Education – Page 3 – Slugger O'Toole

The legacy of the past can still be felt in today’s political relationships, warns O’Neill

Paul Gosling on July 30, 2021, 9:05 am

| Readers 1733

Legacy is being discussed at length at present, following the British government’s proposals to abandon prosecutions and investigations related to Troubles’ events. But there is another toxic legacy – the impact of past events on current political relationships. That aspect of legacy is discussed with Sinn Féin Vice President and Deputy First Minister Michelle O’Neill in the latest Holywell Trust Forward Together podcast. Michelle argues that political leaders must work hard to build trust, to enable the political system here to …

More truth and honesty needed in government, and in dealing with legacy, says Colum Eastwood

Paul Gosling on July 23, 2021, 9:05 am

| Readers 988

Truth and honesty must be at the heart of how we deal with the legacy of the past and in how politicians in Northern Ireland govern today, says Colum Eastwood, leader of the SDLP and MP for the Foyle constituency. He was speaking in the latest Holywell Trust Forward Together podcast and is the third political leader to be interviewed in the series, discussing how to make progress in Northern Ireland. Victims have been badly treated, stresses Colum, and they …

Let’s put our values into practice in how we govern, argues Naomi Long

Paul Gosling on July 16, 2021, 9:05 am

| Readers 2400

If we are to make progress in Northern Ireland’s society, we need to reflect carefully on our core values and ensure that these are reflected in the way government works. This is the message put forward by Naomi Long – leader of the Alliance Party and justice minister – in the second of the Holywell Trust’s Forward Together podcast interviews of Northern Ireland’s political leaders. Among the points stressed by Naomi is that violence is not acceptable as a means …

The Ulster Unionist Party reflects on the future of Northern Ireland

Paul Gosling on July 9, 2021, 9:05 am

| Readers 9692

The third series of Holywell Trust’s Forward Together podcasts has heard from experts in a range of areas – including the economy, skills, education, young people’s experience, housing – and also considered best practice elsewhere. As it moves towards a close, it puts the arguments for major change in the governance of Northern Ireland to our political leaders. In the first of this closing series of podcasts, we spoke to Steve Aiken – who at the time was still leader of the …

Creating a high skilled economy – it begins in school

Paul Gosling on July 2, 2021, 9:05 am

| Readers 1868

Northern Ireland’s economy has a number of weaknesses. At the heart of these is the shortage of skills – higher levels of skills moves an economy up the value chain, leading to improved productivity and greater wealth. Too many of NI’s school leavers have lower levels of qualifications and skills than are needed for the modern economy. This reduces their prospects for obtaining well paid jobs, while some will become long-term unemployed or economically inactive. NI has the UK’s highest rate of economic inactivity. A recent report from the Pivotal …

Professor Rick Wilford has died…

Brian O'Neill on June 16, 2021, 10:54 am

| Readers 2910

The death has been announced of Professor Rick Wilford. Though born in Wales he long ago made Northern Ireland his home. He was an Emeritus Professor at the School of History, Anthropology, Philosophy and Politics at Queen’s and a respected commentator of the political scene. Rick was a familiar face on our screens, especially during election counts. He was known for his laid back manner and dry wit, and amazingly for our divided society, he was universally respected for his …

A ‘single system of education’: the beginning of the end for segregated schools?

Ulster University on June 9, 2021, 11:51 am

| Readers 4269

Many years ago anyone with half-a-titter-of-wit realised that the configuration of education in Northern Ireland was restricting the possibility of restoring fractured community relations. With the exception of the wilfully ignorant, no one has seriously argued that those children who attend separated schools in a segregated system are being adequately prepared for future engagement in an inclusive, egalitarian, peaceful society. Finally, these simple truths seem also to be dawning on our politicians. The New Decade New Approach agreement that brought …

Could co-operatives inspire a better economy?

Paul Gosling on June 4, 2021, 9:05 am

| Readers 1134

The Mondragon federation of co-operatives has been the foundation of the economy in Spain’s Basque country for decades. It was founded back in 1956 by a priest – José María Arizmendiarrieta – who believed that the best response to the hostility and neglect of the region by the fascist dictator Franco was to develop co-operatives that relied on mutual self-help and independence. Today there are 96 co-operatives which are members of the federation, employing more than 81,000 people. The federation includes manufacturing businesses, financial institutions, retailers and …

Treating children fairly

Paul Gosling on May 28, 2021, 9:05 am

| Readers 763

While it is frequently claimed that Northern Ireland has an excellent schools system, it is clear that it is also a divided system. That division is not based only on religion, but also according to whether a pupil attends a grammar or a non-selective school, which is in turn related to the wealth of the parents. The system clearly separates children, despite the need of our society to come together to heal division. This week’s Holywell Trust Forward Together podcast …

Why Conor Murphy’s Budget is failing our people

Soapbox on May 26, 2021, 9:54 am

| Readers 5464

Sinéad McLaughlin is an SDLP MLA for Foyle and is the SDLP spokesperson for the economy For the last 14 years, Northern Ireland has been led by joint first ministers from Sinn Fein and the DUP. This leadership was supposed to deliver prosperity after the peace that was delivered by the leadership of John Hume and the SDLP. But instead of prosperity, the North continues to have some of the worst economic outcomes anywhere in Western Europe. My city of Derry …

Vocational skills: Northern Ireland’s core economic weakness

Paul Gosling on May 7, 2021, 9:04 am

| Readers 1405

Never mind Bill Clinton saying, ‘it’s the economy, stupid’, the answers to Northern Ireland’s difficulties are instead perhaps Tony Blair’s mantra, ‘education, education, education’. In fact, the main way to tackle the economic problems of Northern Ireland are arguably to focus on education and skills. Seamus McGuinness, research professor at the Economic and Social Research Institute, discusses the weaknesses of Northern Ireland’s education and skills system in the latest Holywell Trust Forward Together podcast. Although ESRI is based in Dublin, Seamus …

Schooldays, the most miserable days of your life?

Brian O'Neill on May 5, 2021, 8:04 am

| Readers 1946

There was an interesting phenomenon during the pandemic of children who flourished being off school. Not just for the obvious reasons that they could stay home and watch Netflix all day, but they could escape bullying and the other pressures of school life. For some kids, school is a daily ordeal of stress and misery. One friend’s daughter experienced bullying so severe that she developed a habit of pulling out her eyelashes – and this was only primary school. When …

Education is the key to progress

Paul Gosling on April 30, 2021, 9:05 am

| Readers 947

Education is the key to moving our society forward, says Tony Gallagher in the latest Forward Together podcast interview. But that has to mean much more than encouraging as many students as possible to go to university and obtain a degree. Our society has become fixated with university education, at the expense of school pupils who do not aspire to higher education. More has to be done to support children from deprived families, to encourage them through careers guidance and …

Scottish hustings … via NUS Scotland

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on April 21, 2021, 1:11 pm

| Readers 1513

Election anoraks in need of a regular fix of political argie-bargie may want to dip into last night’s NUS Scotland’s Big Election Debate last night with Anas Sarwar (Scottish Labour), Carole Ford (Scottish Lib Dems), Douglas Ross (Scottish Tories), Nicola Sturgeon (SNP) and Ross Greer (Scottish Greens). Compared with any similar encounter with NI politicians, it felt remarkably calm and devoid of simple point-scoring.

Build Belfast Back Better – #imaginebelfast wants your ideas

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on March 15, 2021, 1:01 pm

| Readers 1047

Ahead of next week’s packed programme, Imagine! festival are calling for your ideas to imagine a better post-pandemic Belfast. How would you Build Belfast Back Better? You can submit up to three ideas that reimagine the city in the face of the pandemic and the challenges presented by Brexit, increased poverty, loneliness and mental health issues.

Derry breathes a sigh of relief as Ulster University plan to move 800 places to Magee…

Jay Burbank on February 2, 2021, 6:46 pm

| Readers 3572

It’s been a debate rumbling on since the 1960s and has been subject to many slugger posts over the years. Including the lack of strategic thinking over the long-term viability for our health service. The post graduate entry medical school at Magee is set to take students in September this year (according to UU’s website at time of posting) but it has been blighted by delays and began as a project in the early noughties. 20 years in Derry (policy) …

The deep failure to re-open Special Schools in Ireland

Peter Farrelly on January 25, 2021, 9:22 am

| Readers 4392

Ireland finds itself as the outlier in Europe for all the wrong reasons. We are the only country to have not reopened special education settings in the New Year. One of the harshest lessons the Department of Education learned during the first wave of Covid-19 in Ireland was the failure to reopen Special Education settings. It was damning and heart-breaking reading and hearing the stories of devastation the first wave of the pandemic caused for the parents of kids with …

Academic selection: a system of failure…

Jay Burbank on January 6, 2021, 4:52 pm

| Readers 1508

As education minister Peter Weir bumbled his way through a ministerial statement on Wednesday afternoon one would be forgiven for confusing the ad hoc COVID 19 response committee with a debate on academic selection. The long-running debate has reared its head again as AQE subscribing grammar schools finally took the decision to delay testing in the face of a 1.8 reproductive rate in the virus here. Whatever your view on academic selection, it smacked of rank arrogance for these 32 …

Northern Irish students to access Erasmus+ via partnership with Republic’s HE institutions…

Mick Fealty on December 28, 2020, 7:03 am

| Readers 2890

Welcome news for ALL NI Students… Third level students from Northern Ireland colleges will continue to be able to study in Europe under the Erasmus+ scheme after the UK leaves the EU because the Irish Government will fund them. The estimated cost will be around €2.1m per year. Erasmus enables third level students to study for part or all of their degree in another EU member state or undertake a work placement abroad, with their fees and costs paid. The …

Lost Lives is a vital and eloquent riposte to “the old Lie”: Dulce et decorum est, pro patria mori….

Mick Fealty on December 14, 2020, 10:18 am

| Readers 2515

I have been to the Vietnam wall in Washington, twice. The second time was every bit as emotional as the first. It was the trouble in the world when I was a kid, until it became us. It cuts a scar in the landscape appropriate to the human mess it left, not just in those who died but in the quiet way old men come to say goodbye to their much younger fallen comrades. I’ve often thought of that great book …