A chara, – With the Government estimating a surplus running into billions this year, it is ironic that the Department of Education had inadequate funds to provide schools with the resources they need to teach the very subjects (science, technology, engineering and maths) that would equip students with the knowledge to excel in the industries that, for the most part, have delivered this financial surplus.
Minister for Education Norma Foley appeared to be surprised by the “overwhelming” amount of applications for funding (“Schools express anger over ‘lottery’ to award Stem grants”, News, December 21st). Was she surprised that schools needed more funding or that so many schools would have an interest in delivering this subject? Shouldn’t schools be given that funding as a matter of course, given that it is one of the core subjects of the new primary school curriculum?
Asking schools to complete an application demonstrates a lack of respect for the time of principals and teachers, whose workload has been called into question on these pages recently. A lottery system, tweaked for “geographical national spread”, is hardly the way a cash-rich government should be providing for the allocation of educational resources. – Is mise,
JOHN KELLY,
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Bennekerry,
Carlow.