After a hostile welcome 10 years ago, Hibernia, the private teacher-training college, now produces more graduates than any of its competitors and has plans to take on the big names in the post-primary training sector, writes Louise Holden
IN AN INTERVIEW with The Irish Timesin 2006, Seán Rowland of Hibernia College made a plea for his online teacher-training body to be "integrated into the mainstream". The call came in response to accusations from established teacher educators that Rowland's private, online product was no match for the time-honoured method of manning Ireland's primary classrooms – through colleges of education, funded by the State.
Fast forward four years to Farmleigh, where Hibernia celebrated its 10th birthday this month. A more mainstream gathering you’d be hard-pressed to find – educational luminaries from Ireland, the UK and beyond were there to celebrate the role of private and distance education in the new economy.
Guests and speakers at the Sharpen the Pencilevent included Harvard's senior public policy lecturer, MIT's director for engineering systems, Pfizer's Europe director and IBM's general manager of global education.
Local talent included HEA boss Tom Boland and Dr Kevin Marshall, academic programme manager of Microsoft Ireland. Educational heavyweights Don Thornhill and Tom Mitchell the current and past chair of Hibernia’s board were also present; a seal of approval from some of the best in the business.
When you look at the figures, it’s easy to see why. In 10 years Hibernia has trained 4,000 primary teachers through its online postgraduate programme. The endeavour has cost the State not a cent, compared to an annual €40 million price tag for the running of St Patrick’s and Mary Immaculate colleges.
Hibernia now trains more teachers than any of its competitors and this global firm has just announced plans to move into post-primary teacher training, putting itself into competition with educational behemoths such as Trinity College and UCD. They won’t be worried for now – demand for post-primary teacher training (or the HDip, as it is still known) outstrips supply, and jobs are scarce.
Hibernia is not expected to offer more than 50 places at first, but if the primary programme is anything to go by, they won’t have trouble filling them. Current demand for Hibernia teacher training stands at four applicants to every one place, and applicants are interviewed to ascertain their suitability.
The unease that followed Hibernia’s arrival is easy to fathom – the concept of privatising a function so intrinsically public as teacher preparation is a difficult sell in this country. But Rowland, its disarming founder, a former teacher, works hard to convince critics he is not trying to make a fast buck by hollowing out the traditional teacher-training infrastructure.
“Hibernia’s model brings a wider constituency of potential teachers into the classroom by offering people a chance to study while in a job or at home with a family. These are learners that would not be able to access teacher training through the colleges of education,” Rowland has explained.
The Hibernia student profile bears out the claim. The majority of students are in their 30s and 40s and they have a higher proportion of male applicants than the colleges of education.
Applicants are coming from a range of professions – IT, engineering, law – rather than straight out of school and all have a prior degree-level qualification.
Now that Hetac has given its blessing to Hibernia’s HDip (and the Teaching Council is expected to follow suit), the online teacher-training model has its seal of approval.
There have even been indications the model might be considered for other aspects of State training. The An Bord Snip Nua report pointed to savings presented by Hibernia, and Minister for Education Mary Coughlan told the Dáil education committee that it may be considered for other training services.
In the public mind, Hibernia has become linked with primary teaching, but this is a global business with big plans. There’s an ideology behind Hibernia, evidenced by the company’s forays into developing nations. Rowland has been working with educators in Haiti and South Africa to develop cost-effective teacher-training models using technologies developed by Hibernia for the Irish market.
Haiti will soon have its first teacher-training college, thanks to a partnership between Hibernia and local higher-level institutions.
The company also provides professional development programmes for a range of organisations including Pfizer Healthcare. There are more than 7,000 Hibernia students worldwide and a recent graduation ceremony at the National Convention Centre in Dublin was attended by 1,360 people from 21 universities. Rowland suggests the attitude to private education in Ireland is based on a perceived dichotomy between free, public offerings and commercial, for-profit entities. “Private education is underdeveloped in this country and there is huge demand for it,” says Rowland.
“Hibernia is a not-for-profit company that puts all earnings back into the college. We are responding to a need from different types of learners seeking different types of learning.”
He has never argued for the supremacy of private education; he believes that there is room for both models in the system.
Despite Hibernia’s success, Rowland still has to plea for acceptance.
It’s not that long since students of St Patrick’s College took to the streets in protest at its entry to the market. Shaun Conaghan, students’ union president at the time, stated publicly that Hibernia courses, which run over 18 months (compared to four years in the colleges of education) would “destroy the quality of education Irish children receive.”
Given the interim success of the programme, and the fact that Hibernia graduates have received very flattering reviews from the schools in which they teach, the response to Hibernia’s HDip offering is likely to be more restrained. However, there are bound to be naysayers in this highly-competitive field.
Rowland is quick out of the traps, defending his programme. “The HDip we’ve designed is benchmarked against international best practice. It’s three years in the making. The programme is a blended learning model, a mixture of online and on-site delivery using unique Hibernia technology.”
Right now, every teacher-training course in the country is preparing many of its students for life on the dole. Why introduce more training when there are no jobs – surely a retraction of places would make more sense?
“We discuss the numbers requirement with the Department of Education and Skills every six months,” says Rowland. “We have no interest in oversupply, but it’s an inexact science as we can’t be sure until the children turn up in September.”
If any retraction of training is on the cards, Hibernia probably has the least to fear. Marvelling at its ability to deliver at such small cost to the State, Dáil education committee chair Paul Gogarty has questioned the viability of some smaller teacher-training colleges. Hibernia’s not in anyone’s sights this December. The party can go on.
THE RISE AND RISE OF HIBERNIA
When Seán Rowland and Sara McDonnell established Hibernia in 2000, their decision to invest in online education – in the midst of a dot.com bust – was questioned. When they brought their online primary teacher education model to the market in 2003, some in traditional education accused them of trying to destroy teacher training for a profit.
This month Hibernia celebrated 10 years in the business, during which the organisation has spread its wings to bring education to everyone from Pfizer employees to the poorest of the poor in Haiti. Meanwhile in Ireland, there are 4,000 Hibernia-trained teachers in the system.
At a celebration in Farmleigh this month, the great and the good spoke of the college with missionary zeal:
"Hibernia is one of the most important and exciting developments in Irish education in a very, very long time" – Thomas Mitchell, former TCD provost and chair of Hibernia College.
"Hibernia College is special because it's a real combination of entrepreneurial spirit and academic excellence" – Kathleen OToole, chief inspector, An Garda Siochana Inspectorate
Hibernia College shatters the traditional model of education – Dr Jack T Watters, vice president of external medical affairs, Pfizer
"It doesnt matter who provides: what's important is the quality of the provision. I think that what youre demonstrating at Hibernia College is that the private sector can sometimes do better than the public sector what has traditionally been regarded as a public sector job – Lord Patten, chancellor of Oxford University
