'Punitive' cuts hit home as schools reopen

As thousands of Meath youngsters return to school this week, many are facing a long winter of 'punitive' conditions, as teachers and officials grapple to deal with the massive education cuts implemented this year. Larger class sizes, a reduction in special needs and language support teachers, children without school books and schools without cleaners or caretakers are among the consequences of the sweeping cuts announced by the Dept of Education earlier this year. As the reality of the situation hit home with the reopening of schools this week, some of the measures were described as "alarming" and "punitive" by teachers and officials as thousands of schoolchildren returned to schools in very difficult circumstances. The prospect of schools not having a caretaker to deal with incidents such as broken toilets and schools struggling to assist children who cannot afford to buy their own schoolbooks are among the problems facing schools around the county, according to the CEO of Meath VEC, Peter Kierans. Mr Kierans, who is responsible for nine secondary schools and almost 4,500 pupils in the county, said that cuts were severely impacting on all schools and warned that proposals in the McCarthy report to increase class sizes even further next year were punitive. "We have lost special needs and language support teachers, which is impacting on schools," he said. The VEC chief pointed out that increased numbers in the classrooms was also impacting on subject options. "While we managed to keep the subject choices intact this year, the proposal to increase the pupil teacher ratio to 21:1 next year is punitive and will make it very, very difficult to manage schools," he warned. "This year, with the increase in the pupil teacher ratio to 19:1, we would have lost 13 to 14 teachers, only our enrolment numbers have risen by over 400," he said. Mr Kierans said that an embrgo on promotion posts was also having a detrimental effect on schools as many schools have had senior staff retiring and their management posts cannot be filled. "We have big challenges in all our nine schools and we are relying on the goodwill and generousity of our staff," he added. Mr Kierans highlighted another major difficulty around the embargo on renewing contracts for cleaners, secretaries or caretakers who are not permanent employees. "This will leave some schools without cleaners or secretaries. Some will have no caretakers if they have problems with a blocked toilet or other mainenance issue," he added. "This is alarming. We have made our case to the Department but key personnel have had to be let go. Even if we are within budget, we still cannot keep them on because there is an embargo on renewing contracts." Another major problem facing schools, according to Mr Kierans, is the cut in the allowances for schoolbooks for the less well-off. While the VEC has book rental schemes in their schools, they are not receiving any funds this year to help purchase books. "In our newer schools like Colaiste na hInse (in Laytown), who are starting their first second year class, and Ratoath College, who are now going into the Leaving Certificate cycle, we have not got any allowance to buy books and have to pay for them centrally," he said. "The impact and pressure of the cut in the book allowance scheme is having is disproportionate and punitive effect on families," he said. The principal of Ashbourne Community School, Áine O'Sullivan, said the cut in the book scheme was the cut which would have the most effect on schools. "We have been given no funding at all this year to provide books for needy children," she said. Ms O'Sullivan also spoke of the impact the loss of language support teachers was having on the school. "We still have a lot of international students coming to us, some of whom have little or no English, who will now have to go into mainstream classes without any support," she said. According to Ms O'Sullivan, another major impact of the classroom cuts would be on extra-curricular activites. "We have always had a lot of extra-curricular activity and our staff will do their best to facilitate them, but we might enter a league and then have to pull out of it because we cannot get somebody to cover for the teacher involved," she explained.