National blamed for loss

Press, 20 February 1986, Page 13

National blamed for loss

Teachers’ College graduates from 1981 to 1983 are annoyed at the sudden turnaround in staffing policy and the fact that teachers are in demand again. For them, the call has come too late.

The loss of these qualified and talented people is a result of the staffing mismanagement of the National Government in the four years from 1980 to 1984, according to Kevin Bunker, assistant general secretary of the P.P.T.A. It also represents a considerable waste of taxpayers’ money. Jenny Nagle, aged 26, is one of a group of potential teachers whom the Post Primary Teachers’ Association president, Tony Steele, says have been treated very badly in the past.

She trained in 1981 when the National Government was cutting back on staffing levels in schools. Large numbers of graduates from the years 1980 to 1984 never got teaching jobs. Some grabbed any part-time work they could in the hope that something would turn up. Others searched for different careers.

Education Department figures show that in 1981 only half of the 998 secondary school graduates found jobs that year. Two years later the number of graduates dropped to 572 but only 292 of these gained permanent teaching positions in high schools that year.

Jenny Nagle still remembers the end of her training college year with some bitterness. “I was so keen to teach she says. “I had a lot to offer, plenty of enthusiasm, and I was told I was good in the classroom. I was dreadfully disappointed when there were no jobs. It was unfair and showed an incredible lack of foresight to

train so many for so few positions.” After 40 job applications and several trips around the country at her own expense for interviews, she says she experienced something akin to the grieving process when she realised she was unlikely to get the job she had spent a year training for and looking forward to. “I became very disillusioned

after all the work I’d done collecting teaching resources and preparing. The reality of the job situation was like a cold shower. I just wasn’t expecting it to happen like that. I lost my enthusiasm and felt angry. I just thought ‘damn them, it’s their loss.’ After a few months on the dole and a P.E.P. job, Jenny Nagle took a job with a firm that markets educational books. Her

talents were soon rewarded by promotion to sales manager and increased responsibility in the running of the business. She feels pleased now at the direction her choice has taken her.

“What I do now is just as challenging and rewarding as teaching, plus there’s more opportunity for career advancement,” she says. The only circumstances in which she would now go back to teaching would be if she needed part-time work because she had a family, but she doubts she would be re-admitted after several years away from teaching. Another graduate from 1981 is Penny Paynter, aged 28, who thought she would get a permanent position if she waited and took on relieving or part-time work in the meantime. But she quickly discovered that part-time and relief teachers have a harder job establishing discipline with pupils than permanent staff. “You’re often just fair game for some students and I resent being treated badly simply because I am a relief teacher. You are not judged on your merits,” she says. In the two years after she trained Penny did a succession of part-time teaching jobs before becoming a mother. Although she would still like a career, she cannot see teaching as a longterm prospect now. “I would have stayed teaching if I had had a full-time job and had my baby later on. But I don’t have the energy to do both things properly now. I’ll probably get bits and pieces of work if I keep up my contacts with the schools.” Chris Pearson’s story is also typical of many graduates from

the early 1980 s. He also applied for several jobs around the country, including in rural areas. He received one offer in a country area, teaching a subject for which he felt unqualified. After a succession of temporary jobs and some time on the dole, he moved into the public relations field and then became a reporter. He does not want to return to a profession that he feels has mucked him around.

A few teachers’ college graduates find out early in their training college year the 'State school system is not for them. Stephanie Wilson, aged 27, was a physical education trainee who became disillusioned with a system that she found repressive for both teachers and students.

“At high school, phys-ed is all sports and ball skills but there’s a whole new awareness of fitness for living that isn’t in the schools. A lot of phys-ed teachers are still into this macho thing and many people leave school hating physed because of this,” she says. Stephanie Wilson took courses for young unemployed before becoming a fitness instructor at the Y.M.C.A.

“I haven’t had any oppressive discipline problems with the young people I’ve supervised on skills programmes,” she says. “We had lots of fun. Often the socalled failures of the school system are not unintelligent, but they are not catered for at high school.”

She finds her job as a fitness instructor stimulating because the people who come to classes are self-motivated and keen to use her organisational skills. Jenny Nagle, Penny Paynter and Chris Pearson all think that

if they had been given the chance to get straight into the teaching profession they would probably still be there. The time they spent moving around various schools in search of part-time jobs made them view the job more objectively and become less enthusiastic about the stress and work conditions. In hindsight, their disappointment has given way to a sense of relief that their lives have other directions which they now find more attractive than the prospect of teaching as a lifetime career.