PUPILS AND parents will, for the first time, have a role in formally assessing the work of teachers and school principals, under a new Department of Education inspection programme.
The department has confirmed to The Irish Times that the inspection programme will begin in three secondary schools on a pilot basis from later this month.
Minister for Education Batt O’Keeffe has also signalled that schools may be obliged to give more information to parents, including on Leaving Cert exam results, under new regulations now being considered.
A sample of pupils and parents will be asked to fill in a questionnaire on all aspects of school life, including the quality of teaching and an assessment of the principal.
The radical new programme represents a significant shift towards pupil and parent power in the Republic. Until now, formal consultation with pupils and parents , which is common elsewhere, has had no role in the school inspection process. A spokesman for Mr O’Keeffe stressed the move was not about creating school league tables. “This is about improving the range of information provided by schools to parents about the operation and performance of the school.”
While the department has published inspection reports for the past three years, sources say it is not happy with the “restricted” flow of information provided to schools. Schools, for example, are not obliged to inform parents about the publication of a whole school evaluation (WSE) report or to give information on exam performance.
The spokesman said the Minister, through either guidelines or regulations, wanted to encourage a consistency of approach “whereby all schools would provide certain information to parents on the operation of the school, including learning outcomes”. The department says the pilot scheme is designed to complement the established WSE process and the process whereby the work of teachers in various subjects is evaluated.
The new inspection model will examine school management, leadership, curriculum provision, planning, teaching, and learning and assessment across a range of subjects.
The department hopes the new model will facilitate a shorter and more focused evaluation of the work of schools. The new programme will assess how schools have developed and improved since earlier inspections.
The results of the pilot study will not be published on the department’s website. However, staff, board of management members and patron/trustees of the school will get the report.
The Minister’s spokesman said schools “should more widely and comprehensively make available to parents and the wider school community information that is already available internally in the school”.
The National Association of Principals and Deputy Principals has commended the new model as a progressive move. Clive Byrne of the NAPD said positive evaluations were an effective way of keeping good teachers motivated “as we endeavour to create a self-evaluating culture in our schools”.