A Mayo secondary school will lose five of its teachers, cease all extra-curricular sports activities and send children home from school if a teacher reports sick once the cutbacks announced in last week’s budget are enforced. Field work, which is compulsory for pupils studying certain Leaving Certificate subjects such as geography, biology, agricultural science, home economics and history, are also set to cease with immediate effect in the school.
The revelation, made in the Dáil last week by Mayo Fine Gael TD John O’Mahony, has come as a huge shock to the parents of the pupils attending the school but according to Deputy O’Mahony the shock will be replicated throughout Mayo in the coming weeks.
“I said last week in the aftermath of the Budget that it was anti-education and this development is proof of that. Subjects that require students to leave the school on field work will cease and extra-curricular activities such as sporting activities will also come to a halt. Schools operate a two teacher policy for most sporting events but because of the reduced number of teachers, schools will not be able to afford to let two teachers leave the classrooms. The impact on the numbers of schools participating in sports will be absolutely massive,” he said.
Dep O’Mahony said the reality of the Budget cutbacks were made clear to him last week when a Mayo school principal told him that his school would lose five teachers from January next. “Not alone that but they will also be forced to send pupils home because of the new policy curtailing the employment of sub teachers. What will happen when a teacher gets sick on a Sunday night and can’t get to school the next day? The new regulations prevents the school getting a sub in until a sick cert is produced, therefore the school will have little option but to send the children home as they cannot afford to leave a class unsupervised,” he said.
He described the scenario that will unfold in the country’s schools as worrying in the extreme. “This Government just seem set on hurting the most vulnerable in our society. Last week it was the elderly, now it’s our young people. The policies are dreadfully short-sighted. They are behaving as if we are going to be in recession forever with absolutely no vision whatsoever as to what is required to build a society. What can be achieved by forcing schools to send students home? What can be achieved by forcing schools to forego sports activities? What can be achieved by forcing schools to curtail field work? ‘Nothing’ is the answer to all three questions and this Government must be made explain where they were coming from when they proposed all these changes. Certainly, no right-thinking person could see any sense in them,” he said.
