TotD: Education

I have been having difficulty titling this particular blog post. Here are some alternatives to give you a better idea of what I'm going to be talking about.
TotD: No cutbacks, no changes, no Labour in the chambers.
TotD: The death of the Labour Party.
TotD: Why this time of year Ruairi?
TotD: Teachers preparing to strike.

I don't know if anyone is following the news regarding teacher pay. I have only been barely following it myself but have some interest because teaching happens to be my profession, even if the government have already made it nigh on impossible for us to get jobs.

So to briefly summarise what I know Croke Park 1 did to teachers pay:
Pay was cut by 14%-30% depending on what stage in your career you were.
Pensions were cut by 4%
Schools with teachers on trips could no longer hire subs.
33 hours of, pretty much, pointless hours were added to a teachers year, just so the government could feel they were getting more for less.
Supervision classes that a teacher does unpaid were increased from 2 to 3.

There are other things too but one of the most important is that Croke Park set teachers' pay and promised to protect it until 2014.

The Labour Party and Fine Gael promised no further changes to pay would be discussed until that time.
Now they are looking for another change.

Croke Park 2 (CPX) would introduce the following (on top of Croke Park 1):
-further pay cuts of 5.5% plus 4.4% in supervision cuts. Add that to the previous 14% (low end) and teacher pay has been cut by 23.9% in the past couple of year.
-Supervision payments will go completely (totally around 1,800 a year)
-Pension money will be further reduced (at least from a lower income)
-Promotions will not get more pay.
-Increments will be frozen.
-New teachers will not increase salary until 24 years into the job (so if I start now and work and have a family and they go to college, by the time my oldest finishes college I might get a pay increase). That puts that into a scary perspective doesn't it?
-Extra pay given for further education (higher rates for those with masters compared to just a BA) has gone and will stay gone.
-A teacher's career increases from 40 years of service to 47 years, meaning eventually with the ban on recruitment we will have very old teachers.
-Supervision for non permanent teachers will be cut (meaning I will not even get a day of teaching in the year, effectively creating no work at all for NQTs). This cut takes off the first day of substitution for a sick teacher, if they are ill a second day a sub can be found.
-JobBridge comes in, under this the Government could employ a teacher for 50 Euro a week.... yes, read that again... Effectively it would mean teachers working for pittance, practically for free. Imagine the effects that would have on the classroom!
-The amount of supervision a teacher does will increase by 12 hours/year from 37 paid hours to 49 unpaid hours.
-The Croke Park Hours, as we unaffectionately call them, will increase from 33 to 36.
- This means teachers will be expected to work 85 hours a year for FREE! (49 + 36)


Okay, there's more there too but I hope you get the point from what I have there and can see, a little better, the plight of teachers.
The media makes it out that we/teachers are just uncooperative rebels who want to bankrupt the country but that is not the case. An almost 25% pay cut and an extra 85 hours of work is just insane. Plus the effects that CPX will have on students are unacceptable. No subs would cause chaos in schools it's ridiculous.

Students need stability in their education. If a student has many teachers for one subject they are more likely to perform badly in that subject than if they have one or two teachers over the course of their cycle (JC and LC)

Ruairi Quinn, the Labour Party and the Government have broken a deal with Teachers and despite a vote against the CPX 'Deal' the Gov. plans to legislate (their proposed cuts in CPX) anyway.

This unfortunate situation leaves teachers in the difficult position of DEMOCRATICALLY rejecting a 'deal' that shouldn't be mentioned until next year, at the least, according to Government promises to those who educate the future of this country.

Teachers HAVE to strike. There is nothing else left to them except to lie down and take whatever is thrown at them, which they did last time and lost between 14 and 30% of their income (by the way if 30% last time it increases to just under 40% [39.9%])


Personally I believe this act has signed the death warrant of the Labour Party, as a member of that party it makes me sad. The party that stood for equality and change have turned out to be just as bad as Fianna Fail.

Also, I will be standing with the teachers when they strike. I hope you will too!

Remember Fianna Fail are equally as bad when the local elections and European Elections come around. Ireland needs real change. That means the death of FF, FG and Labour in the way that the Greens (also sell outs) and the PDs (who were meant to be an FF alternative and ended up spending their only time in government with FF). I think a whole new system is needed at this point!