The SDLP Assembly member who misleads on demography
March 27, 2009
Mr D Bradley: ……We know from the chief inspector’s report — which was debated earlier today — that many post-primary schools, particularly in the non-selective sector, are continuing to feel the effects of demographic decline. Enrolment figures have dropped by almost 4,000, and more than one third of schools have fewer than 500 pupils, which is potentially disastrous. Demographic decline is going to worsen over the next few years, which will lead to unplanned outcomes in the form of school closures in some areas. We need to act now before that situation occurs.
Perhaps Mr Bradley MLA should study the Quarterly Report of the Registrar General before parroting the mantra of the DENI on their outdated rationale for schools estate change. The birth rate in Northern Ireland can be easily followed in the graph below.
THe Rise in the Birth Rate
Why no regulated Transfer Test? The Minister has failed.
March 24, 2009
Caitriona Ruane’s excuse for the continued deregulated and chaotic vacuum in post-primary transfer arrangements has been made clear in answer to a question put by an assembly member
Post-Primary Transfer: CCEA Test
Mr W Clarke asked the Minister of Education to detail why she has withdrawn the test that CCEA had been developing.
(AQO 2304/09)
Minister of Education: Is é an t-aon bhealach amháin gur féidir teist a chur ar fáil ar bhonn freagrach, ná creatlach reachtach a chur léi a mhíníonn cén dóigh a n-úsáidfear í.
The only way a test could responsibly be made available is if there is a legislative framework defining its use. The successful operation of an admission-determining test requires not just a test, but a legal framework providing for which schools can and cannot use it, stating exactly how it should and should not be used and also stating that it alone should be used.
The test was a contingency for an agreement. My proposals featured a test in the interests of compromise and to give grammar schools three years to adjust to a long-term future without any selection and without any test. The reason that will not now happen is because others were not capable of equivalent concessions.
Minister Ruane’s warped thinking is exposed in her answer. She had hoped to gain political consensus from her victims, the grammar schools and those who believe in a choice for a grammar school, via their political representatives, to agree their own suicide.
Her effort has rightly failed but it remains her responsibility and duty of care to uphold the rights of children and their parents to a form of schooling which meets their needs. Ms Ruane continues to preside over a failed administration. It is unfortunate that her political opponents have been unable to outwit her.
Parents: Are You Being Heard by Minister Ruane?
March 24, 2009
The following question and reply appear in the Answer Booklet on the Northern Ireland Assembly website.
Post Primary Transfer
Mr S Moutray asked the Minister of Education how many complaints she has received from parents about post primary transfer arrangements in the last year (i) in total; (ii) broken down by constituency; and (iii) broken down by council area
(AQW 6138/09)
Minister of Education: Tá méid suntasach chomhfhreagrais faighte agam i rith na tréimhse seo maidir le hábhar an aistrithe iarbhunscoile, agus in alán cásanna, bíonn tuismitheoirí agus eile ar lorg léiriúcháin faoi shonruithe um fhorbairt mo mholtaí ar an aistriú iarbhunscoile agus le déanaí ar fhoilsiú na Treoir um Aistriú 2010.
I have received a considerable volume of correspondence on the subject of post-primary transfer during this period, and in many instances parents and others are seeking clarification on points of details about the development of my proposals for post-primary transfer and in more recent times the publishing of Transfer 2010 guidance. Correspondence of this nature is not routinely classified by any category and may take the form of enquiries, supportive or negative comments, or personal views on a way forward. On occasions parental correspondence includes a request for me to bring certainty to bear on arrangements for Transfer 2010. It is a subjective judgement as to whether correspondence of this nature should be described as letters of complaint, and in an increasing number of instances parental correspondence takes the form of an e-mail which contains no address details, hence precluding any analysis by constituency or council area. The information requested is therefore not readily available.
If the minister won’t listen to her travel agent or car mechanic on transfer and tests as parodied in the BBC The Folks on the Hill,
what chance have mere parents?
The Cardinal’s visit to the Northern Ireland Assembly
March 22, 2009
on Wednesday March 18th was an important event in the passage of the Education and Skills Bill through the political arena.
Cardinal Brady and the Bishop Donal McKeown led Catholic Commission have stepped on to the big stage on the education issue by citing in their evidence to the Northern Ireland Assembly Education Committee nothing less than the European Convention on Human Rights.
The First Protocol (1952) to the European Convention on Human Rights includes the right to education (article 2):
No person shall be denied the right to education. In the exercise of any functions which it assumes in relation to education and to teaching, the State shall respect the right of parents to ensure such education and teaching in conformity with their own religious and philosophical convictions.
Implementation of the Convention is ensured through cases brought before the European Court of Human Rights.
Now the Cardinal wishes the Education Committee to respect the rights of the Catholic Church during consideration of the ESA bill on religious belief grounds, including estate and employment matters, while at the same time ignoring the rights of parents with respect to their philosophical convictions on the matter of academic selection and grammar schools.
Cardinal Brady’s Church has declared academic selection “immoral”.
It may be helpful to revisit a PACE commentary on the Catholic Church’s selective position on social justice from early 2008
http://paceni.wordpress.com/wp-admin/post.php?action=edit&post=3
What the Revised Curriculum has given society
March 16, 2009
Can it be any surprise to parents and society that changes in the school curriculum has given rise to a generation of children who have developed an “al about me” mentality?
Dr Carol Craig said children were being over-praised and schools needed to reclaim their role as educators, not psychologists.
Since 2007, there has been a statutory responsibility on schools in England to improve pupils’ well-being and primary and secondary schools are increasingly teaching social and emotional skills.
It is possible that DENI ETI inspectors will soon appraise schools’ performance in this area; and well-being could be one of the measures used in the school report card system that Caitriona Ruane wants to introduce.
Dr Craig told head teachers that this was not the role of schools.
“Schools have to hold out that they are educational establishments,” she said.
“They are not surrogate psychologists or mental health professionals.”
Learning about feelings from a professional in a classroom did not send out a positive message, she added.
And she warned there was a danger the more schools taught emotional well-being, the less parents would take responsibility.
“We run the risk of undermining the family as the principal agent of sociability,” she said.
It seems the message has not reached Ms Ruane’s DENI, in fact the Northern Ireland educationalists could be described as evangelists in this field.
http://www.northernireland.gov.uk/news/news-de/news-de-120208-education-minister-puts.htm
PACE has issued warnings about the pilot of the revised curriculum, the Early Years Enriched Curriculum which was evaluated by none other than the Queen’s University School of Psychology.
http://www.psych.qub.ac.uk/Research/Centres/CALT/index.aspx
What a surprise that their self evaluation promoted the “all about me” mentality. Parents may now be asking – at what cost?
How the Department of Education misleads
March 11, 2009
During her announcement denying parents a regulated measure of their child’s attainment at primary school the education minister stated:
“I will not do it. The test has been cancelled,”
“To simply make a test available and not have a legal framework to define its use would be highly |irresponsible.”
Caitriona Ruane MLA , Minister for Education Northern Ireland Assembly
March 10,2009
On 16th May 2008 the promise to parents was very different.
NI’s education minister has faced the assembly’s education committee about her plans for primary school transfer.
Caitríona Ruane aims to extend academic selection for three years before ending it.
It will take the form of one hour-long test of literacy and numeracy, and it will be held in a grammar school.
The Minister sent instructions through the Permanent Secretary, Will Haire, outlining how CCEA were to proceed.
Asked for the specification under the Freedom of Information Act the CCEA refused.
In early February the Minister withdrew her “regulated test” costing the taxpayer over £100,000
So who’s being irresponsible Minister Ruane?
Ruane: the Rejectionist Minister of Education
March 10, 2009
The Education Minister, Caitriona Ruane, continued with her ideological agenda today by refusing to reintroduce the CCEA test she commissioned and abandoned at great taxpayer expense.
The BBC story http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/7934973.stm tells of Ruane’s refusal to return to a regulated system of transfer based upon attainment in numeracy and literacy.
As ever the ex-professional tennis player returned the concerns of P6 parents with a volley of snide shots including one that placed the blame on unnamed schools.
She had denied threatening schools but said a small number were “blocking change”.
So Caitriona Ruane is against unregulated tests and against regulated tests. She is also clearly against parental wishes for their children
A Solution for Parents: Talk with your feet
March 7, 2009
In a dramatic fashion one Northern Ireland Primary School demonstrated that they understand who they work for and who controls their school – the parents.
Parents have withdrawn their children from the County Down primary school.
The parents at Millennium Integrated Primary in Carryduff believed the school was not going to teach pupils for a replacement to the 11 plus.
The school quickly sought to characterise the matter as a misunderstanding. Perhaps the management and teachers now understand that their various attempts to cajole, bully and mislead parents on behalf of their unions and the DENI can be easily remedied by a simple action by parents - withdrawal of children.
In their rapid response to the removal of the pupils the Millennium Integrated Primary have demonstrated that the ” misunderstanding” was nothing of the sort. Indeed the position is now further complicated by their claim to be:
“ preparing pupils for up to three different sorts of exams to cover the diversity of its pupil population.”
The only exam to be prepared for is the AQE numeracy and literacy test which is a part of the revised curriculum.
The so-called NFER verbal reasoning tests offered by the Catholic schools can only be coached for by ignoring some other aspect of the curriculum. The Minister has made clear that her Inspectorate will take action if this occurs.
Since the Education Minister withdrew her CCEA commissioned test and no specification has ever been revealed for it then Millennium Integrated Primary are further mistaken in telling the BBC that they are preparing children for a third exam.
The nonsense and misinformation spouted by the teachers’ union, the Association of Teachers and Lecturers, is exemplified by the statement to its members claiming “it is illegal to divert from the new primary school curriculum during school hours to coach for the new tests.”
PACE suggests that the union place a call to the DENI to check the law.
Well done Carryduff parents. The answer for other concerned P6 parents is obvious. If you have concerns about teachers willingness to prepare your child for numeracy and literacy testing – move your child to a school which is prepared to teach.
Stanley Poots and the ESA
March 6, 2009
While Stanley Poots is fronting yet another campaign against academic selection to post-primary schools he remains quiet over his role with the Education and Skills Authority.
Mr Poots was appointed to Gavin Boyd’s ESA Working Group for Children’s Services.
The Terms of Reference can be found here.
http://www.esani.org.uk/docs/childrens_services_terms_of_reference.pdf
Nowhere does it state that Mr Poots was to evangelise for Gavin Boyd’s anti-selection manifesto.
Mr Poots gave an interview withe local media in which he stated:
“All schools – primary, secondary and grammar – agreed that the 11-plus test was flawed and should be abolished”
Parents can only speculate as to when Mr Poots came by his now publicly expressed views.
So whose frustration are you expressing Stanley? It wouldn’t be Gavin’s would it?
