 150 years adapting to the rich tapestry of a multi-cultural society. 89 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:16 Page 90
The original Christian Brothers building on Synge Street
George Bernard Shaw, who taught the English a thing or two about their own language, was born in Dublin 8; now the street pulses to a different rhythm, with words translated into a visual message 90 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:19 Page 91
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Around the Table, 2015 The School Building
Clockwise from the top: Derek Lowry, Deirdre Hanamy and Derek West; Martin McKenna, Eamonn Greville and Kevin McClean. [Valerie Mulvin arrived later]
This year’s round-table discussion is about school buildings. One afternoon in April, seven of us sat around a table in the Board Room of the Blackrock Further Education Institute [BFEI], an extraordinary building [part-library, part-fire station, part-town- hall, assembly rooms, old-style ‘Tech’, and council chamber, all protected structures, built between the 1860s and the early 1900s] now re-imagined by architects McCullough-Mulvin and a progressive Education & Training Board [ETB] and re- constituted as a re-activated public library and centre of learning for over 1,000 full- and part-time students. Three architects sat around the table: Valerie Mulvin, Martin McKenna and Eamonn Greville. There were three school principals: Derek Lowry, Deirdre Hanamy and Derek West. There was Kevin McClean, an inspector in the Department of Education & Skills (DES), with a particular interest in school buildings. If you’re ‘into’ school buildings, we think you’ll find the proceedings intriguing. The immediate focus is on the work of the Department of Education & Skills, and on two buildings in the one area, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, but what emerged from almost two hours’ discussion was a much broader picture, encompassing a great deal about the current state of play, nationally, with regard to the care and development of the physical environment for learning and teaching. This is an abridged and modified version of our conversation. The running order has been adapted to deal, first, with the DES, then with the two buildings, and then to draw some conclusions from the afternoon’s proceedings. Three appendices look at the Kingswood project and at the impact of the recession on designing and building and an outline for some future potential developments. At the same time, I have tried to retain as much of the ebb and flow and arbitrary direction of the talk, to give a flavour of what was said. [DW] 95 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:38 Page 96
THE THE BIOGRAPHICAL KEY WORDS PARTICIPANTS NOTES
Access Derek Lowry is Autism Spectrum Principal of Newpark Disorder Comprehensive School, Behaviour Meltdown Derek Lowry Blackrock, Co. Dublin.
Circulation Eamonn Greville is the Demographics Senior Architect in the Planning and Building Design Unit of the Department Eamonn Greville of Education & Skills Disability [DES]. Effect Kevin McClean is an End-user Inspector of Science in the DES, with a Environment particular interest in Kevin McClean Flexibility school buildings.
Form and function
Identity Deirdre Hanamy is Principal of Blackrock Integration Further Education Deirdre Hanamy Institute. Interconnect
Light Derek West is a former Loose furniture Principal of Newpark and is Publications Pedagogical Derek West Editor for NAPD. imperatives
Process Valerie Mulvin is a Project manager partner in McCullough Mulvin, Architects, and Space Valerie Mulvin was Head Designer on Time-span the BCFE project/
Timetable Martin McKenna of Vision Smith & Kennedy, Architects, was the Well-Being Martin McKenna Head Designer for the Newpark project.
Editing, narrative and commentary [in green] by Derek West; Photography by Charlie McManus, Bob Ryan 96 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:38 Page 97
DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND SKILLS – THE PLANNING & BUILDING UNIT AND THE INSPECTORATE
Eamonn Greville and Kevin McClean
“Promoting the whole area level, but it’s accommodation for pupils of integration and that’s key with special educational needs, where in design” you‘re providing accommodation in mainstream schools. There’s a technical guidance document up on the web at the Eamonn Greville: My official title is Senior moment which I, along with the Architect in the Planning and Building Unit inspectorate and other colleagues in the [PBU]. I have been there since 1996. I have Department, had a fairly major role in a geographic area of the country where I developing. deal with primary and post-primary schools, from small extensions to very That’s really promoting the whole area of large projects. I’m making decisions as to integration and that’s key – how you technical aspects, whether it would be develop a design that can have an inclusive better to extend, refurb, demolish, build environment and yet respect the needs of new primary sites, whatever it might be. some of these children, whose behaviours Once the principles and the decisions are and abilities and disabilities can vary. It taken, and briefs are set, I move on to the stretches from there over to special next and those trains leave the station and schools themselves, where you are dealing hopefully they don’t get delayed along the with more complex and challenging needs. way. There are over 120 of those in the country. There’s an extensive programme of Eamonn has a particular responsibility for building going on now because, special needs students, right across the historically, these buildings were built for twenty-six counties. a particular profile of child and that profile has changed considerably over the years “How you develop a design and in many cases the buildings simply that can have an inclusive can’t accommodate it. environment and yet respect “I sit in the corner of the needs of some of these classrooms, evaluating, so I get children, whose behaviours ideas of the effect of the and abilities and disabilities environment on the learning” can vary” – Eamonn Greville – Kevin McClean : That can be split into a number Eamonn Kevin McClean: I sit in the corner of of subgroups, at primary and post-primary classrooms, evaluating teaching and 97 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:38 Page 98
learning, so I get ideas of the effect of the from three to four, so that every science environment on the learning. For two or lesson and every technology lesson can three days every week I’m inspecting, so I take place in a specialist facility. I’m on a have both angles on this. committee with the NCCA, where we are developing a practical assessment in I have been working with planning and science. This will be carried out in school building for part of my time over the past laboratories, so there has to be a sufficient three years. The most recent project with number of labs when the assessment the PBU was the development of new takes place. school designs and new schedules of accommodation. We got approval for The number of new buildings over the past those design layouts just last year. number of years has been phenomenal, so the opportunity has been there to change If a school is looking for a new extension, the way schools are designed and sometimes I make an onsite visit and look pedagogical imperatives are driving at it from the educational perspective and design, rather than the other way around. from that of the school; how the curriculum is developed in the school; the Kevin looked at some specific, quite simple uptake of particular subjects; if there is a changes which have come from what seems need for additional subjects - all of that. like a new capacity to ‘think outside the box’, Because of major changes in curriculum, to ‘flip’ ideas. They were not high-cost but junior cycle reform, the National Strategy they have made a significant difference in for Literacy and Numeracy and the schools. The examples he gave were from increasing importance of using the library Science and Music. in the school, in flexible, multi-purpose ways, the opportunity has been there to Kevin: I’ve had the opportunity in the last change the way schools are designed. two to three years, in the PBU, to make changes. Some of these are very simple, Kevin is the first person at the meeting to use like, for example, making the longer wall the word ‘flexibility’, but it echoes through in the classroom the teaching wall, rather the afternoon, describing both an aspiration than the shorter wall, so that the eye-line held dear by the architects and also, distance from the student to the teacher is hopefully, as an indicator of a new culture shorter. Also, in a science lab, because of within the PBU. services, there wasn’t much wall space, so you couldn’t put a board and a screen Kevin: Where I have been coming from and beside each other; there just wasn’t the advising the Department is encompassed physical room. Now you can do that. So in the word ‘flexibility’. Flexibility in the just changing things around like that use of a school is important and to get worked really well. away from the idea of the cellular The Music Room now is moved from classroom, so that the whole space opens adjoining the General Purpose space over out, the whole environment is a shared to a specialist facility, like any other space for teachers and students. specialist subject. Teachers and the Exams Commission and other bodies, came to us FLEXIBILITY and said, ‘Look, it’s too disruptive, schools So, we’re moving the locations of are using this space for general purposes, particular rooms, we’ve increased the size not for music and music deserves its own of many rooms, looked at disability access, space’. So that’s another change, and we looked at how students store their material have introduced many more in the light of in lockers and increased the allowance for consultation, visiting schools, talking to that. There’s also a greater emphasis on principals and getting feedback from Science, Technology, Engineering & those on the ground. Mathematics [STEM] education. So, for example, in one school we’ve increased Kevin moves the discussion to first principles the number of science labs from five to – the relationship between architectural six, and the number of technology rooms vision and the pedagogy, how the flexible 98 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:38 Page 99
building can support the curriculum; ‘how anymore because if they’re working in every space can be a learning space’. groups, and the focus is on the task, somebody walking down the corridor can Kevin: The architectural flexibility can see the learning and teaching in a more improve the longevity of the building, in open environment. It encourages how it’s adaptable to meet [changing collaboration and sharing. needs] because we have to look at the end result: What kind of skills do we want the Kevin, as an inspector in the Department, is students to develop? They’re documented working on a vision that relates very much to now in Junior Cycle reform and the reform the pedagogy. I am interested in the of Senior Cycle. In the new buildings we communication of that vision through have classrooms that interconnect, so Eamonn, as the architect in the Department, we’re encouraging teachers to bring and through Martin McKenna, as an classes together. There’s a double and a architect working on a particular project, triple space, so, for example, three and through the principal and the classroom transition groups could be brought teacher. Is there a good flow of together. That single space, which would communication? be three times 58.6 square metres, can be used for various purposes: assemblies, Eamonn: A number of years ago I was in parent-teacher meetings. So in addition to Peter and Mary Doyle’s school, St. a library space and a general purpose Brendan’s CS in Birr, that came out of the space, the school now has a triple 1973 post-primary schools design classroom space. It’s flexibility. competition. It chose a very simple precast structural system, reminiscent of factory The pace of change in Information units and it was put together very cleverly. Technology has spawned considerable I remember walking down the corridor, difficulty. where a number of science labs and prepping areas were all glazed. I stood Kevin: Wi-Fi and technology - I saw access there and I hadn’t seen those since I was to computer rooms as being a problem in in secondary school, and here I was just many schools before the advent of strolling down the corridor looking at students’ personal devices. So I am these things and I thought, ‘What a great currently part of a working group on Wi-Fi idea! They’ve turned it inside out.’ Now provision in schools, so that the schools that was that vision from back then but, of will be Wi-Fi enabled. This is driving the course, it changed dramatically. We closed idea that every space, not just the everything up and now we’re going back classrooms, is a learning space. to opening it up again, which I think is great. Some of those classrooms open out onto a courtyard, where that space is also enabled as a learning space. So, weather PRAGMATISM permitting, the class can be taken outside. Some schools have the music room Eamonn has a pragmatic view of the forces opening out, so that the choir can convene that can have an impact on the educational in the courtyard. vision, but also sees opportunities emerging from the new openness. I think flexibility is the key here. We are trying to get away from this cellular design Eamonn: Where I come at it, I wear the and putting in more glazing as well. architect’s hat, but there’s also the Schools have been experimenting with political and there’s the other dimension that. What we’re encouraging now is not as a public servant. There’s a real tension just a glass panel in the door but part of between the two because you want to get the wall of the classroom will be glazed or the absolute very best for the school and semi-glazed, so that, as you walk the to realise that vision, but at the same time corridor, you can see learning taking there are constraints on the purse. You’re place. The argument for students being given a finite amount of money every year. distracted is not really a good one There are things that I would like to 99 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:38 Page 100
achieve but there’s another dimension It is certainly a challenge in relation to within the Department that says that, from technology, because it is changing at such a financial point of view, it’s not possible. a pace and learning is changing at such a pace, too. This is why there’s recognition “I think what [they] have done now that teaching is not just happening now, looking at the post- within the four walls anymore. It’s outside primary brief, is to break that that. I’ve a big concern around circulation open and to start looking at because all we use it for now, is as a transition from A to B. It should be an things in a different way” – awful lot more than that. There have to be Eamonn Greville spaces where you can stop and talk or work. You know, learning can take place The system was very rigid; everybody out there in the corridor, just as much as knew what they were going to get. The in the classroom. problem was that, when everybody started to break out into their own little republics The group then began to explore the effects and to change things around, then you of these improvements on the quality of lose control of a central vision. While it learning and the wellbeing of the students. might be great for yourselves here in Dublin, because you’ve the finger on the Kevin: I think design inputs have a huge pulse of education - and this is no way to role in the students’ attitudes to learning - demean people down the country - it’s the if they feel they are in a bright, welcoming same science lab, same demonstration environment, and that their wellbeing, as room and same home economics room, well as their education, is being looked but they don’t want to make those after – it’s huge. We’re talking about more changes. The system has been somewhat than changing into more open spaces, inflexible over the years. I think what Kevin interconnecting classrooms and opening and the others have done now, looking at out onto corridors. the post-primary brief, is to break that Eamonn: When my son was in school he open and to start looking at things in a said “I hate history”. I said “I thought you different way. There is more opportunity liked history”. He said “Yeah, I like history now in terms of the feedback that comes but the class we have faces north, it’s from schools. That’s what has informed a always grim, it’s such a horrible space”. lot of what’s happened. Valerie Mulvin: What an architect’s son thing to say! TIME Eamonn: So he hated history because of We return to the question of time. Both the the classroom he was in. building projects under the spotlight here have taken an enormous length of time, 17 I found this growing flexibility and growing years in the case of BFEI, and at least the sensitivity to the students’ needs, astonishing same with Newpark. The big threat is The Department is taking the whole issue ‘technical obsolescence’ and again there’s very seriously. The learner is being brought the question of how buildings relate to the right to the centre of this process and is being new approaches to learning and how listened to, whether it’s about subjects of effectively the space is deployed. study, the school environment or the length of the lunch-break. Eamonn: Projects shouldn’t take that long. You have to try and deal with technical Kevin: Wellbeing is one of the focus obsolescence. You start on a building areas of inspection at the moment. We project; fifteen months into it, you’re have a PE inspector involved in a focused ready to equip the labs, or whatever it look at how that’s going to be developed might be, and everything has moved on; into the future. So it’s seen as extremely what you had budgeted for then is totally important and you know there’s been a lot different now. of research, at both Irish and European level, about students’ attitudes to learning. 100 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:38 Page 101
It’s not just the subject matter but how Purpose [GP] space in a school and how they feel about the subject and it ties in that should be organised. with school self-evaluation. Schools The length of lunch break is another issue looking at themselves asking students that students have views on (and so have how they feel about their subjects, how school principals and teachers). We can they find their learning is going in a very often see it being shortened in general way and what can improve. school. This used to be an hour, but it’s So the student voice is now becoming gone down to half an hour in many cases. much more prominent and when we go Students are just getting the day over into schools, we meet students as part of really rapidly. So is that a good thing or a the evaluation. We meet them individually bad thing? It leaves little time for or in groups or in the classroom, meet socialising outside the formal curriculum. them formally and informally and listen to We have bigger schools saying, ‘Look the students and hear what they have to say GP space is not large enough.’ But then we about this. So that has influenced much of ask, ‘Well, are there two sittings for lunch, the flexibility and design, but also what because it’s not designed for one sitting? students would like to see in a General
Newpark Comprehensive School
Architect’s perspective on the new school from Newtownpark Avenue
It seems to me, there are two clients involved “The new building for us is in school buildings: the Department [or the fantastic!” ETB] and the person on the ground, the end- users, Derek Lowry and Deirdre Hanamy in this instance. I was interested in the gap between the main client and the end-user, as well as where they coincide, so I turned first to Derek Lowry. While his delight with the new school is apparent, he concentrated on describing the challenges facing a principal who is involved in a building project. He made light of the time and energy that was required, but he had a lot to say about the demand for instant expertise in an area that is remote from the qualifications and normal competence of a school leader. Derek Lowry 101 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:38 Page 102
Derek Lowry. I have worked with Martin equipment procurement, which is a very on this project since I became Principal of substantial piece of work in a bigger Newpark in 2006. Derek West [my school. predecessor] would have been working with Martin from 2001. It’s been a long, When Derek became a principal, in 2006, arduous journey, but I would preface it to nothing in his training or leadership CPD say that the new building for us is would have prepared him for what turned fantastic. There are so many aspects of it out to be an enormous task. Because of the which are a huge improvement on what we demands of the demographics, and because had before. In terms of light and space, in many of the older buildings are unfit for comparison to what we were in before purpose, there is going to be a demand for [where we had the single, flat-roofed more and more new school buildings. A major building], they are the two words that change is afoot, and more and more anybody coming to the school will always principals are going to be drawn into this mention, because it’s just such a lovely process. open space. That General Purpose area has given students and staff a really big Derek: That’s the reality for most positive. principals. Even in the time that I’ve been at it, I have taken calls from other “The way in which a school principals, similar to the calls that I would develops means that your have made myself in the past. So I am perspective after 10 years is looking at what I’ve learned from this different to what it was at process and what I might be able to hand on to those who are coming afterwards. the start of the process” - Derek Lowry Martin McKenna and Kevin McClean pick up on the issue of classroom size, which has been Derek: When you’re not the client, it increased from 49 to 58.6 square metres, as makes the interactions with the architect part of the new standards for schools, and and the contractor strained at times. I how it relates directly to the new kind of hope that, in the future, these will be much learning that is coming on-stream through shorter processes. For us it began long curricular reform. Again ‘flexibility’ emerges ago with a Schedule of Accommodation, as a concept, determining the appropriate originally agreed in the mid-2000s, and floor-space for varied kinds of learning. The then discussed, but never substantially timetable is a vital tool in making this work. changed. The way in which a school develops means that your perspective after 10 years is different to what it was at the start of the process.
Derek is clear [and this is echoed later by Deirdre] that the principal of a school that is being built or refurbished requires a lot more support from the DES.
Derek: Most principals will only ever do this once [thank God you’ll only ever have to do it once!] but it struck me that every principal seems to be ringing up other principals in relation to it and saying, ‘How do you do this?’ or ‘What should you do in relation to that?’ As a principal you’re learning all that for the first time. We were fortunate in that we were able to access some expertise within our own parent body in relation to furniture and Martin McKenna 102 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:38 Page 103
Martin: … so half a metre bigger all the Is this a different architectural project than way around, but there are options, within you would have in a different kind of building? that, to give the configuration of furniture We’re talking about the school plan, the layout [for active learning and group- architect designing it, a whole relationship work], plus the traditional layout, so that with the Building Unit and then a you can use the classroom for history, relationship with the people on the ground. maths, whatever subject suits that space, and it has the flexibility to do it either way Martin: Somebody once described being an architect as a bit like spinning plates, Kevin: There used to be just two or three and there’s an awful lot of plates to keep larger classrooms in schools – for maths turning all at the one time, from the and social studies, geography. We got Department of Education to the client to feedback from many schools and many the builder to costs, to even running a principals, so the standard classroom has business on our part, which is a bit like gone up in size and this is to you trying to run a school as well as build accommodate group work. They’re coming the building. in from primary school where they’ve been used to sitting in clustered groups. The Martin went on to consider the particular teacher has that option now because the problems of dealing with an existing building, focus will be on autonomous learning, and such as BFEI, not purpose-built, alongside the on every room being a computer room, so specific prescriptions of the PBU. Deirdre there has to be space to use those added in the further complication of this computers or tablets. being a listed building, with considerable There also has to be disability access and restrictions on the alterations that could be circulation around the space when you made. The ‘management of expectations’ have 30 students in those larger alongside compliance with the classrooms. We think we have addressed predetermined criteria of the DES that, but there is also a suite of smaller contribute to the difficulties Derek Lowry rooms in a new school, 38.5 square mentioned earlier and impact on the metres, and these rooms will timescale of the project. accommodate up to 20 students. These are designed so that subjects with a “Somebody once described smaller uptake would have the same circulation space and the same room but being an architect as a bit we are emphasising that these rooms are like spinning plates, and only for use to a maximum of 20 students. there’s an awful lot of plates All specialist rooms are larger. For to keep turning all at the one example, a science lab in the new designs time” – Martin McKenna is 10% larger than it used to be, and the same applies to all the other specialist Martin: It makes it that much harder rooms. We’re looking at circulation and because in a sense we’re designing our access and students being able to carry own rooms. I am familiar with everything out experiments and investigations in a where it should be, but with an existing safe environment, because otherwise we building we’re forced to put them have overcrowding in the space. in a different place than you envisage. One of the areas that are very important is There is a difference between what the that the timetable matches the school Department set as a brief and the design and that you don’t have the smaller expectations of the users in the school, classrooms as teacher-based rooms; that not just the principal, but right down to these are used in a very flexible way for the art teacher or the science teacher, [‘No, subjects such as Applied Maths, or maybe no, I want my fume cupboard over my a language. door because I can keep an eye on the kids!’]. In an ideal world we’d just stick I then ask Martin McKenna about the with what we’re given as a brief and architectural process with a school building. contractually paid for, and say, ‘I am sorry, 103 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:39 Page 104
but this is what you’re getting.’ Normally potential in the new spaces, particularly ‘The we just say that it won’t make any Hub’. difference to move the fume cupboard across because it has no bearing on Derek: From students’ view, it’s been anything contractually, or operation-wise, hugely uplifting, it has made a difference. but we do that just because there’s In terms of respect for the building, we are common sense to it. there now five months and, in terms graffiti, we haven’t had any, and that’s a So the difficulty is trying to redesign what really positive aspect of the being in the the Department has set as a standard [and new building. We’d had no experience of very sensibly, because it applies across to stairs in the previous building so we every school in the country] to the wondered if we were going to be bumping particular needs and the particular into one another. So we said, ‘Right, you circumstances of that site. If it’s an go up on the right and you come down on existing building, you can’t have a the right’ and we’ve had no issue with that standard-sized room, so you modify at all. So that’s been really positive. accordingly. They are the things that take time, so it is like trying to spin the two plates at the same time in respect of those differences. I think the biggest problem is the timescale from when it’s initiated to when it’s completed. That timescale [with Newpark it was more than 15 years] can force you to rethink things that you thought had been put to bed.
Martin stressed the importance of the early engagement between the school principal, The General Purpose Area – bright and spacious; the architect and the Department, so that a natural gathering point. They want to call it ‘The Hub’. issues, such as the four science labs or five, can be flagged early on. A late change-of- In relation to the General Purpose Area, mind can be very diff icult – involving extra which we want to call ‘The Hub’, it really work, hassle and money. has made a big difference. From 8 o’clock in the morning they’ll come in, they’ll sit Martin: In the next month, we’re probably around, they’ll chat, they’ll do whatever going to put in a tiered demonstration they have to do and disperse. We have science room in at St. Brendan’s, and I was some very good tables and benches and thinking, ‘Should we be doing that?’ But we are going to increase the numbers of it’s contractually in place, that’s what was them. designed and paid for. To change that now As part of that process we’ve got the Fifth would be a nightmare for me because it Year construction and engineering classes just generates work and hassle. When to design them. This was an issue which you’re in a contract with a builder, and you came from the students so they’ve actually change your mind, it costs money. And gone to the Parent-Teacher Association that’s the other plate to spin - money. It all with some designs. We’re following comes down to what it costs to change through on that. It is a credit to the design something that’s been agreed and that there are places where they can have established and set as a budget at a the chats at lunchtime and there are places particular time. where the ones who are that bit shy don’t have to be out in the hurly burly of the I asked Derek to share any feedback about yard. I think that’s great. the new buildings, which he’d had from the students. Derek concentrated on the benefits Eamonn and Kevin wanted to share their of improved circulation and the social thoughts on some of the other physical 104 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:39 Page 105
aspects of schools – lockers, toilets, PE halls, Kevin: We’ve been encouraging schools to fitness suites. They convey a sense that the have the wash hand basins open to the fine detail of design is now being brought to corridor, rather than being enclosed so to bear on maximising the positive experience have better supervision and also to use the of school. PE hall as a multipurpose space, for school concerts, for performances and other Eamonn: You remember the old school activities. In more recent designs, the corridors which were quite generous, but, fitness suite is coming up to ground level, at break times and between class times, so there is better access, and its when the bell rang, those corridors filled up what looked like thousands of kids, at At this stage, Derek Lowry, was under three layers of lockers. You know you pressure to get to another meeting, so I could reach the top one, but the poor asked them if there was anything that he did unfortunates at the bottom got things not want to leave unsaid. He focused on Wi- dropped on their heads. Fi and Special Needs.
Kevin: The lockers in the new designs are Derek: One of the areas that have really two-tiered lockers, they’re larger and they changed over the years, since Martin can take sports bags. In addition to would have done the original design, is IT circulation, in a 1000-pupil school there’s and that is proving to be the most also 160 square metres for social areas. problematic area of the new building. It You have the General Purpose space, and would have been cabled basically for IT in there is also dedicated social space across the beginning and then there was a bit of the building that’s not part of circulation, to-ing and fro-ing and it was quite late so that students have various parts of the before it was agreed that there would be school to congregate and meet. the facility for Wi-Fi. Eamonn: It is very nice to have a social space where you can sit down at a window or something or read a book and or have a chat with a group or even teach in it if that ever should happen. But the reality in a school is the social space is where the toilets are, where they all congregate together en masse in the ten minutes they have, because, as soon as school is finished, they leg it home. But all of the social activity does happen in corridors and lockers. , ,
Moving people up and down three sets of stairs was a new challenge at Newpark. Most of the old building was on one level. I have an IT co-ordinator, a very enthusiastic teacher, but he has no real expertise in Wi-Fi. This is one area where Circulation through the school is eased by wide, more investment is going to have to be put well-lit corridors. The lockers are cheery, ample on a current basis, rather than just on and easily accessible. capital, to help schools to get the right IT. 105 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:40 Page 106
Because what happened was that we had minutes to an hour. I have heard both to use whatever the guidelines were for IT, positive and negative feedback on this, but to put in the wireless provision and go schools believe, because of junior cycle through that tender process for the reform, that there will be a lot more wireless provision. Having gone through activity within the subjects, so that an hour that, we still didn’t have enough isn’t too long. Students are only moving knowledge to say whether or not the six times a day rather than eight times a company that won the tender was day, so you have less congestion in the educationally as good as they should have corridors. been. It’s important that we look at the end The other problem is special needs. We result, the learning, what we want to have the biggest special needs hours [360 achieve and the different kinds of spaces per week] in the country and we have had we need. The ‘new’ students are to use some of the group rooms for autonomous learners, good researchers; students withdrawn from classes. So I‘ve they can prepare work, they can do group had a situation where the special needs work, they can present their work. students have had to be factored into a Interconnected classrooms support design that didn’t really take them in to interdisciplinary learning, because we are account. asking teachers of different disciplines to bring classes together, to work together. Last year we had a lot of meetings about this. We‘ve always been very inclusive and So we have to create the space to allow we’d agreed to accept Autistic Syndrome that to happen. Sometimes, in a Disorder [ASD] students. But we didn’t conventional classroom, there is group want two new buildings on our campus. work but you can’t actually move the Now, we do have on the campus a listed desks, because the space is too small. building, still being refurbished, and that’s There has to be that end result, driving the where we would hope to house the ASD design and flexibility of the learning students. We also have classrooms for spaces within the school to become more ordinary subjects in the building so we effective and that’s what we have don’t really see it as the special unit area. attempted to do with the changes. But I have the conflict between the special The provision of Wi-Fi technology can play needs teacher saying, ‘These are all the a huge role if it’s used effectively, reducing, things we need to do for these students,’ say, the number of computer rooms in the and I’m saying ‘Do you really need the school from four back to two, but by room for their [emotional] blowouts?’ So I making the classrooms larger, students will be going back to the Department after don’t have to access the computer room, the project to say, ‘We need to do some except for very specialist areas. small re-configuration of the rooms.’ Eamonn: Just taking up on Derek Lowry’s I’m really interested in the challenge of point on special needs: one of the biggest how you integrate more of your resource challenges at post-primary is that pupils teachers into the classroom, especially if with special needs are coming from a you have a large number of special needs structure where they were classroom- students. based to a structure that is teacher-based Martin: It’s easier said than done. and where they have to move for every period and that’s a hugely difficult task for Kevin: There is no ideal solution as to a lot of students. how each individual school uses the resources, be they staff resources or I don’t know what the solution to it is but physical resources. It’s unique to the I think that’s where the visionary principal school and there are never enough can start looking from the top down at that resources. level of integration and inclusion. So the timetable plays a huge role in that. Martin: They’re putting in beanbags in I’ve been a few schools recently where Newpark, I haven’t seen them yet. I class periods have been changed from 40 thought, how long will they last? 106 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:40 Page 107
Valerie: Oh, they’ll last for ever. I think can’t afford to put a glazed panel beside every library in the country will have it. That idea is great, but unless there’s a beanbags. slight adjustment to the basic building cost for those things to happen, we’re Martin: The kids will just sit out in the going to have to find it somewhere else. corridors and in particular spaces where Even the plaster off the wall has been there’s nice light. It’s an experiment, we’ll reduced; you can’t go any further; you can see if it works. But it does lead on to what take the paint off the wall as well. The we were discussing earlier, the time-lapse good ideas that are well worth doing still between when it was first designed and do cost money. It always does come down when it goes on site, and in that time scale to money. the major changes, whether it’s regulations, like disability access, or even The other thing is the long corridor length just building standards that you’re now against the room-orientated length. The working on. I think everybody would agree reason we turn it at 90 degrees to the that those new standards are far, far better corridor is because we can make our 18% than what we have at the moment. But the circulation work. If that turns sideways, it’s time lapse even for them to be going to make it really difficult to make implemented is going to be probably the circulation percentage work with the another two years. new configuration if everybody has the corridor alongside. We priced doors down to €976.76; we just
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Blackrock Further Education Institute
The façade of the BFEI at Newtown Avenue. From left to right: the original Fire Station doorway, the new extension, the Town Hall, the Public Library and the old Technical School.
Deirdre Hanamy was the hostess for this been a lot changes in the range of Further meeting and she began by outlining the Education [FE] courses over the time of this unique features of the College and how the project, so what had been designed was demands of Further Education differ from on paper for a long time and had to be those of mainstream second-level. amended to cater for the changing and additional accommodation requirements. “Absolutely delighted” We visited other new buildings [the Cavan Institute, a purpose-built FE College, on a Deirdre Hanamy: I am absolutely large, open site and St. John’s Central delighted to be in this new college. There College of FE in Cork] to get advice and wasn’t a stick of furniture here on the First ideas, but in the end it came back to what of June, 2014 and yet we were fully was the best way to build in Blackrock, to operational by the Fourteenth of make additions or changes for our own September, for the start of the academic specific needs. The fact that BFEI was not year. So that was good, and that was a being built on a green-field site meant that huge job. we had limited opportunities to make Three principals were involved in this changes or to implement the ideas we saw project. It started in 1996 with Jack Griffin. in other institutions. Then in 2004, Barry O’Callaghan The first sod was turned in August 2010 continued the work, securing approval and [Barry O’Callaghan was the principal then], funding for the new building. In January but by the following June the builders had 2011, I became principal and worked with gone into liquidation. It took another year architects and builders to complete the to get the project back up and going. So project. really when I came on board we had to It was designed as a Further Education work with what was there, to move it College [We don’t deliver the Junior Cert. around and change things to get it as close or Leaving Cert. curriculum] but there have as possible to meeting our needs. 108 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:42 Page 109
Deirdre pointed out that the requirements of Martin: … ring the Department and say, a FE College are very different from those of ‘Sorry, this isn’t working anymore. When a second-level school and are not necessarily will you have five grand or ten grand to compatible with the same schedules of change this from A to B, because it just accommodation doesn’t make sense?’ Then the Department will go through due process Deirdre: The Department of Education was because that has to be done. You have to very supportive of the project, so when we prove to them that you’re not spending had to add a sheet [to the Schedule of money on something that you shouldn’t Accommodation], and put in what you be doing. need, say, for Beauty Therapy, the DES was very good for everything we put in for. The So how do you manage, on a fixed budget in a rapidly-altering educational landscape? project started under Dun Laoghaire VEC “You keep that change to a minimum”, but by 2013 we had moved into the ETB, suggests Deirdre: “You try to change only under a new CEO, Paddy Lavelle, so we lost what you really have to.” Now it was our CEO, Carol Hannay, as well as some of Deirdre’s turn to speak of her students’ the people who had been behind the feedback. They’re older, some of them are project from the start. young parents, they come and they go, as Echoing Derek Lowry’s earlier point about part of a flexible, staggered timetable. the need for support and guidance for principals involved in school builds, Deirdre made the case for a Project Manager to be involved.
PROJECT MANAGER Deirdre: I think for such a massive project you need a Project Manager. I’d recommend also that the principal should be released from running the school, at least for the last 12 months of the build. It is nearly impossible. We had to move the school from Dun Laoghaire. It was phenomenal. You’re even nearly too busy to explain to people how busy you are! Now we had a Clerk of Works – that was helpful - but at the end of the day you need to be on site a lot, going around the classrooms, the computer rooms, to know exactly where you want it. You’ve got to have such a huge knowledge of it, that I think the principal would need to be released. Now the end-result is super and everyone is thrilled. I’ve learnt an awful lot, but there is a huge demand on your time.
Deirdre cited the example of the electrics in the building, how the specification and location had changed, as they had ‘moved on so much’ in the 18 months since they’d signed One of the two courtyards in the College [the other, the atrium is the main social space in the off. Once they were on site, they had building, featured on the cover]. This is open to identified new needs and changes were going the skies with a fern-filled floor, recalling the to involve increased costs. Martin pointed mountain backdrop to the place, and interrupted out how difficult this can be. As he said, You by conical light shafts to the library below. [Based can’t very well… on a description by Valerie Mulvin]. 109 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:43 Page 110
Deirdre: Our students are mainly 18 or “We’ve got to use our roofs. In over. They love it. Some of them would every country in Europe never have been in our old building people are using the roofs of because they come to us for a year or two, max. We operate from 9:00 to 5:00, so we their schools because it is valid never have a fixed lunch. It’s rolling; it has space and you have control to be, because otherwise the space over it” [Valerie Mulvin] wouldn’t work for us. Not every class starts at 9 o’clock in the Valerie: The thing we really wanted to do morning. We might have a group starting was to open up the roof terrace and to at 11 and have a break at 2 o’clock; or we make a 1.8metre railing all the way have some morning groups that are around, set back from the edge. There timetabled between 9:00 and 1:00, so that would be no danger, whatsoever, of a lot of them might just have their short anybody throwing themselves over. We break and leave at 1 o’clock, collecting tried to push it with the planners, but we children etc. It’s a bit different to a regular didn’t get very far. There is a very active secondary school. Certainly we love our residents association on that side [of the general space, but it can be hard to keep building] which is why all of the clean! A big issue for us is the smoking. classrooms have opaque glass in so many When you’ve got 870 students you can’t of the windows. But I think in the future police that. We’ve a lot of students who that will change: the roof has been smoke. They congregate outside and I designed that it can be added later and I can’t actually stop them, because they are think that’s the big opportunity for a on the public pavement. Students are building like this. We’ve got to use our students at that age, but, on the whole, roofs. In every country in Europe people they are very respectful of the area. are using the roofs of their schools because it is valid space and you have control over it. And it is up in the air; it’s not affecting anybody with smoke. Eamonn: We have a project in the Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown area at the moment where we have been conditioned to provide a green roof. We appealed and we lost. You know if you take it on one building it’s fine, but it has implications for everyone else. Valerie: But don’t you think, though, in the best of all possible worlds, forgetting The sash windows of the original Town Hall offer a about budgets (which, of course, guide an view of the new social space awful lot of the decisions that are made) that [a] it would be very sustainable to have a green roof and [b] particularly in “I think we should have the city schools, where there is so little space, places flooded with light” it should be possible for us to make ways of doing it? We all know it can be done safely and we all know it can be done -- Valerie Mulvin arrives to the table and gives Rutland Street is a very good example and a new impetus and a new direction to the so is Belvedere; any number of schools. discussion speaking first about her work on Eamonn: I have special school projects at the Blackrock project. Her themes were to the moment where they are on such do with flexibility, circulation and, above all, restricted sites that we have to go up and light. Valerie had given this some thought: she put in an external area on first and second is a great advocate of using roof-space floor level. whenever possible. Valerie: Is it the precedent that you are 110 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:45 Page 111
worried about? That people will ask, ‘Why Derek West: Are we too politically correct can’t I have one of them?’ for our own good? Eamonn: Primarily it’s the cost, Valerie, if Deirdre: I mean all that mesh on the back you have to replicate that on X number of of the windows projects across the board. But again the Valerie: Plus the opaque glass. tide is turning a little bit on this and we are facing into a new era of sustainability. We Eamonn: Well, the other side is what we have decent guidelines in relation to all of were talking earlier – about the joy of this on the web, and green roofs are just space and light. But you know, you’re another part of it. We have other projects teaching, you’re in a class, you’re not where because of a restricted site we’ve standing up at the window, looking out the had no option but to go up and put play- window! space above ground-floor level, looking at different types of roof scenarios. Valerie: No, it’s more just that you can look out and go, ‘Oh the sun is shining! It’s This moved the conversation to the issue of great!’ Or you can see the view. It is an the potential clash between public good and occasional thing. private concerns. Eamonn: And, by and large, homes are occupied up to half-eight, nine o’clock in Martin: We tried to do the same. We are the morning, after which most people working on a primary school and we are leave to go and do things, and the people building on their playground so they are come back to their houses at five o’clock losing a substantial amount, but we tried or half-past in the evening, when the to put it on the roof or, rather, looked at school is closed and when everyone is it, but it wasn’t the Department of gone. Education, it was the neighbours just would not have kids overlooking into their “It’s more just that you can gardens. look out and go, ‘Oh the sun is Valerie: I just think that the balance of shining! It’s great!’ Or you can things has gone a bit wrong: the balance see the view. It is an occasional of public good over private individuals’ needs to be mediated. thing” [Valerie Mulvin]
‘The architectural promenade from the front doors up a grand staircase to the piano mobile, terminating in the Assembly Room running the length of the building’ – Valerie Mulvin’s description of the 1865 Town Hall entrance, preserved in the new college building. 111 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:46 Page 112
Derek West: It is a work in progress, isn’t Valerie: We were really lucky with this it? We’re all at different stages on this school, first of all, because everybody was journey. so patient and it went on for so long that nobody thought it would ever finish. What Eamonn: Obviously, Valerie, you’ve was great was to have these existing changed the function of this building and, buildings here, that had all this potential from what you’re saying, that’s a huge to be unlocked. The biggest challenge for challenge, isn’t it? us was taking the Schedule of
Spectacular roof-light in the Board Room at BFEI 112 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:49 Page 113
‘The principle of keeping as much as possible of the original fabric’ [Valerie Mulvin] External moulding incorporated into the new building.
Accommodation and finding the best use EXTRACTS FROM ‘JOURNAL OF for the old rooms. The classrooms are A PLAGUE YEAR’ easy, in that if you can make something that’s relatively rational, you can generally Gandon Editions of Kinsale have published sort of out different sizes of classrooms a book, Blackrock Quartet, 2014, which is and so on, but the real challenge is to find a beautifully-illustrated account of the really good uses for old spaces. conversion of the buildings in Blackrock to form the BFEI and Public Library. There are contributions from Valerie Mulvin, Raymund Ryan, Hugh Campbell and Niall McCullough, who describes, in the extracts below, the effects of recession and recovery on the project. [Reproduced here by kind permission of the author] In Ireland, around 2008, an over- stimulated economy based on property crashed; construction projects were abandoned; building contractors went bankrupt…. The beginnings of recession are hard to define. Our perceptions were, in any case,
Original brick-work and new timber, Restored banister and ironwork on the stair case side by side, in BFEI. to the original Assembly Room. 113 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:50 Page 114
construction remain pure, unproven ideas caught in the aspic of drawings and models. Architecture is an art with its own slow language…. Working in historic contexts, often with old buildings, adding on to them, changing them to new uses, invites an appreciation, both of the relationship of architecture to time and the mutability of physical things. … While the proposal – the architecture – remains at the core, the built result is potentially fragile, susceptible to change. Blackrock, which was very much about the combination of new and old architecture, went through a process of decay before being saved, and was eventually completed. Both structures [they were working at another project at the time of the crash] became ruins when the work stopped, not gradually, but immediately – a reflection on the nature of construction. Blackrock started, stopped, started again, stopped and then, after a long period, restarted and was completed. For two years, this city of plain rooms designed for education hummed in the sea wind, dripping and creaking accompanied by the flapping of A reminder of the original colour scheme, left in situ for posterity plastic sheets; exposed construction, freed of intent, revealed its raw beauty. naïve: the practice had never experienced Visits had a scarecrow character, lost souls recession, or had been too young to drifting down rotting corridors into understand they were in one. This was a derelict rooms, like a trip through a hastily slow ebbing of tides, fewer mails, quieter abandoned city. phones; some projects halted overnight, others drifted on for months, dogged by In the end, it was all recovered and rumour and speculation. repaired; the only mark of that time panels of original surface left unpainted in each Our practice became enmeshed in room, squared and rectangles of russet contractors’ bankruptcies, suddenly and green like ancient wall paintings. expert in balance sheets, bonds, loss adjustor’s details. Many people emigrated; we stayed, but had little to do. NEW USES FOR OLD BUILDINGS When architecture stops it’s a waste of TALKING TO VALERIE MULVIN time and ideas. Architects carry projects like a burning fire within them, a mass of “We’ve such a big stock of thoughts laid out for others to parse buildings, so many old buildings through; clients find what they need, but seldom get in at the private core of intent. that need to be brought along. … When they are cancelled, the grief is They don’t have to be private. dumped – there’s so much However, there is a refinement to potential in them that can be bereavement; projects abandoned before just unlocked.” 114 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:50 Page 115
A prior engagement meant that Valerie joined the discussion in its final hour and much of it then turned to the BFEI and the fact that it had found its home in an existing building, bucking the trend of the 1960s when demolition and new-builds were the order of the day. I cited the spread throughout Ireland of ‘one-off’ bungalows in rural areas and the fact that perfectly good traditional farmhouses were abandoned, or filled with hay bales, and the new dwellings were built alongside them. There are some people who recognise the integrity of those old buildings and other people who can’t wait to get out of them. “You’re suggesting that we have to look at those old buildings and see, as you’ve done here, and see how they can be put to new uses.” Valerie spoke to this idea with utter conviction: “I think it would be brilliant if the Valerie Mulvin Department felt it was possible to take on existing schools more. That’s much more in the same direction and it’s a matter of difficult because there are so many persuading the Department of Finance that un-quantifiable bits, so you need people this is a more sustainable thing to do who are very skilled at doing it. It would be because you’re starting with it already great if you could have a radical attitude three-quarters built. It’s hard to say to to conservation and you could bring rooms somebody that it’s still going to cost you into use that nobody had found a use for. nearly as much to bring it up to a modern You could make rooms that were fantastic, standard as it is to build it anew, but and which you could never afford to do, if you’re doing so many other things for the you were starting from scratch. With this community that it really makes sense. fantastic board room with its lantern roof “It should be possible to get one idea [see opposite page] we had to move this tested in every school, it doesn’t matter lantern from another part of the building what it is, but just to say, ‘This is a design to this location, in order to get the challenge and you’ve got to go and sort circulation through the building to work. It this out. Off you go and use your was an enormous challenge to do all of ingenuity, see if it works!’ And some of that but it was a fantastic opportunity, and them will and some of them won’t. But that we loved doing it. kind of partnership would be brilliant, if “Over the next 20 years we have to find people were able to say, ‘Let’s test just one really good uses for all these buildings, thing in every school.’ modern, flexible ways of working within “There is a definite change from everybody old buildings and for people to enjoy. If about how we go about ‘stuff’. Some of it you think of Georgian buildings, they’re is to do with things like the Google-type probably the most flexible buildings you spaces that people understand how much can think of: they can be theatres, they can fun people have in buildings, and when be bars, they can be places where people they have a fun and they enjoy being in live and sleep and work - they’re really them, everything goes better, they learn flexible. better, they work better. Why does Google do it? Not because they want people to THE COST ‘ISSUE’, THE ‘DESIGN have fun but because they want to make CHALLENGE’ AND HAVING FUN more money out of them. And it’s clearly “The cost issue will have to be dealt with. I working because everybody loves working believe firmly that everybody wants to go them. 115 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:50 Page 116
“When they have a fun and Conclusions they enjoy being in them, everything goes better, they learn better, they work As the discussion drew to a conclusion everyone around the table was in better” agreement that there was a need for more of this kind of dialogue, to start COMMUNICATION people thinking more about form and function and the quality of school “The challenge here [in Blackrock] was to design, between clients, end-users and try and integrate the old and the new and designers, perhaps on a more formal to try and pull it all together on one site. basis. The best thing for us, even though it took so long, was the different bodies of people Some very interesting points emerged: were able to talk together, to come up with l The need for the principal to a sort of land swap, which worked for be supported everybody. The library got doubled in size, the college got as much space as it could l The need for school building have on the site and we got our extension. projects to be much shorter So that all worked very well, but there are l huge challenges in school buildings on The need for flexibility in precisely those things that you were adapting to key changes that talking about. occur between design and construction, e.g. the advent of Wi-Fi CIRCULATION “Circulation, to me, is flexibility and about Our understanding of the workings of the possibility of opening the classroom the PBU was enriched. With the walls a bit. Even here I remember we had increase in the population of school- to go to the ends of the earth to get in four going children the Unit faces a huge folding partitions between classrooms. challenge in providing basic And I know that it costs a little more but accommodation for these students truly, in terms of the overall flexibility that and ensuring the quality of school it brings to buildings, it’s something that building so that it is fit-for-purpose, could be factored into budgets. An not only now, but into the future. operating theatre is going to double in While there was a call for ‘visionary’ cost over 12 months and schools school leaders, i.e. those who could stubbornly stay at the same very, very low identify the needs of their schools and level. I don’t mind the fact that there’s no also maximise the use of the buildings plaster on walls, but it is frustrating that it at their disposal, it was clear that is so difficult to make spaces outside of visionary designers have a lot to offer the corridors and that the corridors to education. themselves are so tied down. Martin McKenna has managed a new build on an old and difficult site. This HOW MUCH LIGHT COMES IN involved much demolition, the “The other big thing for me is the provision of a temporary pre-fab relationship of wall to window. I think we accommodation, the clearing of a should have the places flooded with light. space for the new enlarged building I know there’s a certain view that it is and the restoration of a 19th Century going to cost a little more to heat, but to house on-site – all of this in the face of me the whole psychological and ‘business as usual’ for a school of over phenomenological enjoyment of a building 800 students, a Music Centre, a Sports is to do with how much light comes in. Centre and an Adult Education programme. I said that I’d come to this meeting
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feeling that it might be a bit advice from the DES: “I don’t think it’s depressing [because of my memories beyond the DES to have something there of the early stages of the Newpark in relation to your furniture and project when the hill was very steep], equipment, what’s within the contract, and but I was impressed by the changes this is what you do, to put together that have taken place in the last ten something which would guide the years. principals in how to go about the tendering process, the e-journal and all of that.” Martin: “It’s constantly improving. Ten years ago the standards that we were Valerie Mulvin gave an example of the applying to schools were a heck of a lot rigidity that once characterised the PBU: “I worse than what we’re doing at the remember, years ago, working on a moment and I can see that they’re going Department building and we got the whole to be even better. So it’s the time-lapse thing done, and then we got a letter back [between the planning and the completion] from the Department saying “You’re 18 that is the challenge. I think this square metres over on a 4,000-square- engagement, particularly for a principal, metre school, so, sorry, the process is before it goes out to contract, when it’s halted until you’ve sorted that out.” I’m too late to change everything, is very sure there’s flexibility built into the briefs important. Sometimes I don’t think they now.” really understand what it is they’re looking Eamonn was quick to reassure her: “I at until it’s on site, and then it’s too late. would hate to think, Valerie, that there are There needs to be an earlier letters come out from the Department understanding or engagement and today saying that the project is stopping communication generated, so that that because of 18 square metres, because, if makes it less traumatic when you see it that’s the case, I have approved many being built. multiples of that.” He also expressed belief in the capacity of Eamonn outlined some of the reforms in creativity to prevail over cost – “It’s going the PBU: “It’s beginning to change and to be a big factor but, if you’re creative certainly the new standards, turning all and you look to the strengths of the classrooms, side-on to the corridor, means individual project, and at the uniqueness that the other side is all window-wall, so that each project brings, then there are there’s more light and it’s a shallower ways in which you can squeeze a bit more depth. So they are all improvements. out of it.” “Unfortunately it does come back to cost. Deirdre Hanamy dwelt on the balance that We would love to let the reins loose, and it is needed between the requirements of the does happen sometimes, with the likes of school, entrusted largely to the principal, the Kingswood competition buildings [See and the need to accessible technical page …]. Those designs are looking at the expertise. ”The big thing is to look at latest ways in which education can be resourcing the principal to do that work. It delivered. is phenomenal to run a school and to manage a building project at the same “If there was one message, for me it is time. We have a clerk of works but about functionality. We can have fantastic sometimes they aren’t maybe fully up to buildings, but if the end-user is not happy speed on all your requirements. You need because the building is not functional, the practitioner in there somewhere. You then we get to hear about it. That’s what also need someone that knows the detail you try and achieve: a functional building. of all the electrical and IT stuff. And the I see myself as a facilitator. I am an biggest problem is that once they’ve spent architect by profession and I am a public the fees, they’re not going back to look at servant, but I hope I understand what the it again.” school principal is trying to get. I see everything that’s presented and a lot of Derek Lowry suggested that the school schools won’t understand what’s put up leader needs more support and practical on the screen in front of them. It is my job 117 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:51 Page 118
Deirdre Hanamy and Derek West
to paint the picture for them, to find out if budget item, and being able to solve those they understand, and to get it across the problems in enough time for the next line, so that, at the end of it, they do have school which is being built. The line of a building that works. It is really that form communication and the engagement, follows function. whether it’s a forum like this or just principals putting in the problems of “The funny thing, you know, is we built procurement of ICT, is vital.” model schools at the beginning of the education system. [We’ve a wonderful one “I described the Department to somebody at the back of the Department in recently, as a ‘big machine’. There are Marlborough Street.] Kingswood is a bit about 3,700 primary schools, over 700 like that model school, it is modern post-primary schools and about 120 version. We do need these buildings to be special schools – so that makes about able to test new ideas. You need these 4,500. For the Department to visit one one-off projects that break the mould. It is school every day would take 12 or 13 one thing for the Department to go and do years. Between 30% and 50% of the schools that, but it needs to be led from the top in the country have some form of building down in the school and if you’ve got the project going on at the moment, whether visionary principal, and we are prepared to it’s emergency works, summer works, invest into it, you can have a fantastic devolved grants, but it’s all funded from outcome at the end of it. the Building Unit in Tullamore. It’s the biggest estate I suppose that the country “Kingswood is future-proofing the idea of has and that kind of puts it in perspective. a school building, too, as far as one can manage. The problem is in the continuum “I find myself in a very privileged position, of school buildings: there are schools way because when you’re at the coalface, behind, in terms of the last time somebody you’re shaping things for the generations put money into them, which still have to to come; what we’re doing today, in terms teach this new, evolving curriculum; to of these briefs or policies, might not hit keep them on board is a huge challenge. the desks or the screens of the designers for another two years. The actual physical “Communication and feedback are vital: realisation of that might not be for another between what the Department set as a three or four years. So, it’s a bit like the standard and how it will act out as a mobile phone technology, those guys 118 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:51 Page 119
know what the next handset is going to be Derek West: I think there are three vital like, it’s just we haven’t seen it yet. That’s ingredients you’ve identified: (i) The a bit like what we do. I also get the visionary principal; (ii) the architect who opportunity, as I know Kevin does as well, can work within the brief and find those to go to many of the schools around the extra ways of maximising the use of the country, to see those little nuggets of money, and (iii) a flexible, listening PBU in things and say, ‘That’s fantastic! That that the Department. should be in every school.’
Kingswood, Tallaght
In July 2012, the RIAI announced the winner of an architectural competition for a new school at Tallaght, Co. Dublin, to be completed by 2016. The winners were the Ayr-based, ARPL Architects. The DES intends to adopt some of the features of the winning entry as part of standard designs in future school projects.
Foyer Space by ARPL Architects for the Schools Competition 2012.
Aerial View by ARPL Architects for the Schools Competition 2012.
Outdoor Classrooms by ARPL Architects for Schools Competition.
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Don’t ignore the Acoustics
Derek West meets Colin Campbell, a man with a mission to place the right leve of sound – and silence – into schools.
the preceding article, Around the Table 2015, Eamonn Greville [Senior Architect in the Planning & Building Unit of the DES] described the scale of the ’big machine’ that is the department and warned that ‘unfortunately it does come back to cost.’ With all these conflicting imperatives, it’s unlikely that acoustics, being a ‘invisible subject’ often get a look-in. At least, that’s according to Colin Campbell, a soft- spoken Scot I met at the fringes of the ICP convention and who was in Helsinki to promote the need for good acoustics in learning environments on behalf of Ecophon, a Swedish provider of acoustic solutions, specifically in education.
Colin Campbell Colin identified six factors in the learning environment: l Light here is a significant gap between the perspectives of the school planner, l Heat Tthe designer of the school and the l Humidity – fresh air, air-change, school leader - each one has a different set ventilation of priorities. l Acoustics For the leader involved in a build, it is l usually a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to Ergonomics of furniture get the dream school with sufficient space, l Colour light and heating; adequate specialist areas, geared to the demands of a Colin was essentially at the conference to changing curriculum, fit for purpose both learn more about the issues for head now and into the future; rooms for eating, teachers and to understand more about for assembling, for learning. their long-term thinking and to discuss with people the need for good acoustics The designer may have the skill to bring (‘we’re a manufacturer of acoustic ingenuity and elegance to the design, absorbers’), but, because I’m retired and while trying to minimise the negative have no vested interest in school building, effects of the inevitable compromises that and because we meet at one of the social will have to be made, mainly due to the occasions, rather than in the exhibitors’ constraints imposed by the budget, or the foyer, we end up having an ear-opening site. conversation about the high value of good acoustics. The DES planner will have a wider picture that encompasses many schools and the This is not just about installing resonance- diverse demands of an entire system. In altering panels. Our conversation 120 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:51 Page 121
On the acoustic quality of [most] school canteens: After a full morning’s work, would you choose to eat your lunch right beside a busy highway?
encompasses the education philosophy discipline system that brooked no that underlies the need to address sound disruption to the pouring in of facts. pollution and ‘school noise’. But throughout this century, mass The need to address classroom acoustics education has been engaged in a struggle may have had its roots in the particular to escape its industrial-era roots, moving needs of children who are hard of hearing to student-centred methods that permit and, by extension, to those with special several people to talk in the classroom at educational needs. once – a totally different communication scenario. Learning now involves In January 2015 Ecophon independent investigation, interaction, and LOOP.bz started an intervention study discussion, collaboration, group project at Søgårdsskolen in Gentofte municipality work debate, problem-solving and the in Denmark. This school is a public school classroom can legitimately be a place of for kids with social cognitive challenges clamour, where learning is a robust and learning disabilities (ADHD, autism, exchange and exploration, a hammering brain damage, Downs and others). In the out of knowledge. report on this intervention, they stated – Increasingly across the globe the First of all we learned that working with kids classroom is becoming babel of different with special needs is a special way of voices, dialects and accents, not to teaching. We learned that the teacher could mention different languages, with not teach a whole class standing at the increased sound levels, and this requires blackboard giving instructions – and it is an environment in which the speakers and impossible just to give short instructions and listeners can communicate effectively. And then expect the children to work on their that’s where acoustics come in. own for 15 mins. We learned that it was very important that the teacher physically was The philosophical imperative is inclusion. close to the kids at all times and that he or Better acoustics help to level the playing she was always consistent in the way he or field for learners. They promote better she addressed the kids, worked through the behaviour-management and learning lessons and scheduled the day. We also effectiveness. In a good acoustic learned that no matter what challenges the environment, with lowered background kids have, they can progress! The teachers noise, the teacher and the student can were really dedicated people who tried their speak in a lower voice. Where the level of best and quickly adapted to situations not the voice is high, or raised, it’s harder to yet planned. listen to and it’s just not interesting. The richer the sound setting, the richer the But it goes deeper: in the Victorian model voice can be, ‘the better the story-telling’. of education, the teacher taught and the The quiet, or introverted, student is in a pupils listened. Dickens described them as more sympathetic space; it is more vessels waiting to be filled with imperial feasible to engage in group work. gallons of fact. There was one voice in the classroom – predictably that of the teacher Class management and discipline are – and there was the back-up of a stern easier. You can hear the potential trouble- 121 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:51 Page 122
maker further back and there’s no need Europe. Spain, Italy, Holland Scandinavia for shouting. And those children who sit at (Norway has the highest acoustic the back – even those with hearing loss – standards) and the UK have engaged in can hear what the teacher is saying. It can research, experiment and investment. make a huge difference – less stressful for Ecophon encourages this research and the teacher, calmer for the pupils, disseminates information through the behaviour and listening improved. internet [www.acousticbulletin.com] and a magazine ECO, available free of charge [go If there are several groups speaking in the to www.ecophon.com/eco]. The Irish room at the same time, the signal from Government has been very influential in one group becomes noise interference for this area. Tony Sheppard, Technical the other groups and produces a negative Manager of the Planning & Building Unit, chain reaction, with the teacher’s voice, DES, is currently the Chair of the OECD- student voices, ‘pupil murmur’, disturbing Centre for Effective Learning Environments noise and useful noise all vying with each (CELE). other. The main challenge is to integrate Of course a good teacher can ‘survive’ in a acoustics into school planning from the poor acoustic, but at what energy cost? At outset, approximately three years before what ‘strain on the brain’, as you have to the materials to be used are specified. work harder. School management, planners and How do room acoustics affect teachers’ designers need to be involved early on. If measurable physiological stress in relation the need for good acoustics is not to actual teaching events? A good acoustic considered then, the quality of the will allow the teacher to achieve the same learning environment is not going to – or more - with lot less stress. ‘The remain. Other factors, such as ‘value teachers could speak less loudly [or avoid engineering withing the build phase, will raising their voices altogether] to make factor it out of the picture, or there will be themselves heard, this reducing vocal minimal compliance. stress. The build-up of noise is It needs to be embedded to make learning considerably less, or does not occur at all, environments ‘fit for purpose’ and future- in classrooms that have good acoustics. proofed. Retrospective fitting of acoustic Investigations have proved the facilities is more costly, disruptive and relationship between a room’s acoustic simple less effective. working environment, the quality of communication and the development of Meet Colin Campbell and you start to noise in the classroom. reflect on sound and the environment. It’s a subtle and many-faceted thing. He ‘The first time I entered the classroom mentions the advanced level of after the improvement, something had Scandinavian design. Scandinavians, he changed, everything felt calmer and I maintains, value the outdoors and because automatically dropped my voice. I didn’t they have to spend a lot of winter-time want to go back to the old sound indoors, they attempt to bring the environment.’ properties of the outdoors, in terms of The other philosophical issue is that of sound and light, into their homes. ‘wellbeing’. The fact that Wellbeing is a It might be argued that in Ireland we value subject proposed for the new junior cycle; the indoors, as a retreat from the grey and the fact that planners of the physical the damp, and in social surroundings such learning environment and of the as the pub, we cocoon ourselves in a curriculum are talking in terms of the raucous wrap of laughter and chat, craic emotional effects of these factors on the and lively music, pausing only occasionally quality of students’ learning; this marks a for and mournful and the elegiac singing growing sensitivity to students’ needs and of ‘one voice’. brings an issue, such as acoustics, into a sharper focus. If the acoustics are bad you miss so much – the quality, the harmony, the There is a raised awareness of the precision. We cannot afford to do that in importance of acoustics as an our classrooms. Perhaps it’s time to really environmental factor in education across listen! 122 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:57 Page 123
Delivering Further Education and Training [FET]
t its 2014 Conference, the NAPD Further Education Committee [NAPD-FE] launched its vision document, Realising Opportunities, which set out its ambitions to meet the Achallenges and opportunities presented by the complete strategic realignment of FET. A year later the committee returned to the vision, but this time the emphasis was on implementation. As David Forde, Deputy Principal at Carlow Institute of Further Education, wrote in his introductory note to the Conference programme - “Constructive discourse and sharing of best practice is central to operational transformation, and this is the time for open discussion and direct engagement between providers, management bodies and policy makers. We are cognisant of the need to move beyond pre-existing discourse and definition, and to create instead a new, purposeful operational landscape - one that is readily accessible and comprehendible for its participants, employers and other external partners. Thus we challenge ourselves to step out of our ‘comfort zone provision’ and engage with the panoply of activity (defined best perhaps as ‘tertiary, non-higher’) that is now encompassed by legislation, policy and emerging strategy… “We continually examine our provision to ensure we deliver a service that meets the needs of students, business and progression, and have long sought the opportunity to engage directly with work-based learning, training and skills development. To do so is consistent with our vision for a transformed Further Education and Training sector and can impact positively on other college provision. Delivering the right services is vital - we are focused on those areas where our colleges can deliver the most value to business and industry, to our communities, to youth, to the long-term unemployed, and to encourage creativity and entrepreneurship.” The intention of the 2015 conference, he continued, was to “explore what it means to be involved in delivering Further Education and Training to meet local, national and global demand.” The speakers were representative of a wide range of stakeholders, including industry, enterprise, youth-work, Department of Education and Skills, Department of Social Protection, Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, and SOLAS. Paul O’Toole, CEO of SOLAS, and the Tánaiste, Joan Burton, were among the key-note speakers. The May-June Leader carries a full account of what they had to say. Members of NAPD can access the articles on www.napd.ie/publications. In this section of Le Chéile, we feature four of the papers which focused on the links between training, apprenticeship, employment and enterprise:
l FET to meet the needs of enterprise – SMEs and Entrepreneurship [Tom Hayes, Enterprise Ireland]
l The New Apprenticeship [Ray Kelly, Director of Apprenticeship and Construction Services, SOLAS]
l The Role of Expert Group on Future Skills Needs in Delivering FET [Marie Bourke, Head of Secretariat to Expert Group on Future Skills Needs, DJEI]
l Developing Structures for Employer Engagement to meet Local, National and Global Demand [Anne Forde, Department of Education and Skills].
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The Work of Enterprise Ireland Tom Hayes
Introduction by Pat Maunsell, Principal of Limerick College of Further Education: The focus here is on enterprise, and entrepreneurship and the merging of this with education. Entrepreneurship recently was defined by the OECD as the ability to convert ideas into action. Enterprise education, therefore, is defined as the process of equipping students with an enhanced capacity to generate ideas and the skills to make them happen. It is the government ambition for Ireland to be among the most entrepreneurial nations in the world, given the unemployment situation and the growing need for entrepreneurs and start-ups - hugely important for the continued recovery of the economy. The national skills strategy and other reports have pointed to the importance of skills for enterprise development. The FE colleges’ vision document highlights entrepreneurial education as an important area for colleges to focus on in order to further develop and enhance of culture of enterprise among their learners, students and teachers. Tom Hayes is divisional manager with Enterprise Ireland and he is responsible for micro-enterprise and small business. He also manages the organisation’s network of regional offices. He has wide-ranging experience in a variety of industry and food sectors. He spent six years in Madrid managing Spanish and Portuguese markets on behalf of the Irish Trade Board. He is a member Enterprise Ireland’s Research and Development Fund Committee and of the board of Eircom Venture Fund.
ENTERPRISE IRELAND, WHAT DO You do need to build a cohort of strong, WE ACTUALLY DO? indigenous companies as well, so we work Everybody will be familiar with the with the Irish business community, with Industrial Development Authority [IDA], the research and investment community to but people sometimes confuse the two of build up our indigenous base, us. The Industrial Development Authority international trade, innovation, leadership has been probably one of the most and the competitiveness of that particular successful agencies in terms of attracting industry. Our key objective – what the inward investment into Ireland, bringing government has tasked us with – is to some of the largest names on the planet create jobs and hence create prosperity in and employing huge numbers of people Ireland. not just in Dublin but around the country We work with about three and a half as well. thousand client companies throughout the Enterprise Ireland’s remit is very much country and include small, early-stage with the indigenous sector, the local people with the ambition to grow and companies, because you do need a develop and these people come out of balance in any economy; you can’t be third level, from research, from existing dependent totally on inward investments. multinationals, from overseas as well. 124 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:57 Page 125
You might have seen that the first green- field investment in the dairy sector in 40 years was made recently by Glanbia in South Kilkenny, to take advantage of the opening up of the dairy markets. Those of you who drive down the N7 will see the shiny new Kerry Investment in research and innovation. We had a big say in that because that was a mobile project. Kerry is a global company – it could have located anywhere in the world – but thankfully it located in Ireland. So we work across the whole spectrum of industry. In terms of jobs, what was delivered? For a number of years, as we People come from overseas to start off in went through the depths of the economic Ireland and these are what we call the recession, we would have been looking at ‘high potential start-up companies’, that job losses in industry. Thankfully last year will be the creators of wealth and value [2014] we had the best year in many years: into the future. These will generate jobs over 8,500 net new jobs were created in through a whole range of companies the client base that we deal with. There are across industrial sectors from food to now over 180,000 people working in the engineering, software, technology, Enterprise Ireland client-based sector, and medical devices, and right up to every single job in manufacturing and multi-nationals. We do have the remit for traded service generates at least one other the inward investment in the natural job in the wider economy, because these resource areas, so we deal with companies people go out, they spend money, they like Abbot, and with some of our own have to buy services, they go to shops, home-grown multinationals, Glanbia and they go on holidays, they go to Kerry. restaurants, they buy cars, they buy houses. So there is a multiplier effect and that’s over 300,000 jobs that would be supported by the client-base that Enterprise Ireland represents.
EXPORTS ARE AN IMPORTANT PART It wasn’t just Ireland that suffered the economic downturn, and while we did suffer the huge crash which was banking- and property-related, there was at the same time a perfect storm; there was a major international recession as well. Our exports did suffer but thankfully now they are well back up to 2008 levels and we are exporting all around the world. There are now more Irish companies selling to more countries than at any time in the history of the State. We ran about 20 trade missions last year around the world, but a lot of individual work on the ground goes on as well. So that just gives you a breakdown there as to where our trade was going in 2013 and that again creates jobs and creates opportunities for our people. Tom Hayes 125 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:58 Page 126
business might not get money on Day 1, but they will be offered a Start your own Business course, learning how to prepare The growth is widely spread right across a cash-flow statement, a business the sectors, from life sciences to traded proposition and a business plan. Many of services, to food, to engineering. There is these companies graduate to Enterprise one sector there that I will just focus on – Ireland. construction. Construction fell off a cliff in 2008, but a huge number of companies While we’ve all heard of the difficulties that went overseas, not just the major the bank sector has faced, our experience construction companies but suppliers as is that there is quite a range of well, because there is a whole trickle-down financial supports, increasingly non-bank effect in terms of services, quantity finance, through Angel Investment, surveyors, architects. They went into Seed Investment, Venture Capital places like Britain, a huge number into the Investment, available for the enterprise Middle East, North Africa, Central and sector, for individuals, companies, teams Eastern Europe and while they are of individuals with strong business contributing hugely to the export propositions – where there is a market bonanza, they have managed also to opportunity, there is funding. maintain a base of jobs that would otherwise have gone because of the downturn here. There is a very strong ecosystem in the entrepreneurial area, a huge level of support for companies in terms of venture capital, mentors, government support, support from third level, the whole research community, in terms of anybody who wants to start a business.
THE ENTERPRISE OFFICE NETWORK People will be familiar with the Local Enterprise Office network. There are 31 of those, one in every county in Ireland, two or three in Dublin and Cork. We have the SUCCESS STORIES policy remit for them and we provide a lot It’s always good to tell success stories of support in terms of training. But they about Irish Companies. We should be are now working within the local authority proud that our own developed products remit, so they provide a holistic support to and services are leading lights in various people at a local level throughout the areas across the world, so I want to go country. Individuals who want to start a through a couple of examples. There is an 126 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:58 Page 127
Irish software company which controls all the access points to the Houses of Parliament in the UK. So to the secrets of the realm we have access! Likewise, the prisoners that are being released in the UK are all tagged, and an Irish company does the tagging for those. The FBI uses eye- recognition software for people entering the US which was developed here in Ireland. An Irish technology company, Pixel Earth, protects the data for many of the great global corporations. Trustev, an emerging company from Cork, is now controlling the verification details for people who pay on-line. Zoo Technology, HELPING IRISH COMPANIES which is working the construction sector in the UK, has developed a certain In terms of the 2014-16 strategy that we technology there. Mercury Engineering, are working through at the moment, there with other partners, is developing the are four main pillars. climate control which will enable people to play football in the World Cup in Qatar, STARTING A BUSINESS: even when it’s too hot to walk the streets. We’ve certainly seen a sea-change in this Radisson Diagnostics in Cork have enabled area in the past five years, in terms of blood analysis aboard the European Space individuals, people, teams, wanting to Agency. An Irish medical device company, start and develop businesses for Aerogen in Galway, developed the first air- themselves. It’s a very competitive world cell vaccination device, hugely used now in and unless you invest in research, Africa. innovation, new processes, new ways of doing things, development, staying ahead So there are now many positive signals in of the game, you are going to lose out. terms of the economy and jobs are being Last year, between ourselves and the 31 created again and hopefully we’ll see local enterprise office networks, we unemployment figure dropping further financially supported about 1,000 start-up and further as the months roll on. companies. We can’t financially support There is a lot of positivity about the Irish everybody, because you have economy, but a lot of a people tend to look displacement (we’re not going to fund at the glass half-empty, rather than half- somebody who sets up a restaurant full. A lot of the international studies put around the corner because all you are Ireland very high in terms of being a doing is you are displacing somebody else country that is a good place to do business who has a restaurant on the corner!) so the in, and that’s from the World Bank to the export dimension to what they are doing IMD and other international rating is important. agencies. Enterprise Ireland supported 183 enterprises, specifically in our High Potential Start-Up (HPSU) programme – the enterprises that are really innovative, have the potential to grow to ten jobs within three years and have a strong export dimension. We also put a lot of effort into the whole seeding of entrepreneurship in terms of college programmes around the country, including the New Frontiers programme. We run that in conjunction with the institutes of technology, we’ve had a three year programme (actually in the final year now) so we will have put 127 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:58 Page 128
close to 500 strong business propositions INNOVATION on a six-month programme. There is a In terms of innovation, we are driving the €15,000 stipend for that six months and collaboration between Irish industry and they get mentoring, coaching, value third level, so that we can take advantage propositioning, all of that in terms of of Horizon 2020, a huge EU programme of developing the business proposition that support right across the whole European they have. landscape. We want to ensure that Irish industry and the Irish research community Eleven new businesses spun out from third are fully clued into that and are taking level. We would actually like to see more. advantage of it. The State puts a significant investment into research innovation. Now, there are We want to see companies not just other measures, such as licences, and the growing here, but to be looking globally, graduates that come out are hopefully because that means that, through the Irish contributing to the multinationals that base here, these companies can come in here to our indigenous strengthen their corporate headquarters, companies. Spin-out businesses are an strengthen marketing, strengthen important part of that as well. corporate governance here, even while making acquisitions around the world. We also put a lot of effort into attracting mobile entrepreneurs, young people who can move around the globe. There is a lot SCALE of competition for those nowadays: the UK We worked with over 600 companies last government has put a lot of effort into year to help to develop their leadership attracting people into London from China, capability, because without the capability, India or the States, to develop their ideas the skill sets, training companies just there, because they know that some of won’t grow and develop to the full these people could be the Googles of the potential that we need them. future. Berlin, and a number of areas in the United States, have put a lot of effort into Mentoring is hugely significant. I’ve heard this as well. companies that have grown in scale say that the best support they ever had was There has been a very low level of somebody who mentored them, somebody participation by women in what we call who had been there and done that, who high potential area. That’s not just an Irish gave them some advice and challenged phenomenon, although there are some them. We have developed a cohort of over exceptions to it, notably Australia. We put 400 mentors across all of the business a big focus on that, we had a competitive disciplines, or all of the business functions start-fund, and the evidence is there that to help companies to realise their full there are a lot more females involved now potential. in the higher-end technology companies and start-ups. If they are not the key ANTICIPATE promoters, they are part of a management We have 15 technology centres around the team that is driving those forward. country across a range of industry sectors Regional Enterprise Strategies: our and they are working with the Minister is engaging in a whole series of multinationals because we want to take stakeholder consultations around the from the multinationals some of the best country with a view to developing and ideas and share them with Irish industry as putting a spotlight on the regions. There well, so they are an important part of the is a feeling that perhaps Dublin, Cork, system Limerick and some of the major areas are High-growth markets: We are very focused, gaining at the expense of some regions, and I think rightly so, on markets like so we are looking at ways that we can Britain which is near us. We speak the strengthen and enhance the regions and same language, a lot of the checks and bring a greater degree of business to other balances that are in the system we can areas. work with the UK; likewise the US; but we 128 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:58 Page 129
can’t leave out of any equation markets fitters, tool makers, mould makers, like China or India. We have to be there, we mechanical engineers, all absolutely have to be aware of what’s going on in essential – and if they hadn’t those people those particular markets. they just couldn’t grow. We have done some work in precision WORKING ON SKILLS DEFICIT engineering, working with the IOT in Skills deficit: long before the economy Limerick, because that was identified as started to turn again, the skills deficit was having a deficit and that there needed to an issue, particularly in the technology be an upgrade of the skills-set there. sector. There are more than 600 There is now a strategy: we need to work indigenous companies that are generating closely with industry and with the various double digit growth, but without the skills, partners, other agencies, other arms of the without the people, without capability, state to help in that. But we are in constant they just won’t continue to grow. And if contact with industry. you won’t grow, you stagnate, and, if you stagnate you are losing, and you are losing We need to assist companies, for instance, jobs as well. to ensure that the visas and work permits are allowed because that’s what will keep So it is important that they have access to our companies going, that’s what will help the top talent and in conjunction with them grow and that’s what will help them them we have developed a web portal, to create further jobs into the future. which a number of companies have used it to attract talent into Ireland. Client-management development: we put a lot of effort into building capability in the We have used social media and we work teams that run our cohort of companies with the colleges in terms of Springboard and that ranges from mentoring support, and ICT conversion courses. Quite a in specific areas such as finance, number of people who were engineers, technology, strategic thinking, raising quantity surveyors, planners have money, or in business development. converted over the last two to three years and are now working in some of our We have now sent over 200 chief companies. executives from our indigenous client base on a year-long programme with Stamford MANUFACTURING: and Duke and one or two other leading I am familiar with the deficit in universities in the world. We want to drive manufacturing. 10 to 15 years ago people and fire ambition, we want these people to would have said Ireland is out of think globally, about growing large manufacturing, we are now in the services companies, to look at how they do it, how economy, but nothing could be further do they do it in Silicon Valley, what’s the from the truth, because manufacturing is mindset, what are the parameters, what the bedrock, there are some fantastic are the criteria that are needed. We want manufacturing companies around this them to interact and talk to the people country, like Combi Lift up in Monaghan, who have done that. Now we are finding a Dairy Master, Keenan, McHale. You need a cohort of companies that’s emerging out balance and a mix in any economy and of that. these firms are at the leading edge in what That is at one end of it. Then we cover they do and are selling to 40/50/60 international selling and that’s a real skill markets around the world. set in itself, in terms of dealing with Just before last Christmas, we had a different languages, different cultures, meeting with about 16 to 20 companies in different people, different mindsets, the midlands area and one of the things different channels – that is in itself a huge came up was that skills deficit of people in skill set. engineering – metal fabricators, welders,
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Work-based learning and the new apprenticeship model Ray Kelly
Ray Kelly is the Director of Apprentice and Construction Service with SOLAS; he’s also a member of the National Apprenticeship Advisory Committee and has been recently appointed to the newly-established Apprenticeship Council. Ray has been involved in the development of the new apprenticeship model and is somebody who is passionate about the apprenticeships and the potential that they create. Ray is currently engaged in overseeing the national call for new apprenticeship programmes and is very keen to engage with the FET sector. He began his presentation to the FE Conference with a description of the current apprenticeship system, which formed the basis for the review of that system.
urrently we have a designated The primary legislation, The Industrial apprenticeship system in Ireland and Training Act, goes back to 1967, and that Cbasically that is grounded in is the bedrock of apprenticeship in Ireland. legislation. So if someone wants to That was supplemented in 1997 by a become an apprentice in Ireland, all of that statutory instrument (Apprenticeship is based in legislation. For a programme to Rules, SI 168) which outlines the specific be recognised, it must be designated as rules around apprenticeship. such by SOLAS and the legislation outlines the rules and regulations that pertain to apprenticeship.
Legislative Parameters l The Industrial Training Act, 1967 l Apprenticeship Rules SI 168, 1997 l Further Education and Training Act, 2013
Governance l National Apprenticeship Advisory Council
Non Legislative Guide l Apprenticeship Code of Practice Ray Kelly 130 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:58 Page 131
For employers to register apprentices with The Existing Family of SOLAS, they must be approved by SOLAS. Trades Similarly, there are rules and regulations to determine suitability for apprenticeship: Currently we have 27 designated trades. such as age and educational profile. In Throughout the history of the State, we almost half the current trades there’s a had up to 70 apprenticeships but as time requirement for an apprentice to be has moved on the requirement for a lot of proficient in colour vision and, if they’re those skill-sets has died due to changes in not, they cannot be registered. technology. The remaining 27 are broken into five families of trades. The main The Further Education and Training Act, ‘family’ is the Construction Sector. We 2013, really outlined the transfer of have nine apprenticeship programmes responsibilities from FÁS to SOLAS in assigned to that sector - very traditional, relation to the apprenticeship area. very male-orientated and very much based While SOLAS has statutory responsibility on the craft sector in the economy. Two of for the governance of the whole those nine programmes were only apprenticeship programme, there is also designated in 2014 – Stone-cutting & an overseeing body, the National Masonry and Pipe-Fitting. We envisage that Apprenticeship Advisory Committee, those two new trades will be delivered comprising of all the stakeholders, and entirely within the ETB structure. They are chaired by a board member of SOLAS, the other three areas - Motor, Engineering which has been in operation since the and Print. In the last 10 years only five introduction of the current system in 1993. It advises the board of SOLAS on all matters pertaining to apprenticeship, so if there’s any significant change or redirection, or an application for a new programme, it must go through the Advisory Committee. There is also a non-legislative Code of Practice for Apprenticeship, which outlines the responsibilities of employers and apprentices, and to which both parties must sign up.
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PHASE 4 & 5 [Off-the-job Training & time with the Employer]: The apprentices spend between 10 and 11 weeks of this phase in Institutes of Technology, and they alternate back to the employer and to apply what they have learnt there in the workplace. They are continuously assessed by their employer during this phase.
PHASE 6 [Off-the-job Training in an Institute of Technology]: 10 to 11 weeks.
new trades have been introduced in this PHASE 7 [with Employer]: The last phase. country, which suggests that there was little or no enthusiasm within the State or employer bodies to seek to maximise the Certification use of the apprenticeship training model Apprentices are expected to achieve the as a way of meeting their particular needs. required standards at each phase, before This is one of the main reasons why the they receive their National [Advanced] review took place. Certificate at level 6. With the establishment of FETAC, all Our apprenticeship programmes follow a apprenticeships were placed, as an interim seven-phase structure: standard, at Level 6 in the framework. We’re going through a process with QQI, PHASE 1 [On-the-job with Employer]: in migrating the programmes from interim Apprentices are registered with an standards to common award standards. At employer and spend at least three months this stage we have managed to devise and with the employer, during which time they develop the standards for five of those are required to attend a mandatory programmes and each of them came out induction programme, which outlines key at Level 6 [Advanced]. We are currently issues and their responsibilities over the conducting the review on the remaining next four years, so from the start they’re 22. There is an expectation that not all of very much aware of what lies ahead of those trades will come out at level 6, some them. For example, it’s a statutory rule may come out at either a lower or a higher that, if an apprentice fails any modular level. assessment three times, the apprenticeship is officially ended. They do have a right of appeal for a fourth and final Review attempt, so it’s very important that the In 2013, Minister Quinn initiated the apprentice gets an understanding of this review process. An independent eight- at the earliest opportunity. person Review Group, chaired by Kevin Duffy [Chairperson of the Labour Court], PHASE 2 [Off-the-job Training]: When was established with the primary task of they have been with their employer for reviewing apprenticeship and making three months, they are scheduled for their recommendations. The group was assisted first ‘off-the-job’ training session, for up to by an eight-person Technical Group, 20 weeks, usually held in the old FÁS chaired by Margaret Kelly. network, which has now been taken over The Review Group commenced by by ETBs. They are assessed throughout engaging in a broad consultation process. that process and, at the end, they go back They wrote out to several hundred to their employer. individuals and organisations, inviting them to put forward suggestions about PHASE 3 [On-the-job with Employer]: how the apprenticeship system could be This phase lasts for approximately six enhanced and improved. They received in months. the region of 100 submissions in writing; 132 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:58 Page 133
also a series of presentations were made GOVERNANCE to the council. The Review Group submitted its report in January 2014. l An enterprise-led Apprenticeship Minister Quinn supported the broad thrust Council should be established as the of the recommendations and from there key advisory body in relation to the process kicked into play. apprenticeship. l This body should report directly to the Principal Recommendations Minister. from the Review Group l The Council should be hosted by SOLAS in close cooperation with the l Dual-model training should be Higher Education Authority [HEA]. maintained; that it should follow an ‘alternation’ model, with at least 50% l It was also seen that any future of any programme being off the job. proposals going forward for new [Existing craft apprenticeships would apprenticeship programmes, that there have been divided 80% on the job and should be an opportunity to spread the 20% off the job] responsibility of the development and distribution of curriculum going l Apprenticeship certification should be forward. Currently in current system classified from Level 5 upwards, and SOLAS is responsible for developing, that broader learning outcomes should devising all the curriculum, all the be reflected in the awards. assessments in relation to the apprenticeship programmes and it was l The minimum duration of courses seen here as an opportunity for key should be two years [currently it is stakeholders, the institutes, the four years]. education and training board, l Apprentices should have a specific, employers to play a more active role in approved contract of employment. the development of the actual curriculum going forward. 133 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:58 Page 134
l It also suggested that the curricula and taking place in the engineering sector; whole programmes for all existing their primary problem was that there trades should be reviewed, looking at wasn’t a clear progression path for structure, methodology, duration and apprentices to follow once they’d actually all the rules relating to them. become crafts people in an academic sense. l There was a recommendation that separate awards should be developed This is one of the shortcomings: for young for each trade and placed individuality people leaving school at 18, the only on the national framework of option seems to be third level. A lot of qualifications so that we could people feel there is now an opportunity for potentially see Levels 5 to 10 on the young people to go a different route, to framework. The learning outcomes actually engage in an apprenticeship and award placements would be the programme, where they’ll get a recognised principal drivers in determining the qualification and have the opportunity to duration of the apprenticeship progress that into a third level course, at a programmes. [As it stands at the later stage, if there was a clear, moment they’re all deemed to last four progressional/occupational route. I have years.] gone through all the applications received and there is a very strong commitment by the proposers in relation to the EXPANSION occupational and academic progression The review group felt there is significant routes. scope for the expansion of apprenticeships, across a wide range of The review group stressed the importance sectors and level award outcomes. They of having a mechanism for RPL felt that all new apprenticeships must be [Recognition of Prior Learning] in place, enterprise-led. [If enterprise isn’t not only for existing craft apprenticeships, supporting it there is little value in going but also to facilitate any new down this particular road]. They apprenticeships that come on board. recommended that the apprenticeship council would coordinate, call for new PAYMENT proposals and lead the process and that any proposals would have to be subject to In relation to payment, this is a significant a sustainability test to ensure their long departure from what we currently have. term viability. Whenever an apprentice goes off job- training, the State pays a Training Allowance equivalent to their gross wage RECRUITMENT AND PROGRESSION norm during that off-the-job training In relation to recruitment and progression, period. This is a significant amount of the main recommendations were that money that the State is paying out, almost recruitment was to continue to be equal to a third or half of the total funding employer-led but that there was a need to requirements for apprenticeship. The have a greater capacity in relation to recommendation of the Review Group is planning. To illustrate this: In 2002, 500 that, with any new apprenticeship, the bricklayers were registered; in 2013 there employer will be responsible for paying were 5. That reflects the challenges we the apprentice throughout their face with a demand-led apprenticeship apprenticeship, not just during the on-the- programmes. The proposal here is that we job phases. This places a significant have to have a cap on the number of responsibility on the employer. The main people coming through, but that hasn’t caveat is that the State would have been defined as yet. involvement in setting the level of those There were recommendations about clear salaries. occupational routes. For example: I recently met the engineering sector in PROMOTING APPRENTICESHIP Enterprise Ireland. They didn’t have any The Review Group felt that in Ireland that particular issue with the training that was there is an image problem with 134 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:58 Page 135
apprenticeship. It’s very much associated The Establishment with class and academic achievement. of the Council There’s a need to change that concept and to promote a more reflective, and more The Apprenticeship Council was accurate image of apprenticeship. They established on 18 November 2014. It recommended the development of a comprises of a broad range of stakeholder branding and promotional campaign to from industry, the trade unions, institutes highlight the opportunities that an of technology, ETBs. It is chaired by Pat apprenticeship can afford, not just O’Doherty, Chief Executive of ESB employers but also young people, with the Networks. It already has held a series of ultimate aim of having a significant benefit meetings in relation to their roles and for all. In the UK, for example, the responsibilities. authorities have put in a huge amount of In January 2015, the Council made a resources in promoting apprenticeship formal call for proposals, by means of an and it has been a very successful venture. invitation to a broad range of stakeholders. Invitations were requested IMPLEMENTATION from a number of enterprise and The Department of Education & Skills [DES] education and training providers. The key published its implementation plan in June mechanism for driving this invitation was 2014, with the primary objective of through the Apprenticeship Council appointing an Apprenticeship Council to website, [www.apprenticeshipcouncil.ie] develop the call for proposals from which was supplemented by a series of employers and providers. The plan is a advertisements in national newspapers three-phase plan: inviting and encouraging a whole range of perspective people to engage in this PHASE 1: A complete review of the process. An information session was held existing trades. That is already in place. in the Clock Tower facilities in the DES, The Apprenticeship Council to be set up attended by over 300 people, where we and to issue a call for proposals for the outlined what we envisaged the process development of new apprenticeship was going to follow and what was involved programmes. Those proposals are to be in it. evaluated, with recommendations submitted to the Minister by 30 June 2015. The council has agreed that there will be a formal evaluation panel, comprising of PHASE 2: The development of those representatives from the DES, SOLAS and recommended proposals into the HEA to review all applications and this apprenticeships; to develop the process will be overseen by an curriculum, the standards and the independent auditor, to ensure due awarding arrangements. We need to diligence and that every application is identify the progression pathways. We judged on its own merits. need to work with the various social partners and develop an appropriate The panel will base its evaluation on the apprenticeship contract. following key criteria: The DES is going to look at the legislative l The likely sustainability of the implications of all this. The DES wishes to proposal; bring together both the existing and the new governance arrangements, to l How much is it focused on the learner; ultimately have a single stream. l Practical commitment from industry PHASE 3: From 2016 onwards, there will and the supporting providers; be a particular focus on the promotion strategy; developing RPL processes; l How ready the proposal is for developing the possibility of master implementation; craftsmen as a progression following on l from apprenticeships; enhancing forecast Cost effectiveness of the proposal and capabilities and possibly developing the potential VFM [Value for Money] it pre-apprenticeship programmes. would provide. 135 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:58 Page 136
The proposals will be divided into the Information Technology 6 following three categories: Transport Distribution & Logistics 5 One: is what we deem to ready for a green light, good to go; Business Administration & Management 4 Two: we think there is potential here, but further work is required; Agriculture Horticulture & Marine 3 Three: the proposal is not up to standard Natural Resources 2 or is not relevant to an apprenticeship Sales and Marketing 1 programme. Consideration will be given to the range of THE DURATION OF THE words at different levels on the national PROPOSED APPRENTICESHIPS: framework qualification, to the l geographical spread of the proposals, to 37% 2 year duration the duration of the proposal. l 24% 3 year duration Applicants may be required to make a l 36% 4 year duration presentation to the group of their proposal. l 3% < 2 year duration We received 90 separate submissions from l 14% 5 year duration (progression 74 independent bodies. 51% of the HL6/L7) applications were led by public providers and, of that 51%, 86 were being led by l 2% 6 year duration (progression Institutes of Technology and 14% by HL6/L8) individual ETBs. Note: In relation to the longer courses, an 44% of the proposals were employer-led apprentice could do four years, get a Level and 5% were led by private providers. We 6 award and, if they did a fifth year, get a also received correspondence from Level 7 or Level 8 award. number organisations saying that they would like to make submissions but that LEVELS: they were not ready at this particular time. l 7% Level 5 l Overview of Submissions 29% Advanced Certificate Level 6 This chart opposite indicates the range of l 33% Higher Certificate Level 6 proposals and the type of sector from l 18% Level 7 which we received applications. l 6% Level 8 APPRENTICESHIP REVIEW: l 7% Level 9 OVERVIEW OF SUBMISSIONS RECEIVED The 33% of submissions at Higher Level 6 Manufacturing and Engineering 27 reflects the high number of applications from the Institutes of Technology. So, Build Environment 14 overall, it conveys a sense of how people Tourism and Sport 11 envisage scope and level of the new apprenticeships. Arts Craft Media 9 Financial Services 8
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The Expert Group on Future Skills Needs Marie Bourke
Marie Bourke is manager of Education Skills and Labour Market Policy at the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, and she is responsible for the overall management of their research analysis of the expert group on future skills needs, and we are all very much aware of those reports. Here she outlines how data is gathered and used to inform and advise the Irish Government at a national level on current and future skills needs of the economy.
them at a particular occupational level. In the case of ICT skills, we looked at them across all occupations. You will probably be familiar with a number of our particular sectoral reports, which I will go through shortly. We look at the priority areas of education and training within that and we have now linked a very streamlined process with our work permit system, so that the skills that we identify in short supply are those skills for which the Irish State will issue employment permits to non-EU nationals. That system has now been streamlined in the last number of years and is reviewed on a six-monthly basis. That will be particularly important as the economy begins to pick up again. So there were a Marie Bourke lot of ineligible activities where the work permit system closed down during their he Expert Group on Future Skills session because we had huge numbers on Needs was set up in 1997, when the live register. Tthere were skills shortages in a growing economy. We report to both the Every one of our reports tends to look at Minister for Education and Skills and the international developments, where we Minister for Enterprise, Trade and draw on good practice internationally and Innovation. It is important to point out that try and see how that might apply in this is unique in an EU context, where Ireland. We inform on implementation, we some of our other member states envy the have to report to the Ministers on what link between enterprise, strategy, happens to our various recommendations development and education and training and which ones are still outstanding. within two departments, to help the Obviously we hope that our information is growth and development of the economy. useful to you from a labour information point of view and in the labour market Our mandate that was laid out for us is to justification for the introduction of new look at skills at a national level and at a courses or the modification to existing sectoral level and sometimes we look at ones. 137 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:58 Page 138
So just to focus on the employer. There are enterprise strategy at national level. Each 22 members of the Expert Group on year for the last number of years of the Future Skills Needs. action plan for jobs, the expert group has a role to play in delivering on certain The enterprise members are appointed by aspects of actions within it. Minister Bruton’s Department and have representatives from the medical device We have been instrumental with the sector, from the ICT sector and from small research that went into the development business. We have employer of the ICT skills action plans and the more representative bodies and we have the recent one launched last year, and we have enterprise development agencies IDA and an ongoing role in monitoring EI as sitting members of the group. The implementation of that, there are three Department of Jobs, Enterprise and working groups on that to progress Innovation is represented at Assistant implementation. Secretary level. That is the enterprise input We are linked into the Government’s into the steering group. That steering manufacturing strategy, the trade, tourism group meets about four times a year, but and investment strategy, Minister Simon it is the ongoing engagement between the Coveney’s Food Harvest 2020, the Green members in between meetings that is Economy Skills, and in each of these cases really key to our work. When we look at of strategies the expert group came in sectoral studies, we tend to draw the behind looking at what were the skills that chairperson for the sectoral study advisory will be needed within the economy to group from the expert group so that they progress these strategies. So in the case of can advocate the research back into the the Trade, Tourism and Investment group. So whilst the main group meets Strategy, what were the skills that would four times a year, we could have a series be needed to fulfill entrance into new of sub-groups meeting on particular sector markets, develop sectors in new and occupational studies. international market places and the skills The key thing of interest from an employer applied to that. engagement point of view is that all our As I say, we advise on the eligible work is very much linked into enterprise, occupations for migration, we have had a
EGFSN & National Enterprise Policy
Work of EGFSN linked to Enterprise Developments, National Policy Objectives & Strategies
¾Action Plan for Jobs 2012-2015
¾ICT Skills Action Plan, 2014
¾Strategy for the Manufacturing Sector to 2020
¾Trade Tourism & Investment Strategy
¾Food Harvest 2020
¾Green Economy Strategy
¾Migration Policy – eligible occupations
¾FET & HE Strategies
¾Labour Market Activation • ICT Conversion • Springboard • Momentum • Skillnets
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role and input into submissions into the launched to address particular skills needs FET and Higher Education Strategies and that we identified in that. we input into labour market activation, so I focus on that left-hand side because that we write the guidelines for the side of the chart below, there’s over Springboard call each year for the last five 200,000 people employed in those sectors years for extra courses and higher in the Irish economy and the exports there education, identifying which particular are almost 140 billion, so that is a key areas and NFQ levels the courses might be sector that helped us through the useful for jobseekers to help them on that recession, because of its export step to employability. orientation growth. The last enterprise strategy was Making it If you go to the right-hand side, we’re Happen, and it looked at different sectors looking here at emerging opportunities of the economy. We are currently that have potential in the green economy, underway with a new enterprise strategy the creative area and marine and maritime to 2025, which will be produced later this sector. We are just concluding and we year. But in the strategy we’re looking at hope to publish in the next two weeks our key sectors of the economy, ICT skills in skills needs in five sub-sectors of the financial services, in retail, in business marine economy, and this again will be services, so it is not just for the ICT sector important for the further education sector, itself. We looked at life sign sectors of and particularly when we are looking at pharma and medical devices. The regional strategies around the country International Financial Services Centre, because there is employment in many there was a new strategy launched by rural areas where there may not be bigger Minister Simon Harris and the Taoiseach enterprise operations in place. So here there just before Patrick’s Day, and we fed we’re talking about marine tourism, we’re into the skills chapter, what are the skills talking about fish processing, we’re that would be needed to fulfill that talking about aquaculture, marine energy strategy. We are very much linked into the and we will have an upcoming shipping food and beverages strategy and there services centre. have been new skill nets operations
Enterprise Strategy - Sectors & Job potential
E & m erg ths i ng Un ng e t O Str ce ap p n en p po o g ed rt er Po un ing nv t it Employ c. 208K ild o en ie Employ c. 270K u C ti s & (plus 85K in agriculture) B al (incl. private healthcare c. 124K) Exports €138bn Building a Strong Enterprise Mix in Sectors Employ c.604K A Employs c. 455K R ly Limited foreign earnings e al Locally trading activities ne s c. €6.6bn (Tourism/ Transport) Ma we oc ie t d L t u F ve ivi re o ti t S c ti c e u e A ct s o p d or n e s om C rad T
Source: Making it Happen – Growing Competitive Enterprise for Ireland
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Then on the retail, wholesale, For each sector we set up an advisory construction, tourism, hospitality and group. So in the case of the freight transport sector. This sector now employs transport distribution and logistics sector, over 600,000 people in the economy. Most that group was chaired by somebody from of it is domestic earnings, except for the the trade side within IBEC. We had private tourism sector. We have completed studies sector companies, ERC Group, we had the in the retail, wholesale sector, the Freight Transport Association, we had a construction sector, we’re in the middle of recruitment consultant and we had ISME, the hospitality skills study, which will be as well as a number of companies around again of interest to the further education the table from that. So we draw on area because we’re looking at the drop-off expertise from different people engaged in level 4 and 5 awards in particular in in that sector to advise us of over four or recent years in that sector and we hope to five meetings as we are providing the have that study launched towards research to them and discussing it. July/August this year. In this case we identified 40 to 60 We launched the transport logistics and companies that were interviewed on a distribution skills work just a few weeks one-to-one structure basis to identify their ago and again this was very much attuned current skills needs, the different roles to the apprenticeship call and some they employ, what they expect future skills potential for storage, warehousing and needs to be, what skills they would employ haulage apprenticeships in that sector. if they had them, if they were available readily to them, and then we link that in. Then finally the other manufacturing So in the case of the hospitality sector, sector, which employs about 450,000 and we’d interviewed a number of catering locally traded services, we have done some companies, hotels, restaurants, contract work in that with regard to engineering caterers, hospital catering staff and the and consumer products. retail deli counters within some of the Our research methodolog: I will just focus retail sector. on the steps here which look at the The interviews then that we have with key employer input. We profile each sector of stakeholders would tend to be the economy, so we take information from representative associations. So in the the 2011 census. We’ll have a new census marine skills area we interviewed the next year, so we look forward to updated Killybegs and Castletownbere Fisherman’s figures, and then we would look at the Associations. We would have talked to the quarterly national household service and Marine Institute, which had a key role in we identify the roles and occupations this, and with BIM, which provided some of within each sector. the further education and training required So, say, in the hospitality sector, we’re in the area. Údarás na Gaeltachta, they looking at about 14 to 16 separate roles would have had a number of companies across receptionists, accommodation staff, engaged in the sector; Commission of Irish etcetera, within that sector. We see how Lights and the SEAI in relation to the many are employed in the sector. What’s energy sector. the turnover in the sector? What are the Then we host a number of workshops then vacancy rates in the sector? Then we go where we feed in the information we found out and we consult with industry, we talk from stakeholder interviews, the raw data to a sample number of companies across on occupations and the stats and facts and the sector and we talk to the figures around the sector. We tease out representative bodies and we pull together particular areas, identify any gaps. that information. Then we look at workshops with employers and providers When we produce our reports then we around the table, having pulled together continue to have ongoing engagement the existing supply across the NFQ levels with stakeholders to report back on and across the occupational roles, identify implementation. More recently, Minister the gaps and then make Nash called together the retail consultative recommendations. forum who wanted to discuss skills, and 140 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:58 Page 141
again we produced some evidence about Then we look at the gaps and we make what was going on in the sector and had a recommendations. discussion with regard to skills that might These are some of the areas – so we work be needed in that sector that they’re on sort of the supply and the demand side, currently experiencing issues with. but if you look at the demand side, these So, I suppose the key thing that we do is, are some of the trade bodies, chambers of we link very much to enterprise strategies commerce around the country, AmCham, at a national level. We establish a coherent we would talk to these in relation to some view from enterprise, so we don’t just talk of our findings as we tease out certain to one or two companies, where we might areas. get just their particular skills issues. We In the case of the freight transport area, also play a big role in identifying what we would have dealt with the Road might be a gap in knowledge to particular Haulage Association, the Freight Transport companies or groups of companies, where Association and NITL in DIT. they may not be aware of existing provisions that’s there. So for many of our In the case of restaurants we would have reports we produce a compendium about the Hotels Federation, the Irish Hospitality the numbers of courses at different level, Institute, we dealt with John Mulcahy in what the courses address, the enrolments Fáilte Ireland. and the graduates. And you supply us with a lot of that detail because at the moment We would have ongoing engagement then that’s not centrally available. So in many with IDA and EI and they would provide us cases, you’re probably aware, we write out in relation to the areas that are relevant to to you to find out what each of you is them with lists of companies that would be doing in a particular area. We make that appropriate to interview. So typically if we available to employers because often it’s a wanted to interview 50 companies, we‘d knowledge gap around where to go for probably need a baseline of about 150 some of this. So at some of the workshops companies before we’d be able to extract we will be disseminating this and at one the level of detail that we would need from there was on particular company says I’ll particular companies and get a response take that because I will be recruiting in rate. Then we work closely with Tony January and now I know where to go to Donohue from IBEC, who is a member of look for some of these skills. the expert group, in relation to the various trade bodies within his area. So, when we develop this view we look at what’s a gap to the company versus what’s We would work then with the various an actual gap to the sector and we develop Government departments, so we worked a coherent view around whether there’s with the Department of the Taoiseach on consensus that they are the particular the financial services strategy, the areas. Department of Agriculture on the marine area and the food harvest skills work, the Then we look at forecasts for each sector Department of Transport and Tourism in based on trends and development of relation to the hospitality sector. We enterprise within that sector. Now, that worked with the Department of Health on can be quite complicated in certain the health forecasting areas and obviously sectors, so in the case of the ICT sector, we very closely aligned with the we would have employed IDC, an Department of Education and Skills, again international firm with huge – it is a who are represented on the expert group. multinational firm with offices globally in relation to ICT. They had done work across We would then deal obviously with the the EU on forecasting in the area of ICT supply side, with QQI, HEA, SOLAS, and we needed to identify the base of Skillnets, they have their future skills companies in Ireland and the skills needs funds that we would often advise of capabilities of those companies in Ireland areas that they should look at for skills before we could look at the projections in needs. We normally have a meeting at least the area and we needed some assistance once a year with the Institute of Guidance from experts in that particular regard. Counsellors and we try and disseminate 141 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:58 Page 142
that information to make it available, it’s size of companies etc., it is broken down available on the careers portal website, on by the eight regions. Qualifax website, to get that information These finally then are the skills needs out to people looking to choose careers or reports where we have identified further learn about where there is areas of skills education and training level needs from demand. levels one to six in those sectors. They are Each year we produce the national skills all available on our website. We have bulletin, which looks at 135 occupations produced a very short press release of one across the economy and which ones are in page, if you want to get the key points. We current shortages or where the niche areas produce a PowerPoint slide presentation, are. That is available on the websites to usually about 15/20 slides summarises students. each report. There is an executive summary and then the full report is So, I suppose the key thing here is available, and sometimes we produce the employer engagement is important. We do compendium of the supply available for it at national level and the reason I am here that particular sector. today is to try and assist you in how that might work at local level, how you might So we would encourage you to sign up to translate some of those national leads that, to e-alerts, if you’re not already down, as to whether they are relevant at signed up, or we can mail the reports to local level. you again if you sign up. We also produce the labour market’s bulletin through the SLMRU and SOLAS, ONTACTS and that again gives you regional level statistics about the number of C Expert Group on Future Skills Needs unemployed in particular regions, people www.skillsireland.com on social welfare, numbers of companies,
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Developing structures for Employer Engagement Anne Forde
Currently the Department of education & Skills is running a project to develop regional structures. Anne Forde is leading it up. The new strategies, which span both Further and Higher Education, are being rolled out in tandem. It is also part of a review of the ‘National Skills Architecture’. This is being done as part of the commitment the Department has given to developing a new national skills strategy to be published by the end of this year.
This slide gives an overview of the existing infrastructure.
NationalSkillsStructures
NationalSkillsPolicyand Strategy Springboard/ICT Momentum Skills
National TargetedSkills SOLAS Apprenticeship ExpertGroupon Programmes HEA Ministerfor Ministerfor Education FutureSkills Jobs,Enterprise andInnovation andSkills Needs
CME DES TB SIPTU SOLAS Apprenticeship TEEU ActionPlanfor Council DES Jobs/RegionalEnterprise IOTI Company Strategies IBEC reps DJEI Company HEA Enterprise QQI repsx5 Engagement Forum Chambers Ireland IBEC ISME Amcham
t local level, there is a myriad of structures. They are all interacting with on an ongoing basis around a whole range of issues to do with community development Aand environment. But we have had reflected back to us from the FET sector and from the employer stakeholders, that we are operating with at a national level, that a huge amount of the interaction and engagement is on an informal basis, often down to individual relationships between teachers in FE colleges or in other institutions, local employers, etc. It happens in an unstructured way, which provides some challenges from both the employer perspective and the education and training providers. 143 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:58 Page 144
LocalStructures
LCDCs,BusinessLeadersFora, ChambersofCommerce,IBEC, LocalAreaPartnerships,Local AreaNetworks,LocalAction Groups,Sectorspecificgroups, Professionalbodies, LEADERGroups,RAPIDGroups, LocalEducationCommittees,Jobs Clubs,CountyChildcare Committees
Perspectives
Employers– outsidelookingin Providers– insidelookingout
•Multipleeducationproviders, •185,500activeenterprises StateagenciesͲ programmes •90%employlessthan10people • Don’talwaysknowwhatthey •Diverserangeofskillsneeds needorwhocanhelpthem •Resourceintensive •Limitedtimeavailabletoengage
Left: This is what it is like for an employer looking in – so many different bodies, FE colleges, former training centres, Institutes of Technology, innovation centres. With the downturn in the economy, all of these new programmes and initiatives were rolled out with the best of intentions to support learners and support people back into employment. So the message we get a lot is that employers don’t know how to navigate the system. They’re running their business, they don’t have time to work that out. Right: From the education stakeholder perspective, there are 185,000 enterprises active in the business economy, not including the public sector, which has the health and social care sectors, huge employers for whom the FET system produces large numbers of graduates to fill those jobs. All of these employers have a diverse range of skills, a diverse range of capacities to interact with the system. The vast majority of them employ fewer than 10 people, so it’s a hugely resource-intensive exercise on the part of an individual college or institution to identify the companies in their region and to make those contacts. 144 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 11:58 Page 145
WhatwouldaRegionalSkillsForumdo?
ForEmployers IDA For Providers EI LocalAuthoritiesͲLEOs Employers Gatewayto Frameworktofoster educationsystemin Regular relationshipsemployers region structured Labour Market dialogueon Expertise Data skills needs of InformationonETBs,HEIs, ForumtoBuildlinkswith Skillnets,programmesand region otherproviders,shareinfo, services collaborate
ETBs Universities IOTs Skillnets Frameworktofoster INTREO Betterinformationto relationshipswith informprogramme providers/contactpoints planning
The process we have started to roll out is around the development of regional skills forum to try and provide a bridge between employers, on one hand, and the education and training system on the other. We see this as an opportunity to try and get a structured regular interaction and dialogue going. We are talking about a regional basis because we think that sort of the scale makes sense. You cannot do this at a national level – it is too big – and locally is too small, so in talking about a regional basis, we are very conscious that there’s a restructuring going on in local government, with the establishment of regional assemblies and a whole range of committees, being adapted and changed at the NUTS 3 level, which is very similar to the NAPD sectors: it has eight regions in the country and the intention is to establish one of these fora in each of the eight regions.
ProcessandTimeFrame
National Skills Strategy
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The format for this will be simple, starting off as a three-hour session, to get an overview of the key issues for the region from a skills perspective, drawing on research and data from the Expert Group on Future Skills Needs, plus all of the additional material that is produced from SOLAS. This would be followed by break-out groups for a more detailed discussion on a sectoral basis. The intention is to provide a gateway into the system from an employers’ point of view. From the providers’ point of view, it is to put a framework over what is happening already and to support it. The intention is in no way to cut across the individual links and relationships that are already there but rather to put a structure and supports in place. The intention would be for SOLAS to report on this and to feed back to the education and training providers in the region, to then inform planning in the region. A fundamental guiding principle is that to work and these for a must be useful for all the participants, not to cut across existing links, but to support and provide a framework which will, over time become imbedded, as a regular mechanism, much the same way as have careers or college weeks. It is very important that these fora, which are to be predominantly skills- and education- led fora, interact with other groups, particularly at regional level and at local level, and it is absolutely critical that the fora are designed and developed by the people who are going to be participating in them. We are linking in with the process to develop regional enterprise strategies. The intention there is that there will be an action in each one of those strategies, providing for the establishment of a regional skills forum.
Anne Forde Anne Forde is a Principal Officer in the Department of Education and Skills. She is currently heading up a project spanning the Further and Higher Education sectors on the development of regional structures for engagement with employers on communicating and addressing skills needs. She was previously responsible for Higher Education Policy and Skills which included the development and implementation of the Higher Education reform programme underway since the publication of the National Strategy for Higher Education in 2011. She was also a member of the Expert Group on Future Skills Needs and led the development of the first joint Government Industry ICT Action Plan in 2012 and the Springboard programme which was launched as part of the Government’s Jobs Initiative in 2011. Prior to joining the Department of Education and Skills in 2007 she held a number of posts in the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation.
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The President, the Poet and the Prime Mover
In 2000 Mary Hanley was President of NAPD and she established the Arts & Culture Committee, which led five years later to Creative Engagement. Theo Dorgan [centre] was the poet who electrified the NAPD Conference earlier this year with his presentation about the artist in education. Brendan Flynn [Right] has been a stalwart member of the Committee from its foundation. Long before that he was an impassioned advocate for the arts, making many memorable impromptu outcries for the arts among C & C principals and deputies. He has steered the Clifden Community Arts Festival through three-and-a-half decades.
TO MARK THE OCCASION OF THE TENTH ANNIVERSARY OF CREATIVE ENGAGEMENT, THE FOLLOWING PAGES ARE DEVOTED TO THE ARTS-IN-EDUCATION. DEREK WEST SPOKE AT THE RECENT ‘EXPO’ AND EXPLAINS THE BACKGROUND TO NAPD’S INVOLVEMENT IN THE ARTS. THIS IS FOLLOWED BY AN ARTICLE CULLED FROM The Arts in Our Schools, THE ASSOCIATION’S EARLY POLICY DOCUMENT. Vice-Chair of the European Parliament, Mairéad McGuinness, was guest-of-honour at the Expo. She spoke warmly of the project and we reproduce here the affirmative address she made. Finally, we turn to the words of Theo Dorgan, a keynote speaker at the NAPD Conference in Galway.
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Release from the Dungeon?
Derek West was a member of the first National Executive of NAPD and became its first Arts Officer, overseeing the establishment of Creative Engagement. Chairperson Mary Hanley invited him to speak at the recent arts exhibition, held in Collins Barracks, last October. This is an expanded version of what he had to say on that occasion.
That was more or less the way the e opened with a short, but weighty members of the Arts and Culture quotation from the German H Committee felt in the year 2000, when we philosopher Schopenhauer: had been magicked into existence by the newly-elected NAPD President, Mary “There is one way in which we can find Hanley. We had a shared vision and in our momentary release from our manifesto, The Arts in Our Schools, we imprisonment in the dark dungeon of this declared, rather self-consciously, that world, and that is through the arts. In painting, sculpture, poetry, drama and “The arts are the heart of the nation.” above all music the otherwise relentless rack of willing on which, we are stretched But it wasn’t down to Schopenhauer, this throughout life is relaxed and suddenly we belief; it was down to Ken Robinson, our find ourselves free from the tortures of our hero, wise-man and guru of arts education. existence. For a moment we are in touch We clung to his report All our Futures with something outside the empirical which asserted the vital importance of realm, a different order of being, we creativity and culture in education. literally have the experience of being taken out of time and space altogether but also out of ourselves, even out of the material object that is our body.”
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We were led towards Robinson by Brendan Flynn, the most passionate, committed champion of the arts it’s been my privilege to meet. Brendan was a founder-member promoting the arts in school. Further on of our committee and he’s kept the faith you can read an essay from The Arts in our through the ensuing 15 years, never Schools about this topic, written in the year wavering in his dedication and living that 2000. It provides an interesting out, year by year, with the Clifden Arts benchmark by which to measure the Festival. progress that has been made in those The first five years of our existence were fifteen years. spent balancing our idealism with an The arts are somewhat higher on the urgent need for pragmatism. educational agenda now than they were in Our first aim was to articulate our policy – 2001: the Arts-in-Education Charter, hence the manifesto, The Arts in our signed by Jimmy Deenihan and Ruairi Schools, which was presented to the NAPD Quinn, could be viewed as a first step Conference in 2001. As well as reciting our towards a national strategy; and, yes, credo about the imagination, the ‘essential there IS government support, though, voice’ for the young and so forth, we set obviously in term of validation and out five proposals: funding, we’d like to see more progress toward ‘FULL government support’; the 1. That there must be recognition of the increased dialogue between the Arts centrality of the arts in education; Council, Department for Arts and 2. That there has to be a national Department of Education, (which was at an strategy for the arts in post-primary all-time low in 2001) plus the establishing education of Encountering the Arts Ireland (ETAI) shows that there is now a lot more joined- 3. That there must be full government up thinking about the arts in education; support for the arts-in-education the fact that NAPD was represented on the 4. That co-ordination between all group that produced Artists~Schools relevant agencies to promote the arts- Guidelines and Points of Alignment, that in-education is absolutely essential; the NAPD Arts Officer, Dermot Carney, is a Director of ETAI and involved in the 5. That NAPD must be represented on all development of the Arts Portal – are bodies charged with the development indicators of our Association being a of the arts in education. significant partner in this process. And those five proposals have motivated These are considerable achievements and the Arts and Culture Committee in all its a cause for celebration. dealings since then. We can claim some degree of success. But if, as we believe, the arts are the heart of the nation, we have to look directly at The Committee has always firmly believed the arts, and particularly the experience of in the centrality of the principal in the young people in our charge. They are
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ultimately the most important participants in this. And that’s where Creative Engagement, the brain child of the committee, comes in. Thanks to the consistent financial support from the two government departments over the last ten years, we have seen hundreds of our students blossom and grow through the work of their hands applied with imagination and passion to creative activities. Let’s put some flesh on that. In the pages that follow you can see some images from the 2014 NAPD Calendar, which was devoted to Creative Engagement. There will be a further series of arts-related images in 2016. Within the records of Creative Engagement there are many more examples of students’ work that celebrates life and creativity, partnership and collaboration – where the talents of artist and teacher and young person come together, united with a creative purpose and culminates in an doing; Ministers in Education and the Arts artefact that is a wonder to behold. – now too numerous to name, but what a great thing to see that baton of supportive Shortly after Creative Engagement got funding being passed from one to the under way, we had a kind of evangelical other – let’s just keep it moving. committee meeting where we were filled with a spirit of enthusiasm, where we NAPD is grateful to the officials in both spoke, all at once, in many tongues, and Departments who have been consistently imagined what we then called a Féile, an supportive; to Lorraine Comer, of the event to celebrate the arts. The annual National Museum, a great and long-term event in Collins Barracks has become, in a friend of NAPD, to those on the committee way, the fulfilment of that dream I think it who held the faith – Tomás Ó would be great if we could adopt the name Cruadhlaoich, Michael Parsons, Dave Féile for it – as a nod towards our first MacPherson, and all those who have language, but also as an assertion that it followed – those who provided life-blood is about a celebration of all that is and enthusiasm. wonderful in the creative human spirit. Creative Engagement began with a vision It’s about opening ‘the windows of that has been sustained for over ten years, wonder’ and I hope that, as time goes by, a vision that endorses and encourages the windows will open even wider to let creativity. It is not about results, grades, more light and joy in. points, economy or material prosperity. The pragmatic element of this is support. It is an investment in the generations to The uplifting life blood of encouragement come. It contributes to a future where has come from Mary Hanley, as the NAPD ‘poetry, music, drama, dance, painting and President who set this in motion, Mary sculpture and the visual environment are McGlynn and then Clive Byrne, the NAPD embedded in the heart of the nation.’ Directors who affirmed what we were
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School Leadership in the Promotion of the Arts
An abridged version of an article originally published in 2001 in The Arts in Our Schools, the NAPD Arts Policy document.
single out particular parties to assume responsibility, but it must be clear that school principals, who have developed a clear and full awareness of that heritage, will be in a strong position to contribute to the process of fostering greater understanding. The principal, standing often as a mediator between the Department and the school community of teachers, parents and pupils, is in a good position to develop and convey a vision of the importance of the arts and to translate it into particular actions. Benson writes of teacher training: ‘Well trained teachers are a sine qua non in a good educational system. Arts subjects are underprivileged in schools and need innovative, enthusiastic and skilled teachers.’ The principal, as chief executive in the school and as advisor to the board on This can apply equally to principals. staffing matters, has enormous influence on the curriculum, the disposal of The principal is responsible resources, the employment of personnel, for the stewardship for the and the identification of priorities for a curriculum. The vison of the school. Thus it should be seen that one of principal (the capacity to the first people in the chain to be communicate that vision and persuaded of the importance of the arts must be the principal. to involve teachers) is the central quality required.
PLANNING SERIOUSLY FOR The Transition Year has led to improvement in the provision of arts- GREATER UNDERSTANDING AND related activities in second-level schools. DEVELOPMENT The very fact that the Transition Year must When he writes ‘There is now be free from examination pressure creates responsibility to plan seriously for a a space. The successful exploitation of this greater understanding and development of space requires sound judgment on the Ireland’s artistic heritage,’ Ciarán Benson part of the principals, who will be obliged [The Place of the Arts in Irish Education, to think beyond the convenient ‘hold-all’ Dublin, The Arts Council, 1979] does not for odd subjects that can be created in the 151 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:01 Page 152
Transition Year. Similarly it will be view the change that is needed can no important that a principal has a sound longer be postponed. The arts are not appreciation of the intrinsic nature and peripheral but central to the education of value of an arts subject. every child.’ There is a tendency to see arts more as a It is notable that while making these girls’ subject than as a boys’ subject. recommendations, which would provide Benson quotes a submission by the Art for a considerable contribution from, and Teachers’ Association: involvement by, school principals, there is no direct allusion to the role that they ‘School timetables frequently omit art for might have in such a process. In making their academically bright students, while recommendations about staffing, ample time for art is given to remedial and resources and support systems, the lower grade students’ working party does not envisage a role for As the pupil-teacher ratio is susceptible to the principal. At the end of the National change, either in times of economic Education Convention [1994] the then expansion or recession, those subjects Minister for Education, Niamh which are regarded as peripheral remain Bhreathnach, stated: ‘The widespread most vulnerable. Their position will not concern we have heard for the place of the alter for the good unless the way they are arts in education provides us with an perceived by those in key positions in agenda for action in this area.’ educations, including principals, is It is in positive responses, such as this, radically changed. that one may detect a greater Benson pays attention to the significant determination to address the issue of the contribution to the arts of extra-curricular arts in education and, by implication, to activities: involve principals in the process, but schools and principals still are being left ‘The arts appear to be in a healthier state to work with very tentative guidelines as to outside the formal school system than the provision they should make for the inside it. Interest and awareness, skills and arts. aspirations can all be developed within the school. But it is equally important to make If there is reluctance at national level to provision for young people to pursue their acknowledge the place of the arts in interests outside the school. If the school policy-making, it is going to require drastic is to develop an awareness of the measures to raise the awareness of contemporary worlds of the arts it will schools, either with Boards of have to be engaged in a more Management or with principals. As there is sophisticated exercise, in making these no mandatory training in management developments in the arts accessible to skills for principals, [Remember, this was management and relevant staff as well as written in 2001! – Ed.] it is unlikely that to pupils. This will require precise there will be any specific requirement for knowledge and understanding of principals in relation to the arts. This contemporary arts and the courage to leaves the management of the arts in a bring them into the school.’ precarious position, depending heavily on the goodwill or individual interests of principals. NEED FOR POLICY Despite the many examples of good work The Arts in Education [1985, The in schools, post-primary education is still Curriculum & Examination Board – CEB – making only minimum provision for the 1985] stresses the need for policy. arts. Within the thinking of the Department ‘Arts education must be broad and allow of Education, there is inadequate for a wide range of experience in various recognition, planning and provision. The arts disciplines. A properly conceived degree of participation in the arts depends rationale is necessary to provide the basis on the ethos of the individual school; on for policy relating to the arts in the the presence or absence of an arts policy; curriculum. From an educational point of on the availability of resources and
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personnel; and, centrally, on the degree to child’s development may not be which the principal is inclined to promote adequately served. Arts education for the arts. recreation, decoration and accomplishment may be in place in most FUNDAMENTAL ISSUES schools but too much is being left to chance. History has presented many Four fundamental issues emerge: instances of the profound disturbance l The need for a co-ordinated policy for which art can create in a society bound by arts education at second level, certain conventions or committed to a involving the DES, DAHG and the Arts particular ideology. That may be why the Council education system limits, by a form of self- censorship, the extent and scope of its l Mandatory provision for the arts in the arts activity. Limitations of time and curriculum resources are forms of control. The arts ultimately are not amenable to l School planning containment within an institution which is l Instructional leadership for principals essentially conservative. So, at their most and deputies to include the trivial, the arts can take the forms of management of arts provision acceptable activities that will gain the goodwill of the community, give pleasure From our survey [NAPD had conducted a to many and cause no offence. They may broad survey of arts provision in also be seen, cynically, as good publicity schools, published as part of the policy for the school. This may account for the document – Ed.] it is clear that many proliferation of activities which end in second-levels schools are under the display or performance. management of dedicated principals, who are accomplished arts-minded people with firm convictions about the broadening, THE VITAL IMPORTANCE OF enriching, civilising potential of the arts. LEADERSHIP There is only a small number of those What one may conclude from the polarities schools with a fully-articulated policy on illustrated above is the precarious nature the arts, but there is a climate of of the arts in our system. The arts suffer acceptance of the arts, which is expressed in education as they do in the wide in a less explicit manner. Even principals community. who do not have a strong personal The most important factor in assuring the inclination towards the arts recognise the position of the arts will be the quality of value of certain activities. Teachers in this instructional leadership shown by the area are valued, encouraged and assisted. principal. The principal is responsible for Most principals are positively disposed to the stewardship for the curriculum. The provide as many resources for these areas vison of the principal (the capacity to as they can. communicate that vision and to involve Arts education for recreation, teachers) is the central quality required. Managerial skills are of secondary decoration and importance and are subservient to vision. accomplishment may be in The principal is charged with the place in most schools but too organisation of change – to translate much is being left to chance. vision into action, within a time-frame. To achieve this, the principal must engage the However, there appears to be more honest whole-school community. The principal endeavour by principals to provide for the must have skills of consultation and arts, than profound insight into the communication to foster the collaborative essential need for aesthetic activity. If dynamic. The principal will be required to there is a significant gap between the function as facilitator, organiser, structure- theory of an aesthetic education and the maker, enabler. The quality of practice and provision, there are reasons relationships within the school community to be concerned that this aspect of a will be an essential ingredient. The 153 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:01 Page 154
responsibility of the principal is to identify engaged in the process of formulating needs and to create the structures in which school policy and the arts are included in they can be met. The democratic process an overall plan. What remains the central will be a central part of this, as will the issue is that the effective school, which principals ability to gauge the should be capable of providing for the appropriateness of intervention, aesthetic needs of the students, require, participation or detachment. above all, effective instructional, leadership form the principal. From the The arts suffer in education arts perspective principals must not only as they do in the wide be given every opportunity to acquire the community. skills of instructional leadership, but also to receive a specific education in the The principals will be active in support of nature and importance of the aesthetic those who make the curriculum work. This experience. will require a raising of the professional skills of the staff, encouraging self- TRAINING PRINCIPALS appraisal, creating an atmosphere of trust The government White Paper Charting our and independence. Of prime importance is Education Future [1995] shows that there support. The principal must be available, is a considered awareness of the pivotal accepting, supporting, encouraging, role of the school principal, but it does not promoting, recognising. He must be make any direct connection between that committed to the fostering of good awareness and the position of the arts. working relationships and to the There is an evident impulse to raise the underwriting of developments. He must standards of professionalism among boost staff morale through verbal school administrators. endorsement and affirmative actions. Central to this must be the fuller training At a practical level, the principal will have of principals, as an essential and to manage and make available resources. mandatory part of their appointments, The principal has to be exploitative and both prior to taking up the position and on entrepreneurial. The principal must also a continuing basis throughout service. be able to deal with negative responses - Three essentials for principals’ training the resistance from staff and parents, are: protecting the arts staff, mediating with reality – the conflicting demands of the l The skills of management optional subjects, the inordinate influence l of the examinations, falling numbers. The skills of instructional leadership l An awareness and appreciation of OF PRIME IMPORTANCE IS aesthetics SUPPORT In the escalation of developmental The style of leadership and management planning since the publication of the used in schools has varied between a form Green Paper, Education for a Changing of benign autocracy, whereby the principal World [1992], there are grounds for pursues a personal agenda, based on optimism that the quality of second-level conviction and commitment to the arts schooling, and in particular the promotion and a more open, consultative form of of the arts, will shortly undergo a radical, management where the staff at large is positive change.
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Creative Engagement, 2015
Vice-President of the European Parliament, Mairead McGuiness MEP, opened this year’s exhibition in Collins Barracks on 3 October.
Mairead McGuinness at the Creative Engagement Expo with NAPD Arts Officer, Dermot Carney
reative Engagement is a cross ranging: from film and theatre to music department and agency and sculpture and dance. Ccollaboration - co-funded by the Department of Education and Skills (DES), NAPD has long advocated for this broader the Department of Arts Heritage and the approach to arts-in-education. Indeed Gaeltacht (DAHG) and the Heritage NAPD has been responsible for a shift in Council. It is a celebration of the arts-in- emphasis about an inclusive attitude to the education in Ireland. arts generally in our education system. The Association’s Arts and Culture I was reminded in coming here today that Committee, chaired by Mary Hanley, we are not talking about art education, but lobbied successive governments for the a much broader concept of arts-in- introduction of the arts-in-education education. With arts-in-education, an model and in 2005 those efforts proved outside artist or arts group comes into the successful with the launch of Creative school and works with students. The Engagement. creative engagement comes from the interaction between the artist or arts The arts-in-education model has reached group and the students. The work that over 400 second-level schools since its emerges from that interaction is wide inception, producing a wide range of 157 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:07 Page 158
projects. The collaboration of the two which local artists came into the schools government departments, DES and DAHG, and worked on projects. We see themes and the Heritage Council is a very good from our heritage, from the environment, example of best practice that is reflected from nature and from local and world in other EU countries such as Denmark, issues. Some schools look to local industry the Netherlands and the UK. for inspiration.
This cooperation between government There is also a number of projects departments is something we have seen connected with our Decade of modelled in Europe. It is effective but it is Commemorations such as Larkin College’s not always easy to achieve and requires three year project. In recent years Creative commitment from all involved towards a Engagement has reached out beyond common goal - in this case the opening Ireland to Europe and Africa. St. Ciaran’s out of the arts experience to school Community School in Kells connected with communities the length and breadth of the Iona in Scotland. Pobalscoil Chorca country, allowing all students to Dhuibhne connected with Lesotho in experience the arts in action and the arts Africa. This year there is a recognition of in education. the role of heritage as a starting point for projects. In Ireland this concept has been developed further by NAPD, with partnerships My own experience of visiting schools has extending to other cultural institutions - shown me the extraordinary lengths the Arts Council, Amnesty International, teachers go to in order to get the best local arts officers and many others. from their students and for their school in Just over two years ago the partnership everything they do. between the Departments resulted in the This exhibition is a celebration of that launch of the Arts-in-Education Charter commitment and I’m sure that the pride of which outlines a road map for and the students is match by the pride and joy commitment to the arts-in-education. The of the teachers who are part of today’s Charter has built on decades of discussion story. about the role of the arts in education. It set out a vision for the arts-in-education in Today we also acknowledge the work of Ireland in which the promotion of the the many artists and the arts groups concept of the Arts-Rich School will see an without whom this programme could not increasing emphasis on the arts in the happen. These individuals and groups curricular and extra-curricular life of the come into the schools to engage with the school. students.
It is visionary, envisaging a future where This is a big step for many artists. They schools will extend their partnership with have taken a leap of faith in the artists, arts officers and cultural partnership that underpins Creative institutions. It also envisages the Engagement and one that will further the development of new school buildings that cause of the arts in Ireland. Creative are designed with specific arts spaces to Engagement creates employment for allow for the arts to flourish. artists. It places the arts at the centre of To support the work of the schools and society. the artists, the first ever portal website was We also acknowledge the encouragement also launched on May 19 of this year. Dr of school leaders in fostering Creative Katie Sweeney chaired the committee that Engagement in their schools. There are so developed the Arts in Education portals in many demands on schools, too many which the NAPD was also actively involved. perhaps, that it might be easier to say no This will be a great resource for all to such a project. But instead many, many involved in the arts-in-education in Ireland. schools have said yes, knowing that arts- Creative Engagement is an example of the in-education is beneficial to all - pupils, Arts-in-Education Charter in action. It teachers and the school community and encompasses a wide range of the arts in society in general. 158 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:07 Page 159
I was reminded in coming here that the The arts-in-education programme like former Irish Commissioner, Máire Creative Engagement is the model that Geoghegan-Quinn, used the platform of both Europe and the US government were the European Parliament in 2012 to emphasising. highlight the importance of the arts. Her Finally, a warm word about our students remit in the Commission was research and and their energy, openness, creativity and innovation, but knowing the value of the enthusiasm. They are our future. They will arts to society she urged Europe to put the be responsible for developments and A into STEM, to integrate the Arts into innovation which we have not even Science Technology Engineering and dreamed of. Maths. Her call was for STEAM, not just STEM. But to do that they need the broadest possible education...arts included! She highlighted the importance of the arts and humanities and exhorted the change I am confident that we are only at the from the narrow STEM emphasis. beginning of something big...in ten years a lot of positive things have been done to In the U.S., too, the importance of a focus on the arts in education. broader educational experience is being recognized, with the House of The future is not about arts as an Representatives calling for a similar afterthought but arts at the centre of the change, prompted by Cisco, Google and life of the school. other multinational companies who are always searching for that creativity that We look forward to a future of Arts Rich will spark innovation, which is the key to Schools as envisaged by the Arts in economic development. Education Charter.
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Experts of the Imagination, Artists in Schools Theo Dorgan
The arts enjoyed a prominent place in the NAPD Conference programme on October 15, with the key-note speaker being Theo Dorgan, poet, broadcaster, man of arts. This is the text of his address to delegates.
Theo Dorgan in full lyrical flights at the NAPD Conference in Galway
.S. Eliot built an entire poetics on schooldays, or at least getting back in the proposition that it is only touch with the boy I was. Tpossible to be original when you I promised that child I would not forget his have absorbed and understood the experiences as time went on, that I would tradition you have inherited. The French not forget how he felt, what he thought, at aphorism puts it like this: il faut reculer successive crises in his young life, and I pour mieux sauter, one must step back promised him too that whatever pathetic before taking a jump. insights he gained would be held in memory. It is perhaps not surprising then that, faced with an assembly such as this, and What I most want to remember today is the topic I have been invited to address, I how happy reading made me, how happy I find myself turning back to my own would have been had they been content to 160 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:08 Page 161
leave me in peace, in a corner of the faith, hope and intuition, into a constantly classroom, simply to read the day away. evolving future of promise and delight. Give me the history text, the geography Daydreaming as liberation, as expansion text, the Irish and English course books – of horizons. Daydreaming as the nursery and just leave me alone. And then, when of ambition, daydreaming as time travel, I’ve absorbed all these, let me read what I daydreaming as the medium for living please to my heart’s content. That’s all I simultaneous lives, for accessing the lives wanted, and I did not think it was of others, for understanding that most unreasonable of me to dream of this. I was basic of human truths: we are all in this not a hard-liner, I should say, I was together, this one and only unrepeatable prepared to compromise on physics, life. maths & chemistry, to go at the pace of the class. The entirely unreasonable response You will appreciate, I hope, that I would of my teachers, of course, was to serially not have put it in quite these words at the beat me up for the criminal offence of age of twelve, yet it comes as something daydreaming. of a shock to me, interrogating my memories now, to discover that I had the But, I thought then and I thought now that heart of it by raw instinctive knowledge daydreaming, surely, should be part of it that far back. all. That school should promote daydreaming, actively encourage it, that I tried to capture this in the opening lessons should have as one of their key section of the long poem that opens my goals the promotion of the active collection GREEK, ‘Begin, Begin Again’: imagination, those leaps of the mind into
Flat hard light through the high window, new shoes rapping on the polished parquet, a drift of chalkdust hung on air.
My head still full of summer, running and hurling, space. A fresh year laid out before us.
Head of an argive in the new book, helmeted, bearded, a temple above him, a trireme below in the bay.
Fresh ink, fresh paper, the world quietly opening to the south. Where the swallows go.
Three hundred men and three men. Sparta. The Isles of Greece. Wave-tossed Odysseus. Alexander.
Ships and dark wine, sunlight under the pines, grapes and sour olives, rough bright walls. The childhood of the world.
Round tower on the copybook; last year’s tales of winter storms, of blood and plunder.
I turned my back to the north wind, no interest in Vikings, in death for gold. The South took all my heart.
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Now, hardened veterans that you are, you Catechism. And among those adults, will already have pegged me as one of the figures of unspeakable all-encompassing awkward squad, one of those peculiar authority, school principals. quiet and stubborn ones who can have In other words, light-blotting dark beings such a disruptive effect on an otherwise wielding immense, and almost certainly placid class. Always with a question. dangerous, powers. Always looking at you speculatively when you glance down the room, measuring you Men and women who lay down the law, privately, not quite insolent but… men and women possessed of the power something there you can’t put your finger to punish. on. Trouble. I sympathise, I really do. Men and women one did one’s very best to Can I tell you, though, that like all of my avoid. kind, all I really wanted was peace and quiet, to be left alone at worst, actively That school world, the kind of world in engaged at best. It was not my fault, that I which I went to school, was already old by was born with a hungry imagination, and then, very old, could trace its essential that I was condemned to spend my nature back to the Greeks, the Romans, childhood in an atmosphere that actively the Byzantines and the Moslem distrusted and feared the imagination, an madrassas. The wonder is that it endured environment expressly designed to for so long. suffocate imagination and to enforce The paradigm, enshrined in the conformity by any means necessary. curriculum, embodied in the modalities of Bear in mind, please, that I am trying to authority, embodied in the very persons of recover here the perspective of a child, the teachers themselves, was hierarchical, flawed and unformed, necessarily, still authoritarian, disciplinarian – everyone learning the world, but at the same time drawn into the dark orbit of schooling and hungry for truth – as all children are. school, the teachers as well as those to be schooled, swam in the lightless, My school was the North Monastery; unexamined currents, the to and fro and inspired no doubt by the many comics to fret, of obedience, of obey and be obeyed. which I was so passionately devoted, I very early christened it Stalag Luft North Mon. And now, in what seems like a very short And the Camp Commandant, the Christian time indeed but is really a matter of Brother Principal, was all too willing to play decades, all is changed, changed utterly. out his assigned role. Whether or not a terrible beauty has been born it might be premature to say, but Some of you may remember, and perhaps beauty, the inexhaustible human appetite others will not credit it, but there was a for beauty, has somehow crept into the time in Ireland when a Deputy Principal or equation while terror, if it has not a Principal was a figure of quasi-divine disappeared entirely, has certainly authority. receded. I am thinking here not so much of the What Yeats meant by ‘terrible’ in that actual authority such a figure commanded, resounding line has occupied the minds of but of the dim status allotted to that figure scholars for decades, and rightly. What has in a child’s mind. not received as much attention, though, is the noun the adjective qualifies. From a child’s perspective much of the world occupies that nebulous zone known So, beauty. A troubling term. A word, a as ‘above’ or ‘up there’. Up there are concept, at the heart of our ancient enormous adults, so much bigger than us, philosophies – Plato conceived of it as animated by mysterious impulses, indivisible from the good and the true. In speaking a sometimes incomprehensible our mercantile, neoliberal world a language, deploying powers scarcely to be devalued, indeed a scorned and despised distinguished from those enjoyed by term. Even artists, it sometimes seems, Sheriffs and Marshals, heroes and demons, shy away from the concept of beauty in if not angels and archangels in the these dark days, are apt to become 162 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:08 Page 163
embarrassed when the term is employed, because it is always a good thing to track are liable to change the subject very a word back to its etym, its root, its quickly indeed if you introduce beauty as original and primary meaning. a value. The three words that are to my purpose It’s difficult to have patience with this. here are: school, educate, art. Hurling is a beautiful game; we don’t scruple to say so. Shane Long’s goal against Germany was a thing of beauty, we SCHOOL are happy to say so. What do we artlessly The word school derives from Greek σχολή find in those we love, if not beauty? What (scholē), originally meaning “leisure“ and do we say, coming back to ourselves after also “that in which leisure is employed in listening to a sublime piece of music, if not disputation”, but later “a group to whom “that was beautiful”? lectures were given, school” and “a place in which a philosopher taught.” Beauty is as necessary to the full human life as bread and water and air – so why Here, in the original meaning of the term not say so? we have place, of course, a specific place where instruction is given and received, What troubles the adolescent heart, if not but we note also the aboriginal presence the pity and terror and exhilaration of of disputation and philosophy, the beauty, its presence, its anticipation and presence of the teacher as philosopher, its being withheld? What stirs in the heart and the implied but obvious presence of of a mathematician, a chemist, a physicist those who dispute and learn. when a theorem proves itself out, when a thought comes clear, rings true, if not the beauty of the thing? What teacher, unless EDUCATE he or she is a dark and damaged soul, The verb educate, as all of us here know, deserving of our pity, is not moved by the comes from the Latin ‘educere’, meaning beauty of a young mind reaching out to lead out. The unvoiced and more often towards, sometimes even grasping, some than not unexamined assumption, it truth, some never to be forgotten moment seems to me, is that the led are being of understanding? brought out of darkness into the light, out What is art if it does not announce to us of ignorance into knowledge. the enduring necessity of the beautiful? You might wish to say, art is what ushers ART us into the presence of the beautiful. From the Latin ars, meaning put together, join, fit – as in to join one thing with You might wish to say, in making art we another, to fit one thing with another. discover the beautiful in the human, the human in what is beautiful. What might the Greeks have meant by leisure? In our time, the word has acquired You might wish to say, there is no more an overtone of ‘not serious’ but when you nakedly human gesture than to freely stop to think of it, leisure is a very serious present others with what is beautiful. matter. When work is done for the day, And what, to descend from those heights, that is to say when we have finished or to climb up from those depths, because bartering the daily portion of the one and here direction really doesn’t matter, has only life we have, when work and duty this to do with schools, with education? have been taken care of, is that not the moment when we reach for what makes In a word, everything. our lives valuable, not just bearable but To explain myself here, let me take the meaningful? Is not leisure time that time wise advice of a gifted teacher whom I had we allocate to what truly most matters to for a brief while in primary school, and us, each to her or his own taste? Suppose turn to the dictionary. for a moment we were to replace the term ‘leisure time’ with ‘value time’, what would To be precise, the etymological dictionary, we learn from the exercise?
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Among other things, I suggest, we would all kinds. The beauty we find, perhaps learn that genuine pleasure, I mean above all, in making. pleasure in being alive, is more important The intrinsic, ineradicable human tropism than any economist is prepared to is towards pleasure, towards the joy of acknowledge. I want to ask you now to being alive, towards savouring the consider another proposition, that what unrepeatable experience of being we seek, what we most savour and value incarnate in this extraordinary rich world in good use of our leisure time, is beauty. we share with the creatures and with each The beauty of the body and mind and other. emotions being stretched and challenged, the beauty of good conversation, good There is a poem I love by the late Osip sex, good exercise, the beauty we Mandelstam, who died, as far as we know, experience and share when reading a good while in transit between one Gulag and book, watching a good film or play or another in 1934. match, the beauty in music and dance of
What shall I do with this body that has been given to me, so much at one with me, so much my own? For the calm happiness of breathing, for the joy of being alive, tell me, where should I be grateful? I am garden, and gardener too, and un-alone in this vast dungeon. My breath, my mark, you can already see on the windowpane of eternity. A pattern is imprinted there, unknown ‘til now. Let this muddle die down, the sediment flow out, the lovely pattern cannot be crossed out.
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Art is mark-making, pattern-making; and School time, no matter how good the art, even when urgent and driven, partakes school, no matter how inspired, generous of leisure — that is to say, the artist strives and imaginative the teaching and learning to make and locate her work in that kind environment, is by necessity a zone of of time we actively seek when we are tension. claiming time for ourselves. Observe, please, what happens when an What happens, when you introduce an artist is introduced into this environment, artist into the world of the school? not as a substitute for a teacher, not as an adjunct to the school process, but purely For one thing, you introduce a different and simply as a practicing artist. Those of sense of time. All art takes place in deep you with experience of what I am talking time, whether we are making art ourselves, about will testify that when the process is or present to ourselves in the face of art grounded in good faith on all sides, made by another, we share a common something remarkable happens to time. sense that time is deep and sufficient, that For one thing, it ceases to be coercive — time itself is part of what we are time in the presence of art, whether as experiencing. maker or recipient, is benign, positive, To facilitate students in experiencing this fluid and above all else time devoted to level of time is to hand them the key to a instructive pleasure. richer and deeper life, is to grant them What else happens when you introduce an permission to step off the treadmill of artist into the classroom? Well, there’s paranoia and guilt that time structured this: the concept of failure undergoes towards the exigencies of the curriculum radical interrogation. Let me offer you engenders. first an analogy before I examine this When you introduce an artist into the further: look at a bunch of kids at break school you are actively condoning, even time examining a new game someone has advocating, a modern heresy — you are brought up on an iPad. They gather permitting the students, inside a rigidly- round, they experiment with commands, structured matrix of time, to experience there’s an excited jabber as everyone time as something they can bend and contributes suggestions, contributes mould to their own needs and desires. You different scraps of knowledge. Somebody are, in other words, offering them a taste tries something, it doesn’t work, they of radical freedom, that is to say you are move on immediately and try something offering them an experience of themselves else. Peer-to-peer learning in action, non- and of each other as philosophers, as judgemental, collective pursuit of a people capable of interrogating reality. common goal. The ideal end is, everyone’s knowledge is expanded, You may consider this a large claim, but nobody is shunned for making a wrong please consider this: each and every suggestion, nobody gains any particular student in a school has the strongest kudos for having contributed something possible sense of being individual and that advanced everyone’s understanding. singular. Until they reach a certain age, The point? They are learning while and some never reach it, they consider enjoying themselves, at a phenomenal that singularity as perpetually under speed sometimes, collectively, sharing threat. Consciously or unconsciously, and insights and knowledge, above all for a number of very good reasons, they unafraid of a wrong step, unafraid to try rebel to varying degrees against the something new when something they’ve conformity of rigid structure, against the tried doesn’t work. teleology of a curriculum that ideally expects all of them to think and believe, to Success when it comes is collectively learn, exactly the same things at the same gained and shared. Failure is seen as both time. This pressure is so much at variance necessary to the process and unimportant with radical, felt individuality that the in itself. I repeat, at the gates of the entire school environment becomes school, in the yard at break-time, day after fraught with a welter of tensions — not day we observe peer-to-peer learning at least for the teachers, the educators. work. 165 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:08 Page 166
And, if you’d like to see this at work in a education. Not least, it is to make a classroom environment, watch what connection with valued time, with the happens when the class settles down, entire domain of cultural work, production artfully guided, to make drawings, poems, and creations. The school is the State’s music. How ideas fly into general instrument for socialising the young, and circulation, how something that works, is insofar as it is instrumentally designed to immediately and unreflectively copied and meet the needs of the economy, and this reproduced or varied, how egos are only or mainly, the school can all too easily voluntarily subsumed into the energy and become an instrument of benign, even insights of sharing. Could we learn unintended but real oppression. Consider, something from this? however, the implications of what happens when a school becomes also the place A line in a poem doesn’t work, the poet where you learn how to conduct yourself points this out, there is a chorus of as a free, receptive and expressive human immediate suggestions, and more often being, sharing the processes of learning than not one hits the mark. A drawing and making with others. A place where you doesn’t work? Tear it up, start another, learn that leisure is not some kind of and another again. Life is process, art is soporific or anodyne to take away the pain process, the thing produced is a moment of work, nor yet a reward for work, but a that stands out of the flow but the flow state of mind, a relaxed but engaged state goes on. of mind where human proportion re- What else do you think Beckett meant establishes itself, a state of mind that when he said: “Try again. Fail again. Fail enables us to live and work in community better.” with each other, reflecting on our experiences, contributing, listening and Education, from educere, to lead out. If the offering in the same spirit as those kids teacher will make the leap of faith, if the teaching each other a new X-box game, or teacher has the personal imaginative making a poem together, or making courage to trust this process, then the drawings in the classroom. class, taking their cue from the teacher, will find the trust in themselves and in I am, of course, painting an ideal picture each other to venture on new for you. Do not think for a moment that I understandings of success and failure. am unaware of what obstacles stand in the That’s part of what happens when you way of this bright, brave world I am introduce an artist into the classroom. sketching here. Another part, of course, is that there is a I was a member of The Arts Council/An whole school impact. One happy class, not Chomhairle Ealaíon when we set up the to mention one teacher enjoying herself or Special Committee on the Arts and himself in concert with a class, can cause Education. I remember very clearly that the a buzz that runs through the whole school, nominees of the then Minister for we all know this. The impact of learning Education were dispatched to do their best through the experience of pleasure in to slow down if not actually impede or exercising and understanding skill, the block the deliberations of that Committee. impact of working collectively in an un- I remember very clearly that the report of coerced environment, the impact of the committee was nevertheless directly experiencing peer-to-peer completed in 2007 — and that the then learning, all of this, carefully managed, can Minister for Education simply refused to have a tonic and ongoing effect on a whole accept it; I mean literally refused to accept school population. it into her hands. Why? I can only speculate, and this is the benign version, Art, remember the definition I gave earlier, that she feared having to answer in the is from the Latin ars, meaning put Dáil for not implementing some, many or together, join, fit — as in to join one thing all of the recommendations. I am with another, to fit one thing with another. absolutely clear in my mind that at an To introduce art into the school is to official level in the Department there were refresh in a wholly new guise the art of a set of attitudes opposed to the 166 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:08 Page 167
implementation of the Report, in whole or different kinds who may be known to you in part, for reasons varying from laziness only as maths teachers, special ed. and inertia to outright and downright teachers, teachers of geography, hostility to the very notion that art or secretaries and administrators. Do you artists should be introduced into the always know who they are? Have you classroom. thought of how what they do in their value time may be brought back inside the walls? I might also mention my experience when, Perhaps you have, some of you. as Director of Poetry Ireland/Éigse Éireann, the Arts Council invited me to take the Some of you will already have considerable Writers In Schools under the wing of our experience of bringing artists into your organization. A five minute meeting with schools — and you will have learned, the then Secretary General of the perhaps, among other things, that not all Department of Education, and the artists are suitable visitors to introduce — Minister, was all it took to get their many of us are cranky, socially-inept, agreement to fund a whole-time post that impatient and tongue-tied, in the enabled us to develop and offer a proportion that these traits are distributed thoroughly professional service to both through the general population. writers and schools. It took six months to It would be valuable to have some kind of get the letter confirming this agreement. forum, most likely online, where learning When I taxed the Secretary General with already gained could be shared, but it is this, he explained that the letter would not my purpose here today to offer a list have to issue from a particular subordinate of concrete suggestions as to what might official in the Department, and that this or should be done. That would be individual did not like the idea. But, said I presumptuous of me, and perhaps for in my naivety, you’re the head of the many of you an irritant, given the in-depth Department. Very patiently, that good man experience many of you already have. explained that he could indeed walk down My thoughts turn to my friend Brendan the stairs and stand over the individual in Flynn, who was for many years Principal of question until the letter was written and Clifden Community School. The school, sent even further downstairs for posting — artfully led by Brendan, has been for 37 but he would face as a result a go-slow, a years at the heart of the most dynamic and pattern of obstruction and slow beloved Arts Festival in this country. When compliance with requests that might go on I tell you that Seamus Heaney and Christy for months. Moore would make every effort to be free to perform at this Festival down through I know that, in some regards at least, the years, when I tell you that the whole things have moved on from that sorry school, not to mention the whole town, is pass, but long experience of dealing with actively engaged in the planning, a variety of Government Departments has organizing and delivery of this Festival you taught me to dig in for the long haul when may well be impressed, and you should be. hoping for any kind of change in this Some of you, perhaps many of you, may country. Change, as I have often observed know all this already. What you may not for myself, all too often comes when the know is that a single act of Brendan’s is at State is presented with and is forced to the heart of it all. One day, in a moment of accommodate initiatives from below. inspiration, he painted, over the entrance All of which said, in the light of the Arts In to the assembly hall, the sentence “The Education Charter, in the light of Points of mind altering alters all.” Alignment, of the Arts In Education Portal, The mind altering alters all. I permit myself some guarded confidence that things may yet change for the better. This is the sentence at the heart of all creative understanding, this is the beating Which brings me, ladies and gentlemen, to heart of imagination, of making and you here today. perceiving, of giving and receiving in art You have already on your staffs musicians and life. and writers and painters, artists of The mind altering alters all. 167 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:08 Page 168
I have no doubt that you are, all of you accelerating, and in a neat counter-pulse here, effective and dedicated teachers and our intellectual, cultural and spiritual managers. I want to suggest, with understanding of our common humanity is considerable diffidence and in all humility, also accelerating. that you can be far more than managers. The challenge is to find for ourselves a You can be the experts of inspiration new imagination – which of course will turn out to be the old imagination newly The future is being shaped, right now, in understood. Il faut reculer pour mieux the schools for which you have accepted sauter. We must look to the totality of our responsibility. The civil society of the existing resources to see what new use future is being shaped right now in your may be made from them. And standing at schools, in our schools. You know, as I your gates are the very experts you need, know, as we all know, that the future, even experts and adepts of the imagination. the near future, demands fresh thought, You have only to ask. You have nothing to new ways of thinking, new minds. Change lose; we all have a new world to gain. is the wider world and in the near world is
Theo Dorgan Theo Dorgan was born in Cork in 1953 and was educated in North Monastery School. He completed a BA in English and Philosophy and a MA in English at University College Cork, after which he tutored and lectured in that University, while simultaneously Literature Officer with Triskel Arts Centre in Cork. He was visiting faculty at University of Southern Maine. He lives in Dublin with his partner, the poet and playwright Paula Meehan. After Theo Dorgan’s first two collections, The Ordinary House of Love and Rosa Mundi, went out of print, and Dedalus Press reissued these two titles in a single volume What This Earth Cost Us. He has also published selected poems in Italian, La Case ai Margini del Mundo, (Faenza, Moby Dick, 1999). Dorgan has edited The Great Book of Ireland (with Gene Lambert, 1991); Revising the Rising (with Máirín Ní Dhonnachadha, 1991); Irish Poetry Since Kavanagh (Dublin, Four Courts Press, 1996); Watching the River Flow (with Noel Duffy, Dublin, Poetry Ireland/Éigse Éireann, 1999); The Great Book of Gaelic (with Malcolm Maclean, Edinburgh, Canongate, 2002); and The Book of Uncommon Prayer (Dublin, Penguin Ireland, 2007). He has been Series Editor of the European Poetry Translation Network publications and Director of the collective translation seminars from which the books arose. A former Director of Poetry Ireland/Éigse Éireann, he has worked extensively as a broadcaster of literary programmes on both radio and television. His Jason and The Argonauts, to music by Howard Goodall, was commissioned by and premiered in the Royal Albert Hall in 2004. He was the scriptwriter for the acclaimed TV documentary series Hidden Treasures, and a series of texts commissioned from him features in the dance musical Riverdance. His songs have been recorded by a number of musicians, including Alan Stivell, Jimmy Crowley and Cormac Breathnach. He was presenter of Poetry Now on RTÉ Radio 1, and later presented RTÉ’s TV books programme, “Imprint”.
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Current Issues
his is the place in the journal for miscellaneous items of topical interest. It’s also the place, Tin this instance, for last-minute additions. It cannot claim to be comprehensive. It is quite clear that there is no direct reference to the new junior cycle, which has occupied so many column inches over the past few years. It could be that, for the moment, there is virtually nothing more to add. During Ruairi Quinn’s ministry, the aspirations for, and the parameters of, the junior cycle were laid down. While the detail – that spot occupied by the Devil – remained to be sorted, there was a huge optimism in some quarters that genuine reform was in the offing and that 2015-16 would be a year for action and progress. Unfortunately, neither the optimists, nor the Minister, took adequate account of the conservatism, the resistance to change, the pure suspicion and lack of trust which characterised much of the union resistance to the proposals. It took Jan O’Sullivan, working with Pauric Travers and senior union officials, to work out the compromises that brought new proposals close – but not close enough – to implementation. So yet another school year has started in uncertainty and insecurity. It remains to be seen what reflection and discussion out of the public eye may achieve. Education and life must go on and so we focus on some of the other new ideas. Betty McLaughlin’s opens the section with a timely contribution. As the recent budget conceded extra time and teaching post for guidance, she spells out the wide range of services supplied by Guidance Counsellors. She asserts the need to have fully-qualified personnel available to supply these services. Seán McDonagh analyses this year’s Leaving Certificate results, with particular attention paid to the STEM subjects [Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics]. He does not neglect the Arts/Humanities subjects that transform the acronym for the educational core into STEAM. Alan Kearns outlines the essential 5 Cs for teachers [Competence, Compassion, Communication, Cooperation and Cultivation], which sits well with the increased focus on wellness in schools. From TED comes a short item that offers us all a stimulating must-read book list and, finally, Clive Byrne, offers thoughts and ideas to provoke discussion among school leaders.
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Functions of the Guidance Counsellor Betty McLaughlin
Betty Mc Laughlin [Centre] pictured at the FET Conference, 2015, with Clive Byrne, NAPD, and the Tánaiste, Joan Burton, TD.
he Institute of Guidance Counsellors is seeking to restore guidance supports for schools. NAPD lobbied extensively in support of their T campaign but while the Association was fully in favour of a restoration of guidance supports, it expressed the view that not much would be forthcoming if they insisted that they were to be ex quota. In this article, Betty McLaughlin, President of the Institute of Guidance Counsellors and currently the Guidance Counsellor in Coláiste Mhuire CBS, Mullingar, lists, on behalf of the IGC, the many and varied roles that should be undertaken by a guidance counsellor in a school.
An effective Whole School Guidance Programme (WSGP) includes planned programmes and activities, based on the needs of students, that identify key target areas for service delivery; statements of expected student outcomes in terms of knowledge, skills, and attitudes in areas of personal, educational and career; strategies and activities to achieve these outcomes; and strategies for evaluating the effectiveness of same. It is the function of the Guidance Counsellor to implement these services and deliver the outcomes, in line with the objectives and goals as set out in the school WSGP, and infused into the daily activities of the school. 170 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:42 Page 171
COUNSELLING circumstances. It is a responsive service that consists of activities designed to meet Counselling is a key part of the school the immediate needs and concerns of guidance programme, offered on an students, whether those needs or individual or group basis as part of a concerns require counselling, developmental learning process and at consultation, referral or information. moments of personal crisis. It is an Although the Guidance Counsellor is interactive learning process between the specifically training and possesses the Guidance Counsellor and the student, skills necessary to respond to these which may be undertaken in an individual, immediate needs and concerns, the co- small group or family basis, and is operation and support of the entire school concerned with empowering the student to management and staff are necessary for make decisions, solve problems, change its successful implementation. behaviours and resolve issues in their personal lives. Such activity may be REFERRAL personal counselling, educational Referral includes two types of activity; the counselling, career counselling, or it may referral of an individual student to the involve combinations of each. Guidance Counsellor by a teacher, school The overall aim of counselling is to provide management, or parents; and the referral students with opportunities to work in of an individual student by the Guidance self-defined ways, towards living a more Counsellor to external professionals. In satisfying and resourceful life as cases where students require personal individuals and as members of the broader counselling over a protracted period of society. The focus is on personal growth in time, the Guidance Counsellor seeks the self-knowledge and self- esteem by assistance of non-school based assisting students to understand their professionals e.g. NEPS, following emotions, abilities, interests and special standard procedures. The Guidance aptitudes; to acquire information about Counsellor provides support for students educational and career opportunities; to referred by teachers, parents, and school make and carry out appropriate life management, and voluntary participation choices and plans, and to achieve by the student is respected. satisfactory adjustments in life. PREVENTION INDIVIDUAL COUNSELLING Prevention is related to the creation of safe, caring, and effective school Counselling on an individual basis is part environments, through the development of the support structure that a school of safe schools initiatives and the provides to students who have problems promotion of diversity and inclusion in all or difficulties dealing with relationships, aspects of the school community. As the personal concerns, or normal whole area of prevention and preventive developmental tasks. Within the overall planning responds to a range of time allocated for guidance, adequate time complexity or severity, the WSGP contains is given for the counselling function, and programmes for proactive interventions by the rationale for the time allocated to the Guidance Counsellor, in consultation counselling is evident in the school with other staff and referral to external Guidance Plan. Flexibility is applied by the agencies. Prevention planning exists at Guidance Counsellor in the usage of the three levels: primary, secondary and allocated time, based on student tertiary. demand/need; and balanced against their responsibilities to the full student body. PRIMARY PREVENTION Primary prevention focuses on preventing CRISIS COUNSELLING a problem from occurring. The emphasis Counselling facilitates the student in crisis is on promoting and enhancing a positive by providing a range of coping strategies school climate (e.g. a programme to and interventions in a caring and sensitive facilitate a safe school environment). way, appropriate to individual needs and 171 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:42 Page 172
SECONDARY PREVENTION communication technologies, skills Secondary prevention focuses on development (e.g. planning, decision- identifying the early indicators of a making, study skills, communication), and problem. The goal is to intervene in order career preparation. The objective of these to shorten the duration or lessen the experiences is to provide students with the impact of a problem (e.g. intervening with necessary expertise to assist them in a student at risk of dropping-out, or decision-making, problem-solving, and helping a student apply conflict resolution behavioural change; and coping with ever- skills). changing circumstances in the areas of personal, education and career TERTIARY PREVENTION development. Tertiary prevention focuses on minimising the immediate consequences of an ASSESSMENT SERVICES existing severe problem. The emphasis is The Guidance Counsellor uses a range of on intervening to regain control over a psychometric tests and other evaluative situation so remediation and prevention instruments to support relevant objectives strategies can be developed, implemented, of the WSGP, related to career and and assessed (e.g. transitional counselling educational planning, personal decision and referral; planning for a student facing making, and the development of self- suspension from school; re-integration of awareness. The Guidance Counsellor the student following suspension; selects from a variety of psychological and ‘holding’ a student who is suicidal; or de- educational standardised measurement escalating a student exhibiting explosive instruments to classify ability, predict behaviour). academic and occupational performance, assess remediation requirements, and ADVOCACY FOR A STUDENT determine achievement levels. There are times when the Guidance Counsellor assumes an advocacy role for SUBJECT CHOICE the welfare of a student. In this way, the Many students are uncertain what subject counsellor facilitates and champions for they should study, and there is always the quality curricular and school experiences temptation to take subjects that are for that student. In this role, the Guidance believed to be easy or enjoyable. Many Counsellor is concerned with factors that students do not understand the influence the well-being of the student and relationship between subject choice at promotes gender and ethnic equity; Junior Cycle and future options regarding collaborates with school staff to ensure a career choice at Senior Cycle based upon positive school climate; assists teachers in these selections. As the connection offering student focused support; between education and career entry is not promotes policies that ensure a safe, understood by many students, the positive environment; involves parents in Guidance Counsellor provides individual the growth, development, and decisions of and class-based supports to align students’ their child in career planning; coordinates course selections with their occupational parenting sessions; and, follows the preferences (if known), and highlights the student in a sequential process. implications of subject selection at lower levels on their career goals.
DEVELOPMENTAL GUIDANCE PERSONAL AND SOCIAL GUIDANCE EDUCATION Personal and social development The Guidance Counsellor provides programmes and activities are designed to developmental classroom-based guidance facilitate the transfer of knowledge and activities and learning experiences that are skills relating to a student’s personal and relevant to the objectives of the school social development, self- awareness, Guidance Plan. Experiences include decision-making and planning. The information giving, information and Guidance Counsellor works in close co- 172 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:42 Page 173
operation with SPHE teachers to maximise students with: goal setting, self- the benefits to be derived from guidance- exploration, assessment, decision-making, related class-based learning. understanding trends and personalising information in shaping one’s own plans, EDUCATIONAL GUIDANCE imaging one’s own future, raising self- expectations, individual planning, Educational guidance helps students exploration of the work world and its prepare a developmentally-tailored changing nature, exploration of post- educational plan. This includes assistance secondary opportunities, including in subject choice; an understanding how apprenticeship, and financial aid, subject choice in the Junior Cycle impacts development of a career portfolio, on career choices in Senior Cycle; development of transition, change and information on the ‘points system’ and the coping skills, and examination of the options within it; information on the broad influence of ethnicity, class, gender, range of alternatives within the third level orientation, status, and disability on one’s education system; and information on the career options and choices. transition to employment and work. The Guidance Counsellor pays particular Career education teaches students the skill attention to be gender neutral in of decision making, self-analysis, goal encouraging all students to pursue non- setting and planning, and the development gender specific careers in of flexible implementation strategies. gender-dominated occupations such as These are key skills required in many technology, mathematics, engineering, aspects of life, not just career decision- nursing, psychology, etc. making, and skills that will be demanded from the workforce of the future. CAREER GUIDANCE Career guidance is a service to students by the Guidance Counsellor that assists them CONSULTATION, to make the educational, training and PLANNING AND occupational choices to manage their CO-ORDINATION future careers. It is developmental in nature and focuses students to reflect on DEVELOPING THE GUIDANCE PLAN their ambitions, interests, qualifications and abilities; helps them understand both The school Guidance Plan outlines and the education systems and the labour describes the full range of services, market, and to relate these to what they programmes, events and activities which know about themselves. The overarching the school implements to addresses the objective of the Guidance Counsellor is to needs of the students in the areas of their teach students to plan and make decisions personal and social, educational and about their learning and work. This is career development. It contains a detailed achieved by making information about breakdown of the following elements: educational opportunities and the labour l what the school provides; market more accessible to them by organising it, and making it available when l what target groups are benefiting from they need it. Career guidance, therefore, the provision; requires regular updating to keep in touch with changes in the third level education l the guidance outcomes intended for system and the labour market. the target groups;
INDIVIDUAL CAREER COUNSELLING l how these guidance outcomes are to be achieved; Career counselling is a fluid yet systematic process of helping individuals to explore l what resources are available to both themselves and their possibilities; support the outcomes; and and to decide, with awareness, what they want to do at different stages of the life l how the school identifies if the span. Guidance Counsellors assist outcomes have been achieved. 173 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:42 Page 174
COLLABORATION SUPPORT SERVICES All school staff members work together to The Guidance Counsellor provides support increase opportunities for success in the to parents, teachers, the school principal, lives of students. The Guidance Counsellor Board of Management and referral provides education, guidance, and agencies in assisting the personal and counselling to students through social, career and educational collaborative and consultative approaches development of students. Such support that include direct instruction, guidance may include advocacy on behalf of a activities, team teaching, group and student; assistance in the planning and individual counselling, student support development of SPHE; and other guidance team planning, and other guidance-related related activities. activities. Comprehensive guidance and counselling programmes and services help CALENDAR OF EVENTS all students to realise their full potential regardless of physical, social, emotional, Career guidance is most effective when educational, and other challenges. strong links are established by schools with the world of work and the Guidance Counsellor manages, organises and EVALUATION SERVICES coordinates the career guidance activities To ensure a quality guidance service is into a coherent calendar of events. Events being provided to students, procedures for include career orientation visits, both internal and external assessment and opportunities for students’ work evaluation exist. The Guidance Counsellor experience, work shadowing, visits to is responsible for its internal assessment workplaces, training centres and higher on an annual basis, which includes education colleges and institutes, and documenting the elements of service career days and career seminars. provision to evaluate if key elements are Developmental career guidance and being provided to the relevant quality education programmes focus on different standards; reviewing feedback from experiences and the Guidance Counsellor students, parents and school staff; approaches representatives from the identifying weaknesses, and putting in business community, parents, and place short-term and long-term teachers to provide relevant supports for improvement measures. The review these experiences. creates mutual awareness of the complementary roles that all school staff STUDENT NEEDS ASSESSMENT play in delivering career guidance. External The Guidance Counsellor conducts a assessment is independent, credible, and Student Needs’ Assessment by collecting appropriate and is conducted by the in-depth information through interviews, Guidance Inspectorate. focus groups, and the use of questionnaires with school staff, school INFORMATION SERVICES management, and students. The participation of students is crucial. The Guidance Counsellor assists students to source, interpret and use information relevant to their personal and social, TIME ALLOCATIONS educational and career development. Every Guidance Counsellor evaluates how Information is a key first component in much of their time to allocate to each of guidance. The Guidance Counsellor keeps the four components of the Guidance Plan. fully informed of the requirements of Frequently, the Guidance Counsellor students, parents, teachers and school becomes aware of the depth of some administration; the sources of useful problems underlying a student’s career information nationally and locally; the indecision, e.g. poor study habits, system for acquiring, storing and substance misuse, and absenteeism, and disseminating information; and the has a responsibility to provide counselling, methods of processing and using which must be balanced with other information in an integrated way. components of the Guidance Plan. 174 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:42 Page 175
CONTINUED PROFESSIONAL objectives of the school guidance DEVELOPMENT programme and involves updating of The Guidance Counsellor keeps abreast of skills, the use of new technology, and on-going changes in the fields of training, opportunity for networking. Attendance by education, work, child welfare. The Board the Guidance Counsellor at non-school of Management and school management based events is agreed in advance between facilitates the attendance of the Guidance the Board of Management, school Counsellor at relevant events and in-career management and the Guidance professional training during the school Counsellor. year; and participation is related to the
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Stem and Steam
Aspects of participation and performance in the Leaving Certificate, 2015; some trends and result patterns in that participation; an aspect of the new 2017 Points System.
Seán McDonagh
INTRODUCTION Technological advance and global innovation emphasise the future importance of qualifications and occupations in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics i.e. STEM qualifications and occupations. This note focuses on Leaving Certificate subjects preparatory to entering Higher/Further Education STEM courses and STEM based occupations. It is argued that STEM qualifications need to be complemented with other skills such as communication and multilingual skills, with design and innovative capacities. This leads to the addition of the letter “A” representing broad Arts, covering communication and languages, art and humanities. Broader STEAM qualifications are thus promoted. This note also examines subjects preparatory to acquiring such enriching skills. The 2015 Eurostat Report “Being Young in Europe To-Day” reminds us again that Ireland has the youngest population in Europe with the highest proportions both under 15 and under 30. It has the lowest median age in Europe. This presents both a challenge to provide the highest quality education to these young people and an unprecedented 176 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:43 Page 177
opportunity through enabling them to The “universal” subjects English and exploit their talents in Ireland. The Leaving Mathematics had 53,123 and 53,570 Certificate programme and its assessment entries respectively, up 849 and 1,189 and their comparative quality at the end of from 2014. Between them they account for schooling are key elements in meeting this almost 29% of Leaving Certificate entries. challenge. These two “universal” subjects, enablers of the study of other subjects and proven strong predictors of persistence and OVERALL EXAMINATION success at Higher Education, are key ENTRIES 2015 subjects in relation to the quality of the In 2015 there were approximately 370,000 Leaving Certificate programme. Being Leaving Certificate examination entries “universal”, they enable the direct from 55,000+ candidates. This confirms comparison of school leaver achievement again the common practice of full-time – and schools. students to take seven subjects. The The number of births 18 years ago in Leaving Certificate is a broad programme 1997, a factor affecting the 2015 Leaving with different levels. Certificate numbers, was 52,775. In 2014 Of these entries about 232,500 (62.7%) there were 67,462 births. The Leaving were at Higher Level and 129,000 (34.8%) Certificate programme will continue to at Ordinary Level. The Foundation levels of grow in enrolment. It must meet the Irish and Mathematics contributed 9,156 complex educational needs of people, in a entries, 2.5% of the total. If Mathematics changing world, with a great variety of and Irish, the two subjects with both the aptitudes, abilities and ambitions, from lowest proportions at Higher Level and diverse family and national backgrounds. these Foundation Levels, were removed, then the remaining 30 subjects were 70.9% at Higher level. HIGHER LEVEL BROAD SUBJECT CHOICE The candidates were 27,817 female and The Leaving Certificate Higher Level is the 27,192 male. Females took a majority, highest school level examination. Table 1 122,907, (52.9%) of the Higher Level gives the breakdown of the 2015 examinations while males took 109,565 examination Higher Level entries by broad (47.1%). (In the UK, in 2015, A-level subject subject choice and by gender. The major entries were 54.9% female.) Males formed subjects Mathematics, English and Irish a majority 68,651, (53.2%), of the Ordinary are distinguished and the remaining 29 Level entries with females accounting for subjects are divided into broad discipline 60,413, (46.8%).The Foundation Level groupings in the central column. 9,156 entries were 58.1% (5,320) male and 41.9%, (3,836), female.
Table 1: Higher Level 2015 Entries: Broad Discipline and Gender
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The first column gives the percentage of candidates choosing the Higher Level in each subject area. (The percentage for “National future skills Mathematics and Irish in brackets arises if Foundation Level is omitted.) There are planning should clearly great subject variations in the proportions choosing Higher Level. address the Science Mathematics and Irish are the two lowest subjects in Higher choice. (French is next subject pattern” lowest at 57.5%. By contrast, the subject Music had 92.7% of its candidates, the highest proportion, at Higher Level.) The second column gives the pattern of overall subject area choice at Higher Level. Higher English is by far the largest Higher subject entry with 36,000+, 15.5%, of all Higher entries. STEM related subjects, Sciences, Technology/Engineering and Mathematics, contribute overall 33.7% of Higher entries. Languages overall 7.9% of the total. It formed, in 2015, 15.0% constitute 34.8% of Higher entries. of male Higher entries and only 1.6% of female ones. The last two columns reveal the contrasting patterns of male and female l Males formed a majority, 52.4%, of Higher Level choices. While there is major Higher Mathematics candidates. overlap there is also major difference. Females form a majority, 52.9%, of all l Males also were a majority, 53.2%, of Higher entries in 2015. Humanities entries, which are 12.8% of the total. l Females form a large majority, 59%, of all Higher Language entries. l Business related subjects, 9.1% of the total, had more balanced gender l Females dominate the Arts, with 70.5% entries. of their entries. Arts form 5.9% of the total. When combined, STEM subjects form 41.2% of male Higher entries and 27.2% of l Home Economics has a large Higher female Higher entries. STEM patterns are entry, 8,754, which is 92.5% female. examined now in more detail. Some comparisons by subject and of male and l Science entries, 19.5% of the total, had female performance are made. a female majority of 53.8%, largely because female students studying Sciences, as noted below, are more STEM SUBJECTS –SCIENCES likely to take the Higher Level. Table 2 gives information on the 2015 One large subject discipline area of male Science subject Higher Level examination dominance is Technology/Engineering, entries.
Table 2: Science Higher Entries: 2015
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Biology is the dominant Science with more students. They are a majority in the than half, 56.4%, of all Higher Science physical science Chemistry also. Table 3 examination entries and 65.2% of female contrasts the male and female results and entries. There is some change in the their proportions in each Science subject Higher subject pattern. Since 2011 both taking the Higher Level. Physics and Chemistry have increased by a The left-hand column in Table 3 shows little more than 20% in entries. Agricultural that in each Science subject a larger Science increased more slowly, by 14.7%. proportion of the female candidates do the Biology increased by 12.9%. Few sit the Higher Level. Furthermore, the right hand broad subject “Physics and Chemistry”. column shows that in four of the five National future skills planning should Science subjects a higher proportion of address the Science subject pattern. females get high, A/B, grades at Higher The right-hand column shows the male level. and female contrasting patterns of Science (Of those receiving undergraduate awards uptake. Males dominate Physics and form in 2014 in Natural Sciences, Mathematics a large majority in Agricultural Science. and Statistics 48.6% were male and 51.4% Females form a large majority of Biology female.)
Table 3: Sciences: Proportions Choosing Higher and Proportions getting Higher A/B Grades:
STEM Subjects – Technology/Engineering. Table 4 gives information on Leaving Certificate subjects related to Technology and Engineering.
Table 4: Technology/Engineering Subjects at Higher level 2015
The Technology/Engineering subjects, as male proportion in Table 4, still has three the first column shows, are largely taken male students at Higher Level for every at Higher Level. The second column female. Higher Mathematics and Physics – informs us that these subjects are largely both with male majorities – attract some to male. (Of those receiving undergraduate Higher Applied Mathematics. Of the males awards in 2014 in Engineering/ doing this subject in 2015 18.1% achieved Manufacturing/Construction 86.6% were an A1 grade and 30.1% a grade A1 or A2. male and 13.4% female. Of those receiving Higher A/B grade was achieved by 58.1% – such awards in ICT in 2014 82.2% were clearly many are capable of a more male and 17.8% female.) challenging subject. Of the few doing Ordinary level 36.9% got a grade A!The Applied Mathematics, which has the lowest 179 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:43 Page 180
PISA 2012 results strongly suggested the importance to intellectual development need for the promotion of male/female and in the study of many other disciplines. high Mathematical achievement. The It was the subject with the largest number Applied Mathematics syllabus, being of entries at its three levels. In 2015 27.4% reviewed, dates from 1971. of its candidates, 14,691, took the Higher Level a largely increased proportion since The proportion of Higher students getting the introduction of the flat bonus for A/B grades was Construction 40.5%, passing Higher Level Mathematics. The Engineering 44.8%, Design and number was 8,237 in 2011. In 2015 Communications 48.7% and Technology 13,925 students became eligible for the 49.1%. 25 point bonus. The final column gives an indication of Female participation in Higher enrolment change. Construction, the Mathematics has increased more strongly largest subject, is at its 2011 level. than male. In 2011 females formed 45.6% Engineering has had an 11.3% increase of Higher Mathematics candidates, and since 2011 and Design a 5.0% increase. 46.95% in 2014. In 2015 this had risen to Applied Mathematics and Technology have 47.6%. In 2015 about 700 more males had large % increases but from than females achieved the 25 point flat comparatively low numbers. bonus. As these bonus-driven changes have occurred the pattern of Mathematics STEM SUBJECTS – results has also changed. Table 5 shows the % result pattern change for male and MATHEMATICS female candidates passing at Higher and Mathematics, a “universal” subject of the Ordinary. Leaving Certificate, is of central
Table 5: % Result Patterns. Mathematics: H and O Male, Female Candidates
The result pattern has changed. Higher advantages by becoming the Anglophone A/B grades have increased in proportion country with the highest standards of but a much higher proportion in 2015 get English and the highest levels of C/D Higher grades, the grades multilingualism. The Leaving Certificate proportionately rewarded more by the flat programme has a major role in this bonus. Ordinary A/B grades have declined ambition and in the implementation of a in proportion but Ordinary C/D grades are national language policy. little affected. Table 6 shows that French is the dominant modern language. Since 2011, at Higher ARTS SUBJECTS: LANGUAGES Level, French has increased by 10.9%, The fact that English is consolidating its German by 23.1% and Spanish by 51.8%. position as the dominant world language The category “Others” contains the brings to Anglophone countries and important languages ltalian, Russian, individuals the risk of both complacency in Japanese and Arabic with smaller relation to English language standards and enrolments. The 2015 National Employer indifference to the advantages of Survey, in listing foreign language multilingualism. Ireland can gain major proficiency skills in demand, cites French,
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Table 6: Language Entries at Higher Level 2015
German, Spanish, Italian, Chinese, Dutch, proportion of the male candidates took the Portuguese and Russian in that order. It is Higher Level examination. Irish had the important that STEM Higher Education smallest proportion of males taking its students, who have Higher Language skills Higher Level. A change in assessment from the Leaving Certificate, be given the seemingly has caused an increase in the opportunity to build professional fluency numbers taking Higher Irish. More than and competence in that language. half the females, 53.7%, taking Higher or Ordinary Irish in 2015 took the Higher In 2015 a further 1,361 candidates sat the course. (Only 35.6% of the males did.) The important non-curricular EU languages. result pattern in 2015 in Irish, a Polish constituted half of them, 671, and compulsory school subject, is interesting Lithuanian (247), Romanian (138) and (Table 7). There is a sharp contrast Portuguese (92) were also included. between the male and female results. The The left hand column of Table 6 shows female Higher A/B and the male Ordinary that in all languages a much smaller C/D percentages are noteworthy.
Table 7: Irish Language: % of Higher and Ordinary: Result Patterns 2015
Table 8 gives the proportion of Higher when fewer did Higher Irish, the candidates, male and female, who proportions of Higher Irish candidates achieved high A/B grades in the main getting A/B grades were male 45.1% and languages. The female Higher Irish grades female 51.7%. The Irish language results A/B proportions are noteworthy. In 2011, deserve an explanation.
Table 8: Main Languages: % of Higher Candidates getting A/B Grades: 2015
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Fewer males study languages. A smaller Geography dominates the Humanities with proportion of those that do sit the Higher two in every three of the its candidates. examination. Of these, Table 8 shows, a Males form a majority of the two main smaller proportion get high A/B grades. Humanities subjects. In the two Arts subjects females form large ART AND HUMANITIES majorities. Table 10 gives the proportions of candidates in 2015 at Higher Level who Table 9 gives information on the uptake at achieved Higher A/B grades in the main Higher Level in 2015 of Humanities and subjects. By this Higher A/B measure, Arts subjects. females outperform males in Arts and Humanities.
Table 9: Art and Humanities: Higher Level 2015
Table 10: Higher Humanities and Arts: % Achieving A/B
The results in the Arts subjects are BUSINESS SUBJECTS AND HOME exceptional. The Art syllabus dates from ECONOMICS 1969. Fewer males do the subject Higher To complete a discussion of Leaving Art and their number declined in 2015. Certificate subjects Table 11 gives Those who do, lag seriously behind the information on Business related subjects female candidates. Music, the subject with and Home Economics. the largest proportion at Higher level, had also the highest proportion of Higher A/B grades in 2015. Two in every three achieved a Higher A/B grade. Clearly Music “The comparative students are capable of a higher standard quality of the examination. Leaving Certificate (Of those receiving undergraduate awards is of critical national in 2014 in Humanities and Arts – including languages – 40.4% were male and 59.6% strategic importance” female.)
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Table 11: Business Related Subjects and Home Economics: Higher Level 2015
Business Studies is the dominant Business in 1969. Since then, the Nobel Prize in subject in terms of enrolment. The subject Economics has been conferred on 75 Accountancy is exceptional in that a higher Laureates at 46 ceremonies, supportive of proportion of males took the Higher the view that the subject has developed Examination. In the subject Economics, since that syllabus was written. (Another where males form a majority, a very high subject, Agricultural Economics, had a proportion of candidates choose the small enrolment.) A low % of males doing Higher course. The 2015 Predictability Higher Home Economics got A/B grades Study of the Leaving Certificate tells us (Table 12). that the Economics syllabus was designed
Table 12: Business Subjects and Home Economics: Higher A/B grades
NEW 2017 POINTS SYSTEM subject in Higher Level choices. A new grading system, with H and O Languages, at the lower end, contrast grades at 10% intervals , is to be strongly with, say, Engineering subjects or introduced in 2017. In that system the Art subjects, a contrast that may reflect grouped grades of Tables 5 and 7 will read inherent or perceived comparative H1.H2.H3, H4.H5.H6, O1.O2.O3 and difficulty. Important issues of level O4.O5.O6. Accompanying this will be a purpose and choice, subject by subject, new Points System. need to be discussed for the 2017 Leaving Certificate. A new feature of the Points System from 2017 will be the award of points for the The two subjects with the lowest Higher first time for achieving 30-39% at Higher Level choice, Mathematics and Irish, have Level, the new H7 grade. This is intended both increased their Higher proportion in as an incentive to students to take the recent years. Higher Level option. (It may also, l In Mathematics the result pattern has unintentionally but importantly, provide an changed (Table 5). The real need now incentive to underperformance by some is to increase Ordinary level grade Higher Level students through providing a achievement, so important to many lower, points yielding, safety net.) The Technical Courses and careers. points for H7, which overlaps the present E grade, will equal those for O3 (70-79%). l In Irish (Tables 7 and 8) the 2015 result patterns, different for males and Table 1 illustrates the major differences by females, require explanation.
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l English, the “universal” subject, has examine the percentage at Ordinary Level the highest number of Higher Level who received an A grade, prime targets for entries and yet, in 2015, of the 6,900+ any incentive to switch to Higher Level. females who did its Ordinary Level Table 13 shows the top ten major subjects 621, 9.0%, got an A grade. ranked both by the percentage of Higher students getting Higher E grade and the The new 2017 points for the H7 grade percentage of Ordinary Level students makes it interesting to examine the getting A grades in 2015 proportions of 2015 Higher students who received an E grade. It is also instructive to
Table 13: % at E Grade Higher: % at A Grade Ordinary: 2015
Three Science subjects have the largest Higher Level choice (Table 1), are not proportion of Higher E grades. Indeed, in amongst the top ten subjects by % of E 2015, of males who sat Higher Physics, grades at Higher Level. Only English Agricultural Science and Chemistry 10.6%, appears on the top ten Ordinary A Grade 9.8% and 9.3% respectively did not achieve list. a passing grade. On the left column E grade list, There are seven STEM subjects in the top Mathematics is the only subject where the ten E list. Seven subjects appear on both male % of E grades is less than the female lists in Table 13. %. On the right hand A grade list females have a larger % of A grades than males in Physics in 2015 had the highest % of 9 of the 10 subjects. The outlier Applied Higher students getting an E grade. Indeed Mathematics is the exception. of 4,196 males who took Higher Physics, 442 of them, 10.6%, did not get a passing grade. (In contrast, of 4,082 females taking Higher Music, 13 of them, 0.3%, did “Important issues of level not pass!). A high proportion, 14.4%, of Ordinary Physics students got an A grade purpose and choice, with 20.5% of the female candidates subject by subject, gaining this grade. (One fifth of female Ordinary Accounting students also got an need to be A grade.) discussed for the A smaller proportion of History students choose the Higher course (Table 9) 2017 Leaving compared to Geography. Yet History has a Certificate”. much higher proportion, 14.3%, of Ordinary students getting an A grade compared to Geography (4.3%). Languages, which generally have a lower 184 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:43 Page 185
RANKING OF SUBJECTS 2015 lists. Irish and Mathematics retain their Subjects can be ranked for male and higher rankings of recent years on both female candidates by their number of lists. examination entries in 2015 at Higher Again female choices are more Level. Table 14 gives that ranking. concentrated. Of their choices 54.5% are The ranking of table 14 shows both the from five subjects, including three the degree of overlap and difference in languages in the top four positions. Four male and female subject choices. Both lists out of five female choices come from ten share four of the top five and seven of the subjects. top ten. The subject English is top on both
Table 14: Higher Subject Entries 2015: Male and Female: Ranking
The male list has three Engineering high on both lists. Business Studies is subjects in the top twelve. Clearly the number 8 on both lists. Home Economics Applied Scientific and generic skills is the sixth choice of females. developed by these subjects is of key For comparison Table 15 shows the 2015 importance to the male Leaving Certificate. subject ranking from a different system. It Construction earns the 19th position on gives the male and female A-Level subject the female list. Applied Mathematics does ranking across the UK and in Northern not appear on the top 20 male list. Ireland (NI). Biology is the top Science, in the top 3 on There is major difference between the UK both lists. A physical Science, either male and female choices. Mathematics and Physics or Chemistry, is in 10th position Physical Sciences feature strongly on the on both lists. UK male rankings. Males in Northern Geography, the dominant Humanities Ireland have six STEM subjects in their top subject, is in the top 5 on both lists. eight. Only one language, English, appears French, the dominant modern language, is in the top 10 UK rankings. 185 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:43 Page 186
Table 15: A-Level Subject Ranking 2015: UK and Northern Ireland
CONCLUSION The applied science and generic skills With high (90+%) age cohort participation conferred by Technology/Engineering rates and growing numbers the Leaving Leaving Certificate subjects are vital to the Certificate Programme has to cater for success of the Leaving Certificate for many complex educational needs. Its males. They should get special emphasis. comparative quality is of critical national A national Language Policy should strategic importance. This note suggests promote excellence in English and some issues to be addressed. multilingualism. Languages of strategic Two subjects, the “universal” subjects importance should be identified and English and Mathematics, are critical to promoted. Community languages, the that quality. An Index of English and languages of Ireland’s immigrant Mathematical Achievement would enable a communities, should be facilitated as part direct comparison of students and schools of that policy. In STEM courses in Higher and encourage higher achievement in Education, those with high Leaving both. Certificate language achievement should be enabled and encouraged to transform The Leaving Certificate is a broad that to professional fluency and programme and this note illustrates the competence in the language. wide subject choice, the subject variations in uptake, in Higher Ordinary ratios and in Male comparative school under- result patterns. It shows the major male achievement is an international and female differences in these factors. Greater emphasis should be given to the identification of the range of generic skills “Male comparative being developed by particular subject choices. school With the introduction in 2017 of a points underachievement incentive for achieving 30-39% at Higher is an level –the new H7 grade - a discussion, subject by subject, of the purpose and international choice of Higher or Ordinary Levels needs phenomenon to take place. and a major National future skills planning, including the planning of future STEM qualification issue” needs, should review the male and female pattern of Leaving Certificate Science subject choices. 186 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:43 Page 187
phenomenon and a major issue. A small country, however, should be able to devise successful strategies to address this Seán McDonagh is a former underachievement in key subjects as part Director of an Institute of of a wider programme of addressing Technology and a former underachievement. University Lecturer in A pattern of subject choices has evolved, Mathematics. He has been not for strategic reasons, of “dominant” involved in many high-level subjects in broad discipline areas. These initiatives, including “dominant” subjects include Biology, membership of the expert group Geography, French and Business. The for Future Skills Needs. He has causes and effects of this should be been a regular contributor to analysed. NAPD publications, bringing Music and Applied Mathematics, totally statistic insight and diverse subjects, have this in common. analysis to a wide They are outliers in that they are both range of topics. largely Higher Level subjects with very high proportions getting high A/B grades at that level. A case can be made for both for a new Advanced Level subject classification.
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The 5-C Principles for the School Community
Dr. Alan J. Kearns, Lecturer in Ethics at Mater Dei Institute of Education, a College of DCU.
Introduction The aim of this short paper is to demonstrate the application, and therefore the relevance of, the 5-C principles of competence, compassion, communication, cooperation and cultivation for the teaching profession, parents/legal guardians and pupils together with the broader school community. The argument advanced in this paper is that the 5-Cs stand out as simple, compact and yet rich principles that can provide a useful compass to guide all partners in the daily task of the education enterprise.
THE 5-C PRINCIPLES patient/client and the The 5-C model of competence, institution/corporation, which is in compassion, communication, co-operation keeping with his view that ethics is seldom and cultivation is advanced by Hans-Martin a one-sided activity but an interactive Sass in two major papers.1 Sass presents enterprise.5 For Sass, “… ethics is them not as isolated but interactive reciprocal and all interactions among principles to be originally applied in a humans are based on interacting clinical context. They provide another lens principles and virtues.”6 The principles of through which to examine the ethical competence, compassion, communication, dimension of health care. The principles co-operation and cultivation are deemed to are not necessarily opposed to the be formal (i.e. without having content) and traditional four principle model of therefore need to be applied in Beauchamp and Childress that has professional contexts and embedded as towered over ethical discourse in bioethics professional virtues. The principles are not and health care, i.e. beneficence, non- dependent on worldviews or cultures.7 The maleficence, autonomy and justice.2 As first four Cs are based on a common Sass himself maintains, “respect for morality, albeit not commonly shared persons, non-maleficence, beneficence, moral beliefs.8 and justice, however, are important In what follows, the 5-C principles will be principles for situationally defining and applied to the context of education as a fine-tuning the principles of competence multifarious activity to highlight their and compassion, of communication and relevance for teachers and related partners co-operation in the health care setting, not in the school community environment. 3 at least in the clinic.” However, he does Although they are presented here make the point that the principles such as individually, to be effective these competence and compassion are notably principles need to be interactive with each absent from sets of medical ethical other. principles.4 What is particularly refreshing about Sass’ PRINCIPLE OF COMPETENCE model is that he places the 5-Cs not only Teachers: In the context of education, the in the domain of the health care principle of competency has been defined practitioner but also in the domain of all as “…an integrated set of personal the key partners in the health care context, characteristics, knowledge, skills and i.e. the health care expert, the attitudes that are needed for effective 188 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:40 Page 189
performance in various teaching contexts example, the school should have up-to- [emphasis in the original].”9 The principle date objectives in terms of: a whole school of competence is at the very bedrock of plan, current curricula, and policies on good teaching and general professional positive behaviour, homework, reporting, behaviour. Teachers need to have record keeping, assessments, special competence in the knowledge of their needs, pupils-at-risk and learning support. respective subject areas, the syllabus, and The school should also have a be competent communicators in imparting commitment to continuing professional that knowledge to individual pupils and development of its teaching staff. groups. They need to be competent in preparing lessons that have a pupil- centred focus, direction and goal. They PRINCIPLE OF COMPASSION need to have competency in a variety of According to Richard Reilly, “compassion teaching methodologies, learning is a ‘suffering with’ other beings that activities, assessment and feedback engenders sufficient concern for those processes, and effective classroom beings’ overall good to motivate one to management. Teachers also need to perform helpful actions.”11 Compassion “… sustain and develop those competencies entails acquiring the ability to perceive and by informing their practice with current respond to suffering.”12 Sass states that research and best practice that is compassion “… is the golden rule for evidence-based. Cultural competence is respecting life and caring for life ....”13 He another highly significant proficiency: refers to the ‘father’ of bioethics Fritz Teachers need to be able to understand Jahr’s understanding of compassion as a the world-view, religious beliefs and values universal moral law.14 Compassion is at that can inform the diverse culture of the the basis of treating people with dignity pupil population.10 and respect as it enables us “… to see things and feel things the way they do.”15 Parents/Legal Guardians and Pupils: Article 42.1 of Bunreacht Na hÉireann, the Teachers: The principle of compassion Constitution of Ireland, recognises the should be the medium through which family as the primary and natural educator teaching is practiced and delivered. Sass of the child. Therefore the principle of maintains that: “practice without competency is relevant to parents/legal compassion is blind and morally 16 guardians and pupils in partnership with ineffective.” The principle of compassion teachers. Teachers seek to promote implies that teachers need to be caring competency among pupils in the subject and compassionate towards pupils. areas. Parents/legal guardians and pupils Teachers may have competency in their need to be willing to invest time, energy own subject area but without compassion, and resources in developing competency their expertise can be blind to the needs of knowledge, understanding and skills, of the pupils. In practice this means to be which is at the heart of the education attentive to the welfare of the pupil and to enterprise. be on the alert for signs of harassment, bullying and other child safeguarding and School & Management: The principle of welfare issues. Teachers also need to be competency also applies to the school as careful not to unintentionally contribute to a whole and to its management. the humiliation of pupils in the context of Management needs to be able to provide the classroom, especially when giving an environment that facilitates the feedback on assessment activities. Being development and maturing of knowledge, compassionate and caring does not imply understanding and skills both in the pupil that the teacher has to become a friend of body and in the teaching staff. Leadership the pupil: The demarcation of professional competency is needed in providing boundaries should always be upheld. education facilities and services that are Ultimately, the principle of compassion pupil-centred in partnership with should guide attitudes, thinking and parent/legal guardians and other behaviour to foster academic excellence stakeholders. The school should be and achievement, human development competent in a number of areas. For and well-being. 189 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:40 Page 190
Parents/Legal Guardians and Pupils: The guardians and with their principal/ principle of compassion should also guide employers and other colleagues. This is a the attitude and behaviour of two-way process. Pupil journals and parents/legal guardians and pupils in how parent-teacher meetings/reports are a they interact in the complex web of good means of communication between relationships that define the school. The the school and home. principle of compassion denotes that parents/legal guardians and pupils ought Parents/Legal Guardians and Pupils: to be caring and compassionate towards Parents/legal guardians and pupils need to teachers and other pupils. In practice, this have good communication with teachers underscores the importance of being on for individual support and guidance. the alert for harassment, bullying and Parents/legal guardians and pupils should other child safeguarding and welfare also be familiar with the ethos and various issues and not to (unintentionally) policies of the school. It is very important contribute to the humiliation of other that parents/legal guardians inform school pupils. The perennial problem of bullying of any pertinent issues and needs. Good through its various forms and its adverse communication with teachers is essential consequences highlight the utmost for an organised and effective classroom importance of this principle of compassion climate. to become a living ethos within the school School & Management: Communication of environment supported by all the key the ethos or mission of the school to the stakeholders. Compassion and care are staff and pupils is very important. The essential for a warm classroom climate school and institutional management need built on respectful relationships and is to ensure that it has good channels of especially relevant for all partners. communication with relevant School & Management: The school should stakeholders, government departments be compassionate in its work to attain its and the wider community. goal to provide for a context of flourishing and academic excellence. In practice this means ensuring that the learning PRINCIPLE OF CO-OPERATION environment is a caring and Teachers: One of the defining features of compassionate one. Management need to contemporary school life is co-operation be concerned about the welfare of both between parents and teachers. When staff and pupils (and by extension their dealing with this principle, Hass speaks of 17 parents/legal guardians) and to tackle it as co-operation-in-trust. The principle issues of harassment and bullying on a is about building good working whole school level. Management need to relationships. For a teacher, this principle ensure that child protection policies and would imply co-operation-in-trust with his procedures are in place, are adhered to or her principal, deputies, colleagues, and are implemented. class tutors, year heads, pupils and parents. Closely allied to this would be co- operation with other colleagues to ensure PRINCIPLE OF COMMUNICATION consistency in approaches to practical Teachers: The principle of communication issues such as positive behaviour within permeates every aspect of the practice of the school and communications within and teaching. Communication of knowledge outside the school. Although the teacher and understanding is a key skill in is responsible for his or her classroom teaching. Teachers also need to management s/he will need the co- communicate the rules/commitments of operation of parents/legal guardians, the classroom and to advise pupils about pupils and school management to enable potential consequences for behaviour him or her to affect a context that that does not support a successful facilitates and fosters learning. All policies learning environment for themselves and and codes – whether it is a policy on others. Celebrating pupils’ successes is bullying or code of positive behaviour – essential. Teachers need to have good need co-operation from relevant communication with parents/legal stakeholders to be effective. 190 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:40 Page 191
Parents/Legal Guardians and Pupils: personal development where the desire for Commenting on Article 42.1 of Bunreacht learning is fostered and nurtured. Na hÉireann, the 1995 White Paper on Education states that “parents should CONCLUSION nurture a learning environment, co- operate with and support the school and This paper has demonstrated the other educational partners, and fulfil their application, and therefore the relevance of, special role in the development of the the 5-C principles of competence, child.”18 Co-operation-in-trust from compassion, communication, co-operation parents/legal guardians and pupils is and cultivation for the teaching paramount for the successful work of the profession, parents/legal guardians and teacher. Every successful environment and pupils together with the broader school an effective classroom climate need co- community. In the hustle and bustle of operation from pupils and parents/legal education life with its various competing guardians. demands, a system of short, but yet rich, normative principles that are easily School & Management: The school and its recognisable and knowable could be management need to support co- useful. It is the view of this paper that the operation among teachers, parents/legal 5-C principles of competence, guardians and pupils, stakeholders and compassion, communication, co-operation other schools to maintain a good working and cultivation should be at the very core atmosphere and learning environment: of everything that is done in the education “Effective partnership involves active co- life of the school community. If all the operation among those directly involved stakeholders in education follow such in the provision of education and the principles there may be less of an anchoring of educational institutions and opportunity for a potential tug-of-war structures in the wider communities they between the sometimes competing rights serve.”19 and obligations of the partners in the education experience. The 5-Cs could become the common framework to assess PRINCIPLE OF CULTIVATION proposed initiatives and actions and to According to Sass, competence, orient all partners in the education compassion, communication, co-operation enterprise thereby becoming embodied in ultimately need to be cultivated in persons the very heart of the school. as character virtues. The principle of cultivation is focused on the habitus of attempting to enact the other principles. REFERENCE LIST For Sass, the cultivation of competence, Beauchamp, Tom L. and Childress, James F. compassion, communication and co- Principles of Biomedical Ethics, 7th edition operation, is a never-ending goal.20 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013). Cultivation needs to be “… an Bunreacht Na hÉireann (Dublin: The Stationary overreaching goal in pursuing and Office, 1937). Available at: implementing competence with www.constitution.ie/Documents/ compassion, compassionate and Bhunreacht_na_hEireann_web.pdf competent communication and co- [Accessed 11 February 2015] operation.”21 The ethos of the school should facilitate this cultivation of the Cavanagh, Michael E. ‘Rediscovering Compassion’, Journal of Religion and Health, principles into internal character virtues of 34.4 (1995), pp. 317-327. its staff and related partners. The principle of cultivation allows for an incremental Department of Education & Science, Charting approach to the other principles, which Our Education Future: White Paper on makes them ideals to be cultivated by all Education (1995). Available at: involved. A school that promotes the habitus of cultivating competency, www.education.ie/en/Publications/Policy- Reports/Charting-Our-Education-Future- compassion and care, co-operation-in-trust White-Paper-On-Education-Launch-Copy- and vibrant communication may lead to a 1995-.pdf positive atmosphere of learning and [Accessed 11 February 2015] 191 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:40 Page 192
McAllister, Gretchen and Jordan Irvine, Sass, Hans-Martin, ‘The “5-C Model” for Jacqueline, ‘Cross Cultural Competency and Guiding Science and Technology: A Précis of Multicultural Teacher Education’. Reasonable Moral Practice Amidst a Diversity Review of Educational Research, of Worldviews’, Synesis: A Journal of Science, 70 (1) (2000), pp. 3-24. Technology, Ethics, and Policy (2012), pp. 52-59. Reilly, Richard, ‘Compassion as Justice’, Buddhist-Christian Studies, 26 (2006), Tigelaar, Dineke E. H., Dolmans, Diana H. J. M., pp. 13-31. Wolfhagen, Ineke H. A. P. and Van Der Vleuten, Cees P. M. ‘The Development and Validation of Sass, Hans-Martin, ‘Interactive Health Care a Framework for Teaching Competencies in Principles in the Clinical Setting: Competence, Higher Education’, Higher Education, Compassion, Communication, Co-operation, 48 (2004), pp. 253-268. Cultivation, Formosan Journal of Medical Humanities, 10.1 & 2 (2009), pp. 21-45.
1 Hans-Martin Sass, ‘The “5-C Model” for Guiding 10 See Gretchen McAllister and Jacqueline Jordan Science and Technology: A Précis of Reasonable Irvine, ‘Cross Cultural Competency and Moral Practice Amidst a Diversity of Worldviews’, Multicultural Teacher Education’. Review of Synesis: A Journal of Science, Technology, Ethics, Educational Research, 70 (1) (2000), pp. 3-24. and Policy (2012), pp. 52-59. See also Hans-Martin 11 Richard Reilly, ‘Compassion as Justice’, Buddhist- Sass, ‘Interactive Health Care Principles in the Christian Studies, 26 (2006), p. 20. Clinical Setting: Competence, Compassion, 12 Communication, Co-operation, Cultivation’, Christopher P. Vogt, ‘Fostering a catholic Formosan Journal of Medical Humanities, 10.1 & 2 commitment to the common good: an approach (2009), pp. 21-45. rooted in virtue ethics. Theological Studies; 2007 68 (2): 394-417. p. 405. 2 See Tom L. Beauchamp and James F. Childress, 13 Principles of Biomedical Ethics, 7th edition Sass, ‘Interactive Health Care Principles in the (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013). Clinical Setting’, p. 29. 14 3 Sass, ‘Interactive Health Care Principles in the Sass, ‘Interactive Health Care Principles in the Clinical Setting’, p. 26. Clinical Setting’, p. 25. 15 4 Sass, ‘Interactive Health Care Principles in the Michael E. Cavanagh, ‘Rediscovering Compassion’, Clinical Setting’, p. 25. Journal of Religion and Health, 34.4 (1995), pp. 317- 327, p. 320. 5 Sass, ‘Interactive Health Care Principles in the 16 Clinical Setting’, p. 26. Sass, ‘The “5-C Model” for Guiding Science and Technology’, p. 55. 6 Sass, ‘Interactive Health Care Principles in the 17 Clinical Setting’, p. 26. Sass, ‘Interactive Health Care Principles in the Clinical Setting’, p. 27. 7 Sass, ‘Interactive Health Care Principles in the 18 Clinical Setting’, p. 42. Department of Education & Science, Charting Our Education Future: White Paper on Education, p. 11. 8 Sass, ‘Interactive Health Care Principles in the 19 Clinical Setting’, p. 42. Department of Education & Science, Charting Our Education Future: White Paper on Education, p. 9. 9 Dineke E. H. Tigelaar, Diana H. J. M. Dolmans, Ineke 20 H. A. P. Wolfhagen and Cees P. M. Van Der Vleuten, Sass, ‘Interactive Health Care Principles in the ‘The Development and Validation of a Framework Clinical Setting’, p. 31. for Teaching Competencies in Higher Education’, 21 Sass, ‘‘Interactive Health Care Principles in the Higher Education, 48 (2) (2004), p. 255. Clinical Setting’, p. 31.
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Ten teachers share the books that changed their lives
o celebrate the power of a good that period in our country’s development; book, we asked the TED-Ed the contents of this book show how TInnovative Educators to share the research and science now give us a better books that changed their lives. Looking alternative.” – David Miyashiro, Cajon for a good education read? Check out Valley Union School District, USA their book list below: Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple The Element by Sir Ken Intelligences by Howard Gardner. “I am a Robinson. “Without a doubt, this is the product of an educational system where one book that had the biggest impact on most of the emphasis was given to Math me and my teaching. It opened my eyes to and Science. I always felt that there was the fact that there is a better way to teach something wrong with it, but for the first students, and that my role as a teacher time I found evidence of that in this well should be to help students explore researched book. It reinforced my belief knowledge in their own way.” – Craig that an educational system should help Zimmer, Durham Catholic District School learners explore their talents and Board, CANADA dispositions.” – Mahrukh Bashir, Lazuardi- GIS, INDONESIA Drive by Daniel Pink. “This is one of several books that changed my life as an Last Child in the Woods by Richard educator, because it demonstrates so well Louv. “This book made my heart sing and that the notion of “management” is no scream. It was everything I knew longer relevant. The industrial instinctively – but to have the impact, the revolution – and the system of education implications, and the reality of nature that aligned with it – was necessary for deprivation laid out so clearly was eye- 193 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:40 Page 194
opening.” – Shannon Brake, Elyria educator, it changed the way I thought Christian School, USA about primary sources and multiple perspectives. In our current age of Welcome to Your Brain by Sandra unlimited information and crowd Aamodt and Sam Wang and Blame my accelerated innovation, embracing the Brain by Nicole Morgan. “The books that ideals of “this voice matters” matters have changed me as an educator are more than ever.” – Jimmy Juliano, Lake about the brain, especially the teen brain. Forest Community High School District It is a whole other story to know how you 115, USA work from the inside, and how it affects your thoughts, behavior, and experience Other People’s Children by Lisa of the world.” – Kristine Sargsyan, Tumo Delpit. “This was the most controversial Center for Creative Technologies, text we read in my Equity and Democracy ARMENIA course in grad school. It made me aware of all the loaded everyday interactions we Ain’t I A Woman by bell hooks. “This have as educators. It also made me proud book was part of a doctoral program in to be part of the growing number of Curriculum Studies that opened my eyes educators of color.” – Josefino Rivera, to the concept of social justice and the Asociación Escuelas Lincoln, ARGENTINA power of education – and educators – to ‘level the playing field’ for ALL learners, Up the Down Staircase by Bel thus changing lives and molding the Kaufman. “This book taught me how the future of our world.” – Vicki Albritton, the life of an educator, although filled with STEM Academy at Bartlett, USA numerous obstacles, can really be surprisingly beautiful. It made me realize Savage Inequalities by Jonathan that students are literally starving for love Kozol. “The book that changed my life, and attention and as educators we need inspiring me to become an educator, was to learn how to keep the fire burning. We this one. It was inspiration in the sense shouldn’t just teach, we need to touch that I knew I had to do something, so I hearts and make students providers of changed my major from business to knowledge.” – Evanthia Poyiatzi, English elementary education and philosophy. Language Private Institute, CYPRUS The conditions Kozol described in this book, published in 1992, are still very Link to the original article: much a reality and may even be worse. I http://blog.ed.ted.com/2015/10/15/10- dream of policy that will tackle the issues teachers-share-the-books-that-changed- of equitable funding and their-lives/?utm_source=TED-Ed+Sub- resources.” –Della Palacios, Colorado, USA scribers&utm_campaign=ccba68115b-20 A People’s History of the United 13_09_219_19_2013&utm_medium=emai States by Howard Zinn. “When I read it l&utm_term=0_1aaccced48-ccba68115b- back in college, it was the first time I’d 40424493 really been exposed to a non top-down TED-Ed Innovative Educators // version of history. As a learner and
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Posing Questions and Ideas to Initiate Debate Clive Byrne, Director of NAPD
part from presenting a detailed annual report to the AGM, October 2015 in Galway, Clive Byrne took the opportunity to address delegates Aon the conference theme of Leadership for Growth Demands a Growth in Leadership, to look at the NAPD record of involvement in education in the past, and to pose some questions and ideas to initiate a debate on areas which could benefit education. 195 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:40 Page 196
I believe that a school leader, promoting and in classrooms is vital to the success of education as a common good, must, in the that endeavour. first instance, be the leader of learning, There are a number of systemic barriers but, to be the leader of learning, the that will affect the change: principal and deputy need adequate support in terms of personnel, resources l In Ireland we have too many schools, and time, particularly thinking time. both primary and post-primary. Competition is the heart of our policy The leader needs to have a high degree of because the money follows the autonomy, to be transparent and to be students, so there is a lack of accountable for their stewardship. The collaboration between schools. I leader needs to be empowered to develop wonder in the current context are we a strategy and a vision for the school, and brave enough to tackle this issue. its particular context. It is important to develop a learning environment based on l Our current curriculum has very little the needs of the particular students in that joined-up thinking between a very school, the needs of the community and active primary school curriculum and the culture of that community. the early years at second level. The leader needs to be an individual with l In addition, we are in the midst of an the financial capacity to invest and not extremely fractious debate about merely to spend - and knowing the junior cycle reform. financial straight jacket most schools are in at the moment, that is a very difficult l If we were to characterise our system, role to carry. The leader has to be able to we would probably say that it is driven build partnerships, both within the school by book learning and teaching to the and without, with neighbouring schools. test. That is something that goes right We want somebody as leader who can the way back from Leaving Certificate contribute to, and influence the building and influences parents of children in of, a vision for the community in which primary school. they live. l It is also affected by teacher morale. In We all want happy fulfilled students that my experience and from visiting the are challenged in the school and by their NAPD regions, it is quite clear to me curriculum. We want students who can that, for instance, ‘Croke Park Hours’ think for themselves. It is vital that there have come into our educational be equality of opportunity and we also lexicon, not as an ability to use times need to have equity within our system. In positively and constructively, but the students we want a passion and a love because of the climate in schools at of learning and we want a system that the moment, but as a type of detention recognises the reality of young people’s for teachers. lives, as they are and how they need to live their lives to grow and develop. In trying People often talk about learning from to respond to some of these statements overseas experience, where countries like we have to ask ourselves what type of Finland and Estonia have made enormous, schools do we want. as per the OECD reports. That’s good in so far as it goes, but the system in European I’ve said in the past that our students are countries, New Zealand or whatever, won’t over-schooled but under-educated; that transpose into the Irish context. (And it is our teachers are over-teaching and the interesting to note that, although the Finns students are under-learning; that school is are often espoused as the panacea of a place where the students go to watch the education, not all is rosy in other gardens: teachers work while they sit back and have I remember being at a meeting with a the information coming to them by way of Professor of Education in Helsinki and he osmosis. So promoting teaching and freely admitted that Finnish kids don’t like learning in a positive school climate is school; recent OECD findings suggest that where we see a future role for NAPD and Finish kids are not interested in reading its members. The atmosphere in schools and don’t read for pleasure.) 196 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:40 Page 197
In terms of the junior cycle reform we need Planning Initiative, were a wonderful to try and get rid of the idea that what we recognition of the value of investment in are doing at junior cycle is radical. It is leadership and how that could pay off. simply looking to change what transacts in Although it is starting small, with a modest the classroom, the teaching and learning budget and with more particular aims and experiences that could come about for goals, the Centre for School Leadership students and teachers, as a result of the will kick-start a reinvestment in the reforms envisaged in the junior cycle, and professional services and supports that which, if implemented, can make life much principals and deputy principles at primary easier and much more enjoyable for both and post primary level need to enable teachers and for students. But we need to them to do their work. have the appropriate resources to There have been over 700 changes at effectively implement junior cycle reform. senior leadership in second level schools As a result of recent agreements with the over the last five to six years. That is an unions, professional time is being made enormous change, an enormous loss of available for the teachers. I think it is a capacity but it does give us the very positive development. It will be opportunity to work with a huge body of difficult for school leaders to organise, individuals, who will enable us to unless there is more information and more safeguard the future of the education dialogue in relation to the use of it, but to system. actually have dedicated time for teachers, The Centre for School Leadership is going that they can use to improve their levels of to be based at the Clare Education Centre professionalism, is brilliant. and, from 2016, CSL will have a formal One of the positive developments, over the mentoring programme for all our new course of the last year, was the school leaders. This will be a pilot project establishment of the Centre for School and phase one will provide assistance to at Leadership. It is clear that we have a very least 25 second level principals. NAPD will good inspectorate: their professionalism, also be supporting with a mentoring as they dealt with subject inspections, the programme for colleagues who won’t be management of leadership and learning, participating within that pilot project. whole school evaluations, programme One of the other key goals of the Centre is evaluations and so on, clearly emphasised to establish a coaching service for that, in areas where there was deficient principals and deputy principals. We want teaching and learning going on in the class to ensure that those who feel that they room, oftentimes there was a deficiency in would benefit from coaching can aspire to the leadership provided within the having an effective coaching service. schools. The political drive of the current – and previous – Ministers for Education & The third key action of the Centre for Skills, as well as the influence of key School Leadership is to retender for a post figures in the DES, from management from graduate diploma aimed at aspiring school the inspectorate, has led to the leaders. If you have participated in the establishment of the Centre of School Tóraíocht programme, or have views on Leadership, collaboration between the the content of such a programme, you are Irish Primary Principals Network [IPPN], invited to put your thoughts on paper and NAPD and the DES, the Teacher Education send them to Mary Nihill, CEO of the Section in particular. I think it is a Centre c/o the Clare Education Centre. wonderful innovation that will support principals and deputy principals. The The teacher’s contract is not within the Centre is now up and running. NAPD and remit of NAPD. We are not an Industrial IPPN will have a key role in generating the Relations partner and we will never be priorities into the future and ensuring that involved in negotiating the contract but appropriate professional supports are since the mid-1990s there has been a there for us. plethora of contracts available for teachers. It seems to be something that we LDS, the Leadership Development for have shied away from; many of the Schools, and SDPI, School Development contracts have not been amended since 197 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:40 Page 198
the 1950s. I think it would be really The Irish education system works well in worthwhile to have some new discussion terms of outcomes. As President of ESHA, and negotiation, involving the working I have to speak about the Irish education week (teaching in the class room, time for system: people in Europe and beyond are preparation and correction, time for very impressed that 90% of those who start interaction with colleagues and time for an school at the age of 4 are still in the involvement in CPD). This would give an system aged 18; that of that 90%, almost indication of the professionalism of the 70% go on to some form of third level or teacher and also of the roles and further education and that is probably due responsibilities of principals and deputy to the dedication of our teachers. It is also principals who are also teachers and not due to the system that we have, which employers. suits many of the students within the school. But we need to see that it may not There has been disappointment that, while be possible to suit the interests of nearly the TUI voted to accept junior cycle reform 20% of the students who are like square and move forward, ASTI is seeking ‘further pegs in round holes; we need to recognise clarifications from members’ as to the that and put in place curricula that actually areas of concern. Adverse comment has meet their needs. been made about the low turnout in teacher union ballots, particularly in ASTI, NAPD tries to take the high ground on but in that respect I am with President education and I am wondering if we should Bartlett (of The West Wing) who maintained be looking for the great and the good that “decisions are made by the people (people like Lord David Putnam, Professor who turn up”. So we can’t actually gainsay Brian MacCraith, Professor Philip Nolan, the mandate that the unions have had, as John Herlihy, Sister Stan, people from big a result of engaging in the democratic business) to help us create a debate about process. So we need to provide those why we need to reform our education clarifications as soon as possible. system and what will be the benefits, because if people understand the why then It will be difficult for ETB schools, ASTI they will be more willing to run with the schools and dual-union schools, if the potential changes. reform agenda is proceeding at a varying pace in the different schools, and that will We need to be more conscious of the make the role as principals and deputy learner voice and we need to promote staff principals more difficult, resulting in the and recognise their teaching excellence in school leader being left as piggy-in-the- the class room – what they do best – and middle, trying to make sure that it does that is financially rewarded within the class not affect the school climate. When all of room. At present, the higher you go in this is solved and all the decisions have terms of promotion (Posts of made by individuals way above our pay Responsibility), the greater reduction you grade, it is the principal and the deputy in have in your class-contact time. the school who will be responsible for We should aspire to close investment in ensuring that a positive school climate early childhood education. I was very exists. heartened to hear in the recent budget The principal is trying to be the leader of that a second pre-school may be made all of these initiatives and to provide for available. From my time on the NCCA I can the difficulties which may emerge. We tell you the benefits of the Aistear can’t do all this on our own. We need help Programme, the investment in early to create time, to look at curricula that are childhood education and the effect that relevant to our own schools; we need to could have on our system in years to look at timetabling. The DES is maintaining come. At four we can have a diagnosis of now that no class can be for less than 40 dyslexia or dyspraxia, before children have minutes but many schools have already started formal education in many other moved to a one-hour timetable and countries. So we should have a debate possibilities are wonderful if people are about what the ideal age to begin formal involved in positive discussion in relation schooling is and to try and achieve a to it. consensus on it. 198 Le Cheile Journal 2015:Layout 1 18/11/2015 12:40 Page 199
Have we looked at the model of the At the moment the CAO and the Leaving American middle school, where we could Cert. provide very effective ways of filling have education from 6-16, with a senior first year places in college and IOT cycle [16-19] education that would move courses, but the Leaving Cert. is not doing more towards the vocational or academic what it says ‘on the tin’, i.e. giving a but where you could also have an certificate as to what the children have individualised curriculum for individual done and learned over the previous five or students? That would involve changes to six years in school. The secret is trust. We curriculum and practice, not to mention a must enable the message to go out that huge investment, but it would mean we we are proud of the young people entering have an excellent education that is fit for our education workforce; that we trust purpose. teachers in the role that they fulfil in the class room. If society can trust the One of the things that has become clear to teachers then I think we will be on a much me in the recent debate over junior cycle, better road. is that second-level teachers for the most part have a fear of assessment, because NAPD poses these ideas to try and create they don’t quite understand what is debate. We are unabashedly pro-reform involved within the process. We need to because standing still isn’t an option. have a debate about that, so that the plain People are interested in learning more parents of Ireland can realise that the about their new profession and in growing world won’t come to an end if their their new profession. The establishment of children are assessed by other means than the Centre for School Leadership, the one terminal exam; that open-book increases in the budget, to cope with exams, projects, extended essays, guidance and additional supports at assessments for character, credits for deputy principal level, are all very involvement in extracurricular activities worthwhile but we the plain fact is that we and social support and community work - need these and many more supports that all of those should be taken into account will enable us to do better into the future. for the assessment.
We need to create a system that ONTACTS emphasises competence rather than qualification, and we need to decouple the C Clive Byrne certification that people get at the end of E: [email protected] second-level school from third level entry.
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Le Chéile
Contributors
Marie Bourke Seán McDonagh Clive Byrne Mairéad McGuinness Colin Campbell Martin McKenna Andrew Cole Charlie McManus Theo Dorgan Niall McVeigh Brendan Feehan Michael Minnock Ann Forde Valerie Mulvin Maria Gaidarova Christian Nitsche Eamonn Greville Mary Nihill Deirdre Hanamy Gary Ó Donnchadha Tom Hayes Finn Ó Murchú Shirley Kavanagh Paul Reville Alan J. Kearns Michael Schratz Ray Kelly TED Derek Lowry Derek West Kevin McClean
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