asked the Minister for Education on what dates the document on community schools was communicated to (a) a member of the Irish hierarchy, (b) school management organisations, (c) teachers' organisations and (d) parent school organisations.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Community Schools Document.
21.
Copies of the document were sent to a member of the Catholic hierarchy on 12th October, 1970. I understand that the hierarchy subsequently sent a copy to the chairman of the council of managers of Catholic secondary schools. Copies were supplied to the Irish Vocational Education Association on 14th January, 1971 and to the ASTI and VTA on 7th April. The document has not been sent to any parent school organisations.
Could the Minister explain why this delay occurred in sending this document to those other bodies and why he has not sent it to parent school organisations?
I have gone into this so many times that I have it off almost by heart. I explained on many occasions to the Deputy that when consideration was being given to a number of school areas in the country we found that there were certain general considerations as well as the particular considerations pertaining to the various districts in which the schools were situated and we felt that some of these general considerations could be overcome, because of the fact that all of the schools concerned were Catholic schools, through discussions with the Catholic hierarchy. In relation to their not being sent to parent school organisations, apart from a small number of ad hoc committees, I do not know of any parent school organisations which are purely and formally representative. This matter of parent teacher relations should be dealt with with very considerable care. There are very good relations building up at present between parents and teachers particularly in the post-primary schools, on an informal basis. Quite recently I advocated that efforts should be made to build up a somewhat similar situation in regard to primary schools.
What significance are we to attach to the order of priority shown by these dates of consulting first the hierarchy, then the managers, then the teachers and never the parents?
In the first place the question arose in relation to particular schools and I referred it to the Hierarchy because of that. The fact was that, of course, the vocational school system would also be involved and I got in touch with the IVEA in relation to schools under their control. I then felt that it was important that we should have discussions with the teachers who are teaching in these schools and, as I said, there were no formal parent school organisations which I knew of, but even if there were I would want to know how they come about, what, in fact, they represented, and so on. Basically, it should be remembered that it is doubtful if a parent is entitled to speak for any child other than his own. At the same time, I want again to stress that I am very strongly in favour of close liaison between the parents and the schools and as I say this is growing up in a very natural way throughout the country and we should leave it at that.
Question No. 22 to the Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries.
Could the Minister state——
This is a very long discussion on a question. We cannot have discussions on every question on the Order Paper.
(Interruptions.)
Question No. 22, Deputy Bruton.