Shorter pay scale and secure jobs will lessen teacher supply crisis – ASTI leader
Shortening teachers’ pay scale, offering permanent teaching jobs, and doubling middle management posts in schools would be a good start to addressing the teacher supply crisis in Ireland, according to ASTI General Secretary Kieran Christie.
Addressing 500 teachers at the ASTI Annual Convention in Wexford today, Mr Christie said the “minimalist” approach being taken by the Government to tackle teacher shortages has “hardly made a dent in the problem”.
“The dogged insistence on persisting with a lower salary scale for new entrants to teaching over the past decade, an inadequate number of promotional posts, and the continued casualisation of teaching, have debilitated the profession,” Mr Christie said.
The ASTI General Secretary also criticised the lack of education funding in Ireland stating that Ireland invests 1% of GDP in second-level education compared to OECD and EU averages of 1.9%.
“Schools and teachers are under strain, so much so that the Irish education system is at a critical point. Failure to act on this reality in the face of overwhelming evidence demonstrates unconscionable short-sightedness which must be called out.”
ENDS
Read Kieran Christie's Address to ASTI Convention here.
