Mary Harney
Question:8 Miss Harney asked the Minister for Education the plans, if any, she has to rescind the quota on numbers in the H. Dip in the Education class in Cork; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [13482/95]
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - H. Dip College Quota.
The Higher Education Authority has advised me on the number of places to be provided for Higher Diploma in Education courses in all the colleges which provide these courses. I have accepted the authority's recommendation, which will afford H. Dip graduates a reasonable prospect of following a career in teaching, while ensuring that there is a sufficient number of qualified teachers to meet the needs of the second level system.
H. Dip courses train graduates as second-level teachers. Newly-trained second-level teachers are finding it very difficult to get permanent employment. If I abolished the quota I would be making a difficult situation worse. I have no plans to rescind the quota fixed by the authority for University College Cork.
Is the Minister aware that a number of students select their leaving certificate subjects every year and subsequently go on to select their degree subjects with the specific intention of taking teaching as a career? Those students are actively encouraged by their career guidance teachers. What right have these students when, having completed their third level education, they cannot take a professional qualification that will enable them to take up employment as teachers? In respect of Cork specifically, what saving has been made to the Exchequer by putting a quota on the number of entrants to the higher diploma course? What would be the cost to the Exchequer if that quota was lifted in the morning?
I cannot give the Deputy the pounds, shillings and pence breakdown. Many students studying for the leaving certificate, with the active encouragement of their career guidance teachers, who set their sights on a particular career may not reach their goal. The Deputy said they come to the end of their degree course and are not encouraged or are prevented from doing the training to find a job. I can give the Deputy some interesting statistics which I gave to the House last year. A survey, which was responded to by 585 higher diploma graduates, was conducted on what happens to higher diploma students. Some 5.1 per cent had got permanent teaching posts in Ireland; 55 per cent had part-time, temporary or substitute teaching posts. Some 5.1 per cent obtained posts compared with 10.8 per cent in 1983. If we go back to my time in the teaching profession the employment rate for higher diploma graduates was 57.6 per cent. Those who are guiding children towards teaching must not use the information of their own time. I was in the teaching profession at a time when the employment rate for higher diploma graduates was nearly 60 per cent. The recent survey conducted by the Department shows that employment for higher diploma graduates has fallen to 5.1 per cent. Deputies and people in Cork, in particular, who encourage students towards teaching because it has employment prospects do not recognise the reality of the demographic trend in the school system today.
It is unsatisfactory that the Minister is unable to tell the House the financial basis on which the quota was imposed and the savings that will be made as a result of this quota. It has always been the practice to take a broader view of education. A number of newly qualified teachers have left this country to teach in European and American schools and to do a great deal of work furthering education in the Third World and developing countries. Is the Minister saying we will no longer train and enable teachers to follow in that proud tradition? Is the Minister saying this country will never again train second level teachers who can fill such posts in European countries from which they may return to education, a few years down the road, bringing the linguistic and other skills they have learned from teaching abroad? That is a very narrow view. A time will come when there will be a scarcity of teachers in second level education as there now is in the first level education.
The question is rather long.
Yes, I agree. The Minister said today that when people like us raise issues here they sometimes cause her to re-enter a case and a decision made by a body such as the Higher Education Authority, who may be further away from the realities of the classroom than the Minister or I. Will the Minister consider it in the broader terms I have put to her?
That was a wonderful speech by the Deputy which implied we had saints and scholars in Salamanca and wherever. Even if the Deputy thinks, given the demographic trends and the patterns of fertility in Ireland now, teachers will return to teach at any stage with the language skills and experience gained abroad, as Minister for Education I have to be more realistic in the advice I take and in the encouragement I give to people about teaching. The schools were bursting at the seams in the 1970s. Today there is a dramatic drop in the fertility rate which means there will be 600,000 fewer children in the system. I have no reason to doubt those figures which are the long term forecast for the drop in the school-going population. I suggest it is not sound advice to send trained teachers abroad without being able to say they will come back.
I can go back to how this was examined and I can give the statistics. At one stage there was a recommendation to close some of the Department's higher education courses in the universities. Following a re-examination the Higher Education Authority, whose remit is to advise the Minister, made these recommendations. I say to the Deputy, parents, career guidance counsellors and to children, that the employment rate for graduates in Ireland is satisfactory but the job prospects for graduates with a higher diploma in education who wish to go for teaching is not as rosy.
I accept Deputy Quill's broader philosophical perspective but does the Minister accept that the employment prospects in many professions have been fairly bleak because of economic circumstances?
Where will they teach? Where are the children?
Had the Minister received phone calls, as I did, in May, June and July from anguished students — mature enough to make up their mind without encouragement from me — who have committed themselves to a career in teaching and have lost out last year and again this year because of the imposition of a quota, would she not give these students a break? They feel cheated because they were under the impression when they started the BA they could follow through in the traditional way and do the H.Dip. That expectation has now been dashed by the Minister. If she had organised it so that all new entrants from next year onwards could not expect to pursue the H.Dip., that would have been just but there is no justice in the way the Minister has dealt with these students. Many of the 55 per cent engaged in part-time teaching will progress to permanent positions. The Minister will be aware from the early retirement negotiations that teachers now obtain permanent jobs later in their career than ten years ago and many students are prepared to take part-time positions for four or five years. The Minister should rectify that injustice.
It is only fair to students, particularly students in Cork, that we put the record straight. We are talking about a cohort of students who entered college in 1992. In 1991 there were 132 places on the H.Dip. course in Cork but in 1995-96 there are 185 places.
Eight hundred students applied for the places.
These are the facts. The Deputy said that the students had unfair expectations but they went to college in 1991 when there were only 132 H.Dip. places and now there are 185 places. The number of students doing the H.Dip declined. There was a recommendation to reduce the number of education departments from five to two which the Higher Education Authority was asked to examine and it recommended in its report of July 1991 that the five education departments should stay but that a quota system should be introduced. It recommended a quota of 500 — I was not in the Department of Education at that time — and that the intake should be restricted from the beginning of the academic year 1992-93. At that stage I asked it to review its recommendations in the light of the demands and the improvement in the pupil-teacher ratio and we arrived at 800 places which is the number now available. It must be remembered that there is postgraduate training for national school teachers.
We are educating young people for the teaching profession, in a system where the numbers are dropping dramatically despite an improvement in the pupil-teacher ratio. We are saying to students, their parents — who think of teaching as a very safe profession — and their guidance teachers that there are many other degree courses which students may take.
I have accepted the Higher Education Authority's recommendation which stood at 500 in another Minister's time but now stands at 800. It is putting a wrong slant on it to say that I have cancelled places. There are 185 places available to students in Cork who wish to pursue the H.Dip. but the employment prospects are none too bright.
Is the quota subject specific as a situation could arise quite quickly where there might be a shortage of teachers of science, maths or basic subjects? My information is that the quota is not subject specific and I would like the Minister to clarify this. Perhaps she could demonstrate at a later date the savings to the country from the introduction of the quota. The country has made investment in the young person's education from primary school through to university. There is only one more year to do in order to obtain a professional qualification and now the person is being denied that. Since the music hall ditty "Don't put your daughter on the stage, Mrs. Worthington" I have not heard such a passionate plea for not entering a child for teaching. That is unworthy of a country that has always prided itself in its education system.
I thank Deputy Quill for making that very interesting point and for her contributions to the debate in this House. In asking if the H.Dip. is subject specific, the Deputy has highlighted an area that is causing concern, that is, how to make best use of the 800 places that have been allocated for the H.Dip. I intend to follow this up.
I will try to put figures on the savings that will arise from the introduction of a quota. It will be interesting to try to put figures on the savings that will arise if students find alternative jobs and do not go into teaching. It would be helpful if the Deputy could be more specific in the information she is looking for. The information from the Higher Education Authority is that graduates who do not go into teaching have excellent job prospects.
The H.Dip. is not subject specific.
Would the Minister agree that the imposition of a quota normally has the reverse effect in that it stimulates demand and furthermore that in spite of the demographics there are schools in the primary sector that cannot get trained teachers because things do not work out that easily? By definition, if schools are allowed to choose teachers will we not have to train more than the exact requirement? Would she not agree that when one takes the requirements of all Irish language schools and for different subjects we will find in a large number of cases that we will have sufficient teachers with specific qualifications and that the basic right of someone who did a degree with a view to teaching is being denied when there is a lottery for H.Dip places? Will the Minister confirm that half the places for the H.Dip are allocated on merit and the other half are allocated by lottery and those who go to university will not have the opportunity to chose teaching even though that is their chosen career.
There was concern when the employment of second level teachers went out of control. As a result of concern expressed before my time in the Department of Education the then Minister for Education requested the Higher Education Authority, whose remit is to advise the Minister of the day on the necessary areas where needs should be met, to report on the matter. It recommended that given the demographic trends the quota should be 500. Last year we initiated extra teacher training for primary level.
They cut back.
I have directed people towards the primary system. However, I cannot see us training many more because——
Three or four years ago they were saying there was an over supply of primary school teachers.
Let us hear the Minister's response.
The population trends in Ireland are interesting. A Minister must plan for the future. In looking at the fertility rates there is nothing to suggest that we will have another bulge in population. When we have had such a bulge in the past we have responded and trained more teachers.
The Deputy's last question referred to language needs. I refer that back to the positive contribution from Deputy Quill who talked about language specific skills——
That was made last May during a debate on the Adjournment. I am amazed the Minister is saying that she has not heard about the response until now or that she would not have taken cognisance of that fundamental point.
——I have undertaken, in response to what Deputy Quill has said, to look at that. I have answered the Deputy's four questions.