Thirteen teacher colleges face axe in major reform
September 6, 2012
THE number of teacher training colleges will be cut from 19 to six under radical restructuring proposals announced yesterday.
The reduction would be achieved through closures and mergers. It is designed to bring Ireland into line with best modern practice by moving away from a system of too many small colleges with unnecessary duplication and ultimately towards improving teacher quality.
Another issue touched on in a report from an international panel of experts is the supply and demand of teachers.
Concern
The report expresses “surprise and concern” that this has not been addressed in Ireland, as it has elsewhere. The 19 colleges currently offer more than 40 programmes of teacher training at primary and post- primary level.
Education Minister Ruairi Quinn is backing the experts’ recommendations and has asked the Higher Education Authority ( HEA) to draw up an implementation plan. However, the proposed rationalisation is certain to spark controversy within the sector, and how mergers would work remains to be ironed out.
One proposal would see teacher training at Trinity College Dublin and University College Dublin coming together with Marino Institute of Education, which would also be the base for the new centre.
Meanwhile, the Church of Ireland College of Education, traditionally linked to Trinity, is involved in discussions with a group involving Dublin City University, having previously been involved in discussions with NUI Maynooth.
The six mergers envisaged in the proposals are:
- Dublin City University, St Patrick’s College Drumcondra, Mater Dei Institute of Education and the Church of Ireland College of Education.
- Trinity College Dublin, Marino Institute of Education, University College Dublin and the National College of Art and Design.
- National University of Ireland Maynooth and Froebel College.
- University of Limerick, Mary Immaculate College and Limerick Institute of Technology.
- University College Cork and Cork Institute of Technology.
- National University of Ireland Galway and St Angela’s College Sligo.
It also recommends that Galway- Mayo Institute of Technology and St Patrick’s College in Thurles opt out of teacher training.
In countries such as Finland, all teachers are educated to Masters level in research- based universities, which could be an aspiration for Ireland.
The report praises the “several advantages” of our system, including the calibre of candidates, with academic standards among the highest in the world.
Specialism
It also notes that entrants to publicly- funded teacher training colleges are capped while numbers in the private sector are uncapped.
The private online Hibernia College last year accounted for more than 700 of the 1,887 primary teacher graduates and has now also moved into post- primary teacher training.
At second- level, the report queries the lack of a mechanism to decide how many teachers are needed in each specialism.
It says that the lack reliable data has led to increasing reliance on the use of “out of field” teachers – those who are unqualified in the subject.
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