BOOK OF THE DAY: A History of Ireland's School Inspectorate 1831–2008; By John Coolahan with Patrick F O'Donovan Four Courts Press, 347pp, €40
ALTHOUGH MOST Irish adults have at one time attended a national school, few will be aware why the development of a national system of education in 1831 was one of the most important innovations in 19th century Ireland.
Fewer still will know of its rapid growth and significant progress including in more recent years universal second-level education.
The title of the book suggests a rather narrow focus but such was the central role played by the school inspectorate in almost every educational development, this publication is actually a very accessible account of nearly two centuries of Irish education.
Remarkably, given its centrality in the development of Irish education, this is the first published history of the inspectorate. As such it makes a major contribution to our overall understanding of the education system.
Its pages provide ample evidence of why, despite the fact that inspectors are drawn from the ranks of teachers, a rather uneasy coexistence persists even to this day. From the outset, inspectors were given their riding instructions (literally because owning or having access to a horse was a requirement in the early days).
Orders included arriving at schools unexpectedly, assessing the quality of teaching and learning and collecting large amounts of factual information on every aspect of school life.
For many years, teachers’ salaries depended on inspectors’ ratings. The last quarter of the 19th century was the era of payment by results which the book records had many notable ill effects on the overall operation of the school system.
A rating system which affected teachers’ salaries continued until the late 1940s, which no doubt contributed to the strong criticisms of inspectors by teachers, some of which are recorded in these pages.
At second-level, things were different. Inspectors had much less influence on the career prospects or remuneration of teachers and obviously lacked some of the enthusiasm of their national school colleagues.
The book makes reference to anecdotal evidence existing of leisurely coffee breaks and lunches at the Shelbourne Hotel near the offices of the intermediate (second-level) inspectorate!
While the book charts some periods of considerable difficulty for the inspectors, it also accords considerable credit (“the finest hour”) to the primary school inspectorate for the development of the 1971 curriculum which revolutionised teaching and learning in primary schools.
However the significant obstacles to its implementation, including “pupil-teacher ratios which remained high”, are honestly recorded.
In bringing the story of the inspectorate up to date, the book records recent achievements and the considerable progress made in the creation a unified schools inspectorate.
So are there lessons to be learned from history?
The book provides a warning to those who might champion Colm McCarthy’s proposal to close small schools. From the mid 1960s, this was official State policy with inspectors dispatched to be persuaders for closures at meetings in local communities.
Advice given to inspectors at the time included the suggestion to have motor cars parked to facilitate speedy departure should that become necessary!
While praising recent developments in the publication of school reports, the book also comments on a previous era when inspectors were required to produce detailed reports on schools. Interestingly it concludes that “the remarkable detail of these documents was a tribute to the thoroughness of the bureaucratic mind, but it could also be regarded as undermining their usefulness in terms of over-reporting on schools . . .”
Plus ça change . . .
Peter Mullan is press officer of the Irish National Teachers Organisation