The Teachers’ Union of Ireland (TUI) has said that Irish teachers returning from jurisdictions such as Dubai and Australia must be awarded full incremental credit for their service abroad if they are to choose to stay in the profession.
Currently, teachers returning from positions in private schools outside the EU are placed on the first point of the teachers’ salary scale here despite the significant and demonstrable experience attained in teaching diverse curricula abroad. This affects the overwhelming majority of those who may wish to return to Ireland from countries such as Dubai.
Meanwhile, a survey of principals and deputy principals in 104 second level schools carried out in October by the Principals and Deputy Principals’ Association of the TUI found that 77% of schools advertised positions in the previous six months for which no teacher applied, while 64% have unfilled vacancies due to recruitment and retention difficulties.
The same survey found that just 1% believe that enough is being done at Government level to tackle the crisis, while 90% believe more could be done to tackle bureaucratic/incremental credit barriers preventing Irish teachers living in other jurisdictions from returning home.
Speaking today, TUI President David Waters described the Department of Education’s failure to tackle the incremental credit issue in the middle of an unprecedented teacher recruitment and retention crisis as ‘absolutely unfathomable’.
‘Second level schools across the country are experiencing unprecedented struggles in putting teachers in front of classes, yet the Department still refuses to properly facilitate a highly qualified and significantly experienced cohort in returning to Irish schools,’ he said.
‘This really puts into question the commitment at Government level to properly tackling this crisis.’
‘These dedicated professionals have honed their skills in diverse environments, gaining a wealth of relevant knowledge and an international perspective. Now more than ever, we need to dismantle the barriers and deterrents that are preventing them from returning home to use their expertise within our own education system.’
‘In many cases, they will simply choose to continue to teach outside Ireland or, if they do return, work in other employments where their transferrable skills are better appreciated. Ultimately, it is students who will lose out.’
‘Aside from tackling the recruitment and retention crisis, their return would also have significant educational value, bring a diverse range of teaching practices, methodologies and fresh perspectives to classrooms. It would also assist in imparting a global perspective to students in our increasingly interconnected world.’
Other key measures to tackle the crisis that the TUI has set out to the Department include:
- Improving teaching allocations to schools to allow them to offer secure jobs of full hours. Currently, 70% of second-level teachers commence on a contract of less than full hours.
- Restoring posts of responsibility in schools to pre-2009 levels to provide a much-needed career structure and to ease administrative overload.
- Halving the duration of the two-year Professional Master of Education (PME) to reduce the cost of what is becoming an unaffordable profession for too many.