Education – Page 6 – Slugger O'Toole

We need technological talent more than corporate tax breaks…

Mick Fealty on September 24, 2012, 8:45 am

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By far the most fascinating point in the BBC’s new replacement for Hearts and Minds, The View [catchy title, eh? – Ed] was this sequence in which Bro McFerran Managing, Director of Allstate Northern Ireland, cuts to the chase, pointing out that the campaign for lower corporation tax and long (and thus far rather sterile) dialogue between the Stormont Executive and HM Treasury is somewhat beside the point. In his view, technology provides a viable route to economic growth in …

#DigitalLunch 7: The Future of Education?

Mick Fealty on August 30, 2012, 1:17 pm

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Okay, so seven weeks since our first experimental steps on Google Plus (you can find all previous #DigitalLunch programmes here) and we’ve had an interesting journey through the summer… Tomorrow, it’s all about the challenges and opportunities of education in a digital age.. By that, I mean how is the net affecting the way education is done (and I’m not taking about the increasingly sterile forty year old ruck about selection, under-performing secondaries or Hogwartian indulgence over the excellence of …

The trouble with Stormont’s MLAs is that they are not real politicians…

Mick Fealty on July 10, 2012, 12:40 pm

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Well, the Irish News yesterday went fairly big on the possible abandonment of the ESA (Education and Skills Authority) that was supposed to streamline the running of schools in Northern Ireland by amalgamating a whole bunch of organisations, not least the many of the executive of the Department and the five Education and Library Boards. Brian Feeney is pretty sharp in his attack on the lack of any political nous amongst the political parties at Stormont. One minute they are …

Niall Ferguson on the devolution of Education to a bigger society…

Mick Fealty on July 10, 2012, 10:23 am

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This podcast of Niall Ferguson’s last Reith lecture (transcript, h/t Nev) is well worth listening to, not least because a really sharp Scottish audience which is not prepared to let him off with anything sloppy. There’s some very good stuff on de Tocqueville, and Democracy in America at the beginning plus a great line on technology. On education, I rather think his own rather too strident ideology gets in the way his making a good point on how devolving greater …

Giants’ Causeway Interpretive Centre: “This is, as far as we are aware, a first for the National Trust anywhere in the UK, and it sets a precedent for others to follow…”

Pete Baker on July 5, 2012, 2:27 pm

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John’s professed concern is misplaced. As the National Trust press release on the “new state-of-the-art visitor centre” at the Unesco World Heritage Site Giants’ Causeway noted New interactive displays and activities inside the visitor centre include an animation of the legend of Finn McCool and an innovative hand-held audio guide. Such distractions aside, and without access to the material at issue, the quotes in the UTV report from the National Trust raise serious questions. The trust said that the exhibit gives …

The raising of school leaving to 18 is momentous, yet I hadn’t noticed. Had you?

Brian Walker on June 22, 2012, 3:32 pm

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For someone priding myself I stay in touch, I find that sometimes this emperor has no clothes. There I was, tut tutting over Michael Gove’s leaked plan to scrap GCSEs and guessing that Northern Ireland would be compelled to follow suit. Guessing? It’s inconceivable that NI could afford to be different however the nationalist parties might grumble. Even in supposedly transferred matters, devolution is exposed as strictly limited. I confess that the Education and Skills Act 2008 had passed me by. …

Catholic Post-Primary Education Reform: “I am anxious to try to build consensus on the way forward”

Pete Baker on May 31, 2012, 4:42 pm

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Following on from the Northern Ireland Commission for Catholic Education (NICCE) belated publication of its Post-Primary Review Strategic Regional Report, individual dioceses are bringing forward their suggestions. The first one out of the blocks appears to concern Catholic maintained schools in Londonderry. The Derry Diocese Administrator, Monsignor Eamon Martin, has published “Together Towards Tomorrow – a discussion paper re Post-Primary Education in the Derry City Area”. [Direct link to 9mb pdf file here]. This Discussion Paper explains the opportunities offered in a ‘partnership’ …

Grammar schools and social mobility: a Northern Ireland contribution to the debate

Brian Walker on May 21, 2012, 12:20 pm

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Here’s something that won’t make relations between the Education and Finance ministers any easier.. An approving poll for a UK wide campaign to revive grammar schools has received a gushing review from Independent columnist Mary Anne Sieghart. It’s pegged to the general angst about stalled – even reversed – social mobility which all UK political parties share. Nick Clegg will wring his hands about it again this week . If you wonder why the references to Northern Ireland are unusually heavy …

Education Minister refuses to provide colleagues with a breakdown of £2 Billion of funding for schools…

Mick Fealty on May 21, 2012, 10:36 am

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So there’s been a little addendum to the sudden, and last minute, reappearance of £72 million in funding in the Department of Education just before the minister was expected to explain his spending patterns to the Finance Minister. It seems the Finance Minister is not best pleased [Ahem, well we did suggest he mightn’t be – Ed] On the Radio Ulster lunchtime news bulletin on Friday, Martina Purdy noted this little number (which seems not to have made it to …

Looks like the Minister really did find that extra £72 million down the back of a departmental sofa…

Mick Fealty on May 15, 2012, 10:02 pm

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Interesting that with just over a month to go before Sammy Wilson puts all departmental budgets under scrutiny to see what he can claw back for DFP, the Education Minister managed to locate £72 million of ‘savings’ over the next three years. According to the Minister’s party political presser, this figure was as a result of “an internal review that has led to further reductions in bureaucracy and savings from other educational services.” That impression was enhanced by his colleague …

Without a new approach to Education, the Minister is condemned to micromanaging micro outcomes…

Mick Fealty on May 10, 2012, 1:53 pm

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Well, I didn’t hear it, but apparently the Education minister John O’Dowd let rip this morning on the Nolan Show (42 minutes). But some time earlier, his party colleague Daithi McKay gave a fairly calm account of the Department’s request to school inspectors to report primary schools found to be giving special tuition to pupils sitting grammar school entrance exams: listen to ‘John O’Dowd urges school inspectors to report schools preparing for transfer tests’ on Audioboo I know of no …

Cross border education: lay out all the facts please

Brian Walker on April 5, 2012, 12:27 pm

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Is this form of cross border cooperation actually divisive? Contrast two stories about the SF led Education department’s plan for a survey of 50,000 “border families “ (i.e. families on both sides of the border) on the takeup of school places by children from the other side. Liam Clarke’s story records the objections of DUP’s Mervyn Storey, chair of the Assembly Education Committee, to SF minister John O’Dowd’s plan on the grounds that the minister “ has lost all sense of …

“I believe that schools are best placed to make decisions in light of what they believe is in the best interests of their pupils.”

Pete Baker on March 12, 2012, 3:58 pm

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So sayeth the Northern Ireland Education Minister, Sinn Féin’s John O’Dowd. He’s not, however, speaking about academic selection… Following a 12-week public consultation on GCSE reform, which ended on 30 December 2011, the NI Education Minister has decided to give no direction on whether schools should use unitised or linear GCSEs. [Let the market decide! – Ed] Indeed. From the ministerial press release Following a 12-week consultation the Minister has decided not to follow England where, following a decision by Secretary of State for …

#CATJRF: Scoil an Droichid and the downside of asset transfer?

Mick Fealty on February 28, 2012, 5:01 pm

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In case anyone was under the impression that community asset transfer is being pushed here as a panacea for all ills and all occasions then what Scoil an Droichid are currently going through should serve as a dire warning of some of the risks involved. It’s not that the school is not in general terms viable. But that the original transfer of the asset (back in 2001) according to Simon Doyle writing on the front page of todays Irish News, …

Learn from the English experience in secondary schools

Brian Walker on February 15, 2012, 11:03 am

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Interested parties would do well to examine battles over secondary school admission in England. The Northern Ireland debate, such as it is, is locked in parochialism and stand- off. Unwisely it seems to steer clear of the English experience – on political grounds?- even though we have broadly the same schools system. The major difference is that in England, academic selection is prohibited in most areas but admissions policy still can be just as controversial. English secondary education, the argument …

“all schools in the Catholic sector should move to an alternative form of transfer as soon as possible and by no later than 2012…”

Pete Baker on February 13, 2012, 11:12 pm

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Six years in the writing, the Northern Ireland Commission for Catholic Education (NICCE) has published its Post-Primary Review Strategic Regional Report. It’s a mixture of proposals of limited school closures, amalgamations… and wishful thinking. As the BBC reports, Catholic Church representatives have been focusing on one issue in particular. Cardinal Brady was speaking at St Mary’s College in Belfast when he criticised continuing academic selection by schools. “It is totally unacceptable that some Catholic schools are, in effect, becoming all ability …

Some secondary schools get better results than selective grammar schools

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on February 5, 2012, 9:05 pm

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In days and weeks to come, there may be many ways to slice and dice the data that Kathryn Torney published in The Detail and the Sunday Times this morning. Chris has already alluded to the potential weakness in directly comparing the raw NI stats about numbers of pupils achieving 7 or more GCSEs at grades A*-C including English and Maths with English secondary schools given the selective nature of the NI educational system. I wondered about the blurred boundary …

John O’Dowd: the education debate is “continuing in a better atmosphere” but it’s not yet time for all-party talks

Alan Meban (Alan in Belfast) on February 3, 2012, 8:50 am

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John O'Dowd on East Belfast Speaks Out panel

I grabbed a very quick interview with Education Minister John O’Dowd as he headed down the corridor in Ashfield Boys School to go home after last night’s East Belfast Speaks Out community hustings. In the past few months he’s announced reductions in school budgets, given a partial reprieve after finding extra money for his department, and most recently announced a shake up of SEN/statementing. I asked whether this was all not a lot for school principals to have to deal …

“A working democracy must have in place effective mechanisms for holding the Executive to account…”

Pete Baker on January 10, 2012, 4:47 pm

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As the BBC reports, the Northern Ireland Appeal Court has delivered, “with regret”, its judgement on the NI Department of Education’s appeal of the “abuse of power” ruling that followed a judicial review of the then-minister Sinn Féin’s Caitríona Ruane’s refusal to provide funding for Loreto Grammar School’s planned new-build on its existing site in Omagh. As the BBC report notes In ruling the court said: “The representations and actions by the Department of Education and the minister of education did not give rise to a …