Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 24 May 2017
103. Deputy Fiona O'Loughlin asked the Minister for Education and Skills the incentives which can be offered to teachers of science, technology, engineering and maths, STEM, subjects in order to address the shortage of qualified STEM teachers; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [24818/17]
Amharc ar fhreagraThe Deputy is referring to one of actions of the Report of the STEM Education Review Group.
At the launch of the STEM Report I prioritised the implementation of 21 of the Report’s 47 actions. One of the actions was to publish a STEM Education policy statement and implementation plan, which I intend to finalise in the coming months. As part of the process in developing the policy statement and implementation plan the remaining actions, including that referred to by the Deputy, will be investigated further.
In the meantime, a new STEM Team will be set up in the Professional Development Service for Teachers (PDST), a support service of my Department, from September of this year. The team will support the achievement of the relevant STEM actions set out in the Action Plan for Education, the priority actions of the Report of the STEM Education Review Group and the National Strategy to Improve Literacy and Numeracy through the provision of high quality CPD support and resource materials to primary and post-primary teachers of STEM subjects.
The Deputy may also wish to note that my Department continues to fund, at cost of over €5m since 2012, the Professional Diploma in Mathematics for Teaching, a two year part-time programme available nationwide free of charge, to improve the skills of teachers of mathematics at post primary level and enable them register with the Teaching Council as teachers of mathematics. To date over 700 teachers have graduated from this programme, which is led by EPI-STEM, the National Centre for STEM Education at the University of Limerick (UL), and is accredited jointly by UL and NUI Galway through their strategic alliance.
