The Irish National Teachers Organisation (INTO) is to use the next round of benchmarking discussions to push for primary school principals to receive the same level of pay as their second-level counterparts.
Despite previously looking for the benchmarking body to address the issue of pay parity, it said the benchmarking report actually awarded greater increases to second-level principals.
"This was totally unfair and unjust to principals who had very real expectations that their salaries would increase to reflect their increased responsibilities," Mr John Carr, general secretary of the INTO, said.
"Primary school principals are overburdened, over-stretched and overworked. At the same time they are undervalued, underpaid and under-resourced. Morale is being eroded by an ever-increasing workload."
"Goodwill is being sapped by an education system that clearly places a lower value on the work of the primary principal than on the work of their second-level colleagues . . . a resolution must be delivered in the next round of benchmarking."
According to Mr Carr, recent years have also seen a significant increase in the workload and bureaucracy associated with the work of a primary school principal or deputy principal.
Most principals are teaching principals, he said, a fact which needs to be recognised as an "impossible" dual role.
"School administration is becoming increasingly impossible due to increasing paperwork and bureaucracy. It appears that every new initiative brings additional bureaucracy," Mr Carr said.
"New legislation, new initiatives from the Department of Education and Science, a new emphasis on school planning, are creating a paperwork nightmare for principal teachers."
One example of this, he said, was the establishment of the National Educational Welfare Board, which expected schools to compile detailed data on attendance.
"There must be no new duties, no new roles, unless ways are found to reduce the administrative and bureaucratic workload. Principal teachers must be allowed to concentrate on learning and teaching," Mr Carr said.
"It is wrong that a primary pupil should be valued less than a post-primary student. It is wrong that post-primary principals and deputy principals should be treated more favourably than their counterparts at primary level."
Another major challenge for the coming year was to re-establish the professionalism of the principal teacher, he added.
This meant teaching principals in particular needed at least a day a week to concentrate on parents' meetings, staff meetings, preparation of reports, planning, assessment, professional development and curriculum development.
A spokeswoman for the Department of Education and Science said discussions with the interested parties are still ongoing in relation to the issue of bureaucracy in schools.