Sir, - I am a secondary teacher and an ASTI member. I would class myself in your terms as a "moderate". But the campaign of denigration and misrepresentation waged against my profession and that of my colleagues has embittered me and hardened my resolve. It has also - paradoxically and quite contrary to your intention - made me think more highly of the work I have been trying to do, to the best of my ability, for many years now.
Among the falsehoods and half-truths elicited, I suspect, from self-serving Government press releases, hearsay and rumour, I have only space to note the following canard: that examiners are paid £2,000 to £3,000. I have worked as an assistant examiner (the official title) 10 times and have never been paid anything approaching this. The best I ever got, after spending four weeks virtually as a prisoner in the house, continually under pressure and apprehensive about urgent deadlines, was well under £800 after tax.
The pay grew less and less worthwhile and less commensurate with the work and commitment involved. A week of oral examining (admittedly in term time) brings in £150 and two weeks' exam supervising £500 (and I am including the munificent travelling expenses we hear about).
The responsibilities involved here are no light matter either. I was fascinated to hear your correspondent and the Government following the ex-minister Gemma Hussey in claiming all the problems of the exams would be solved if we had a system like Scotland's, where teachers apparently don't mark state exams. (Who else has long summer holidays to devote to this work, I wonder - politicians perhaps?) I heard on BBC Radio 4 an interesting item about the Scottish exams the other day - thousands of papers marked inaccurately, many results late or never sent. It all sounds rather familiar, doesn't it, except that if such an eventuality occurred this summer it would no doubt be because teachers were not available to do the work. I looked in vain for any mention of Scotland's experiences in your paper or on RTE. In this country we have had few serious hitches and even when they did occur they were publicised, leading to more pressure on exam workers. Of course all this experience is to be jettisoned so that "wreckers" like us will never get near the "nuclear button" again.
When industrial relations go badly awry one soon finds out who one's friends are: for instance the sports organisations who have benefitted from all the voluntary effort put in by teachers have made no acknowledgement that I know of, though at least one relief agency has, I understand, thanked teachers for their efforts over the years.
Finally, your Education Editor Sean Flynn takes us to task for the violent scenes involving secondary school students we have seen recently, Why be so modest, ladies and gentlemen of the media? You have been talking for six months about the students taking matters into their own hands and creating anarchy. RTE the other night was showing how it should be done with archive footage of rioting in Paris 1968. Another newspaper said the students could text message each other to rendezvous for demonstrations. This is your self-fulfilling prophecy, but luckily you have a scapegoat to hand in the form of secondary teachers. - Yours, etc.,
Paul Taylor, Woodpark, Ballinteer Road, Dublin 16.