Cork teacher makes plea for further investment in schools 

On the day junior cycle results were released, one Cork teacher yesterday highlighted the need for a more sensible system of funding schools and examining students.

Speaking to The Echo, English teacher Conor Murphy said: “Over the last decade, there’s been an increase in teacher-bashing in society, saying we’re lazy. 

“But we’re [Ireland] first in the OECD for reading, seventh in maths, and eighth for science. 

“So teachers must be doing something right. Imagine what we could do with more investment.”

The most recent OECD PISA report shows that 15-year-olds in Ireland ranks first out of 37 OECD countries for reading literacy.

Ireland ranks seventh for performance in maths and eighth in science. However, Ireland remains at the bottom of the league for investment.

The OECD report, 'Education at a Glance 2024', positioned Ireland in last place out of 34 countries for investment in second-level education as a percentage of GDP.

Mr Murphy said changes to the curriculum have made it harder for teachers and students, explaining: 

“In English, students can be asked on literally anything. 

“For example, the curriculum says they need to know about genres and subgenres, but doesn’t specify any, so I have to teach everything you can think of. 

“I can’t get that done in two years, so I’m trying to get as much done as possible without getting anything done in real depth.

“My teaching of Shakespeare has completely changed, because I simply don’t have the time.”

Mr Murphy said coursework has become a lot more about preparing for the exam than reading and understanding the material, adding: 

“The questions are oddly worded and paragraphs long, and there’s not enough time to answer them all.

“The time I have to spend training students how to understand the question and do the exam in the short time takes away from teaching.”

“In my opinion, education is being lessened.

“Before, I just taught them English, but now way too much of my time is taken up preparing them for those two hours in the exam.

“I don’t think that’s an educationally sound model.”

Finally, he said that while there are merits to the classroom-based assessments in every subject, “they can become overwhelming for students, particularly the high achievers, get quite stressed”.

Mr Murphy added: “The Junior Cert is not as heavy going or serious as the Leaving Cert because there’s no CAO points at the end, and now every Leaving Cert subject is going to have a project as well. 

“Teachers are very worried about how that will affect the wellbeing of students.”