I welcome the opportunity to highlight the shortage of trained teachers in primary schools in disadvantaged areas. This is a major problem for schools designated as disadvantaged in my constituency and other urban areas. For three successive years, such schools in west Tallaght, for example, have found it impossible to attract trained teachers. At the same time, there has been an exodus of trained teachers to relatively more affluent areas where the demands of the job are somewhat more straightforward. There are even cases where teachers have gone to temporary positions in those areas, rather than accept or remain in permanent posts in schools designated as disadvantaged.
I draw the Minister's attention to one primary school where, of 32 staff members, only 9 have spent longer than 18 months in that school and only 16 have been there for more than six months. I know of schools in the area which have simply failed in recent years to attract teachers to fill their staffing complement. It is not at all untypical to have one quarter of staff untrained. In one such school, no fewer than 21 trained staff have left since the beginning of 1999. Only nine trained teachers have been appointed to replace them.
I would like to believe the Minister and the relevant staff in the Department of Education and Science understand the socio-economic environment of these schools. Untrained teachers cannot reasonably be expected to cope with mainstream classes, because of discipline problems. As a result, they tend to be inappropriately assigned to special needs, where the number of pupils is smaller. One cannot exaggerate the extent of abuse that such teachers are expected to survive from a small minority of pupils.
These schools have been excellent in accepting all pupils, including Traveller children, emotionally disturbed children and children with specific learning difficulties. These schools acknowledge good work done by the Department and by successive Ministers for Education to address the attendant difficulties which arise. However, much of the good work done over the past six or seven years is now at risk if the Minister for Education and Science, Deputy Woods, does not act speedily to address the present crisis.
I ask the Minister to imagine the outcry from parents and community leaders if children in more socially advantaged areas had such a high proportion of untrained teachers. Privilege is still transmitted in this society by educational opportunity. Children in disadvantaged areas do not have equal opportunity. Children schooled in the circumstances which I have described certainly do not have equal opportunity. The disruption and uncertainty in such situations and the undesirability of a disproportionate complement of untrained teachers, warrant priority attention by the Minister.
I look forward to learning whether the Minister has a grasp of the situation which I have described and to hearing what action he proposes to take. One school in my constituency has no less than 107 pupils with special needs. That is more than the total number of pupils one might find in a special school. That kind of school requires and deserves special attention. While not disparaging the commitment of untrained teachers, it is unfair to both teachers and children to have a school so reliant on untrained teachers.
I ask the Minister to outline what actions he proposes to take. The Department of Education and Science got it wrong some years ago in predicting teacher numbers. As a result, teaching posts are now vacant in several schools and those in disadvantaged areas are being denuded of trained teachers because they are going to schools in more socially advantaged areas.
