Dempsey speech: Primary teachers will have an additional year to implement the new curriculum, the Minister for Education and Science, Mr Dempsey, has announced.
Speaking to delegates at the INTO congress, Mr Dempsey said he was responding to a union request for more "bedding down" time, beginning next September.
He also announced his intention to require primary schools to evaluate themselves. His department intended to publish a document, Looking At Our Schools - An Aid to Self-Evaluation in Primary Schools.
The Minister appealed to "learners, teachers, parents, managers, officials and Ministers" to ask themselves: "How can we improve further?"
Teachers at the congress complained of oppressive bureaucracy regarding the curriculum.
One delegate compared the many reports which have to be written and filed as writing novels no one wanted to read.
Mr Sean Rowley, incoming president of the INTO, proposed a motion demanding a renegotiation of the benchmarking report.
He said overworked primary principals and deputy principals should have parity with their counterparts in secondary schools.
"All principals should have one week's release time from teaching per month for administration duties."
The general secretary of the INTO, Mr John Carr, expressed "anger and outrage at the shabby treatment of principals and deputy principals in the benchmarking report".
Mr Declan Kelleher, of the INTO Central Executive Committee, also spoke in favour of the motion, which was unanimously passed, that the benchmarking body had failed to recognise the increased workload of primary school principals. This "bureaucratic nightmare" had been created by the department.
However in his speech the Minister denied teachers extra resources, stating that voters in the last general election had decided that they wanted to keep taxes low, rather than investing in education. Improved management was his message.
Mr Dempsey appealed for partnership between teachers and the department outside a setting of union negotiation.
"We need to look to the future to create a new vision for education. To create that vision we need to have open discussion and dialogue with all partners in education.
"This new vision. . .we have for education will be a shared one and will be aimed at achieving the optimum results for those who should count most in our system - our young people."