The reports may be bland but they will enable parents to begin to peel back the curtain of secrecy in education, writes Ombudsman and Information Commissioner, Emily O'Reilly
Not for the first time, the fears articulated by those seeking to prevent the publication of information of great and obvious public interest proved unfounded - when school inspection reports were published yesterday.
Three years ago, my predecessor as Information Commissioner, Kevin Murphy, ordered the release of similar reports despite claims by the Department of Education that the education system would be significantly damaged if that happened. The INTO subsequently fought against their release through the courts, securing a victory last year in the Supreme Court which ruled that academic comparisons between schools could be made through such reports.
Only the Minister therefore had the discretion to release them in accordance with Section 53 of the Education Act of 1998.
Parents can now judge for themselves whether in fact such comparisons can reasonably be made given the lack of any test or examination data contained within them. Parents might also note that they do not have access to the reports as of right, but rather through ministerial discretion.
In my recent report to the Oireachtas on secrecy provisions in legislation, I called on the department to include Section 53 of the Education Act in the Third Schedule of the Freedom of Information Act. This would mean that decisions to release this and other kinds of information about school performance would be tested independently through the FOI framework.
I welcome the release of these reports nonetheless. I am aware that they are viewed by some as bland and lacking in the type of hard, factual information that more and more people are demanding But they do represent a start, and will enable parents to begin to peel back the curtain of secrecy that has enveloped some parts of our education system.
The very fact of their release will also heighten parental expectations of what should be contained in these reports in the future. Over time, that pressure will encourage the educational inspectorate to cut down some of the rhetorical foliage, and focus more tightly on key performance issues.
Teachers too should appreciate the forum they now have to articulate publicly their concerns about resources and other issues concerning their schools. If education is truly to be the "partnership" we are constantly told it is, then these reports should force a re-balancing of the educational triangle, with parents, teachers and pupils having more equal access to the information that all need to bring about an optimal educational environment.
But, the elephant in the living room remains, in the shape of academic results. The single subject reports released yesterday, concerning secondary schools, have a sub-heading called Assessment and Achievement, which tell a little about the former and nothing about the latter. All it is is a description of the type of tests the pupils undergo and how they are managed, but not a hint as to the results themselves.
I have argued before that academic results should be released. In a recent speech to the Irish Vocational Education Authority, I argued that any "league tables" subsequently produced may well be "crude", but as such they mirror the crudeness of the points system, the only measure of our children's ability used by third-level colleges.
The department and many teachers have argued that their release would be damaging, that they force a form of educational apartheid and hurt more disadvantaged schools in particular.
Yet, extremely crude league tables exist already - by way of third-level intake reports. A form of educational apartheid also exists, ironically fuelled by our economic growth in recent years, and disadvantaged schools might actually benefit from the harsh light of publicity being cast on their difficulties. Adverse publicity might force the system to tackle the disadvantage that is most certainly there but, to a large degree, still remains hidden.
A friend of mine teaches in one such disadvantaged school. Her pupils struggle to attain basic literacy and numeracy levels. One pupil recently needed time off because it was children's allowance day and he needed to stay with his mother to make sure she didn't spend the money on heroin.Nonetheless, with falling numbers, the school struggles to maintain its complement of teachers.
What would a true warts and all inspection report say about that? The unvarnished truth or a description of the junior infants' classroom colour scheme?
As things stand, the tests the children do to assess their literacy and numeracy are forbidden to be published and the possibility of shocking the system into action is removed. Freedom of Information is not about doing harm; it is about balancing out the harms and the benefits. The recent history of our State shows that secrecy has yielded much harm and precious few benefits.