President's address: The ASTI president has strongly defended his leadership of the union despite criticism from hardline elements.
In his address to the conference yesterday, Mr P.J. Sheehy said he had no alternative but to put the 13.5 per cent benchmarking offer to a ballot of members.
In a pointed riposte to hard-line elements, he said: "As president of ASTI, I had a duty to bring the option of a ballot on the offer to the 17,500 members. Such is the duty of any leader who represents all of the members and not just a single group."
Mr Sheehy also stressed his personal support for much closer links between the ASTI and the other teaching unions, the INTO and the TUI.
"While many advances have been made, education services continue to be vulnerable. A strong relationship between the three unions can only be a valuable strategic advantage as we take the next step forward."
Reflecting on the three-year pay campaign, he said that what began life as a simple straightforward pay claim resulted in much antipathy, antagonism and acrimony. The struggle however highlighted a number of issues, not least of all the right of a union, any union, to attempt to plough its own furrow independently.
Mr Sheehy said that recent ballots on benchmarking and supervision drew a line over the pay campaign. On the new "modernisation" agenda, he stressed that the ASTI would be working alongside the other teaching unions in the Teacher Conciliation Council.
The Department of Education is seeking modern measures such as night-time parent/teacher meetings and a common school year in return for the benchmarking payments.
Mr Sheehy said he would welcome any wide-ranging review of teaching and education.
This should dwell on issues of concern to teachers including staffing levels in schools, the impact of education legislation on teachers and schools, the evolution and development of school curriculums, teacher workload, teacher recruitment and retention, the professional development of teachers and the need for an orderly and respectful environment for teaching and education.
Mr Sheehy said the IDA chief, Mr Sean Dorgan, was wrong to suggest recently that there had been little substantial change in Irish education in recent decades.
"Even a cursory examination of the second-level sector demonstrates the considerable transformation which has occurred in less than 20 years," he said.
Mr Sheehy also expressed alarm about efforts being made to counter the alarming fall-off in the number of second-level students taking science subjects. A much-needed revised Junior Cert science curriculum had been agreed but little investment had been made to prepare the ground for it.
"Unless there is radical action between now and September," he warned, "schools will not be in a position to successfully introduce the new syllabus because they do not have the required laboratory facilities and equipment. Teachers must get the resources they need if they are to deliver."
