Attempts to break the deadlock in the ASTI dispute are set to be stepped up after the Minister for Education, Dr Woods, intervened last night.
But the Minister has played down hopes of a breakthrough by warning that no "blank cheque" is available for the ASTI.
The ASTI is due to impose a ban on supervision from next Monday. School managers say the vast majority of schools will remain open because of their success in recruiting non-teachers.
The Minister is set to meet the ASTI and the other teaching unions - the INTO and the TUI - in the next 48 hours. It is hoped that a proposal could be ready in time for a special ASTI executive meeting on Friday. But Dr Woods ruled out any move on the ASTI's latest demands, including pensionable supervision payments for all retired teachers.He said last night: "I am happy to say that the contingency arrangements for supervision and substitution which have been made in second-level schools throughout the country will work well.
"The upcoming meeting with the teacher unions will have plenty to discuss, but I must dispel the notion that there will be any blank cheques available. I hope that all of the teacher unions will approach the meeting with an awareness of what is possible in the national interest. Some of the demands which have been made recently are patently impossible to meet."