Curriculum changes must not be just another cynical cost-cutting exercise
THERE ARE really good reasons for Junior Certificate reform, and really bad ones. The worst reason would be a desire to save money. It is expensive to set, supervise and correct 10 to 12 exams for 15 year olds, not to mention the costs of teaching them in the first place.
In theory, there are 26 subjects for examination in the Junior Cert, including, rather quaintly, typewriting, but most schools don’t offer that many. It is still generally agreed that the curriculum is overloaded. Students “do” too many subjects.
However, abolishing the current format simply to cut down on costs would still be foolish and short-sighted. Not that those patient people at the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) are suggesting anything so drastic.
Years of dealing with procrastinating ministers have taught them to offer a menu of options, ranging from the mild to the radical. Mind you, they must be rather startled to find themselves dealing with a Minister who seems to want to change everything at once.
Nonetheless, at one end of the range offered by the NCCA, you have a modest proposal to decrease the number of subjects for traditional examination, and increasing other options for assessment, such as portfolios.
At the other end, you would have a tiny number of core subjects that are examined at national level, and lots and lots of school-designed courses which would be certified in other ways.
The latter option would be quite possibly creative and innovative, and also quite possibly completely unworkable without significant resources. As a teacher for many years myself, I believe a switch from a system which has been completely skewed in favour of exams to something utterly different is impossible without significant preparation and piloting.
Nor should the system change to one where students are primarily assessed by teachers. The disadvantages, particularly in a small country, would outweigh any cost savings.
Teachers have been to the forefront in pointing out the flaws of the current system. However, they are sceptical about motives for reform. Aside from parents of children with special needs, they are the ones who most see the effects of cuts in resource hours and special needs provision. They wonder how substantive reform can happen given cuts in staffing and other cutbacks.
They see schools stretched to the limit coping with the moratorium on posts of responsibility. Management and other staff are supposed to take up the slack when posts are no longer filled, and TUI research shows that it is affecting the ability of schools to deal with problems like bullying and absenteeism in a timely manner.
Teachers have also had to deal with criticism of the educational system, particularly in the wake of Pisa reports which have been spun to suggest there has been a major decline in the quality of Irish education.
It is simply not true. For example, our science results are above the OECD average, despite suggestions to the contrary.
There are other circumstances that have affected results, ably outlined by Gerry Shiel of the Educational Research Centre this week. For example, the proportion of “immigrant” students increased from 2.3 per cent of 15-year-olds in 2000 to 8.3 per cent in 2009, and the number of these students who come from poorer backgrounds and have less proficiency in English has greatly increased, in a way that is not true of other OECD countries.
Similarly, there has been a laudable increase in the numbers of students with special needs attending mainstream schools, but it, too, has had an effect. Perhaps the most underestimated factor, however, has been the cultural change.
There has been a dramatic switch to electronic media. Young people are not reading as much as they used to, despite the fact that there is a much better range of literature available.
Minister for Education Ruairí Quinn raised eyebrows with his suggestion that not reading to children was a form of child abuse. While child abuse should never be trivialised by being applied to just about anything, there is no doubt that the Celtic Tiger era significantly decreased the amount of time parents had to spend with their children, and that would have included reading to them. Even still, according to the Minister, a middle-class four-year-old child will arrive in school with twice the vocabulary of a less advantaged child. Given educational cutbacks, that gap will continue to widen.
Schools can always improve, but it is not fair to imply that Irish education has somehow deteriorated wildly in just a few years. But then, commentary on education is rarely fair, something which we saw in the recriminations following the economic meltdown. Public servants, including teachers, were blamed for the fact that we could no longer pay our bills. Given the lack of consequences for many at the top in the banks, this is difficult to swallow.
Despite these factors, there are still good reasons for carefully managed reform. The first is to ease the transition from primary to secondary school, which is a culture shock for most pupils.
A new range of skills are vital for the 21st century. The ability to navigate, select, summarise and apply information is essential in a digital age.
Even more important are problem-solving skills, creative thinking, taking personal responsibility, team-building, and making ethical and sustainable choices. Teachers do their best to help to develop well-rounded and thoughtful human beings, but the exam-obsessed system militates against it.
Reform undertaken in tandem with the senior cycle and third level is overdue. Let’s just hope that it is undertaken in the right spirit, and is not just another cynical cost-cutting exercise.