Sir, - One recent survey concluded that 25 per cent of Irish adults were "functionally illiterate". Another concluded that the vast majority of primary students place teaching as a profession at the bottom of their wish list of career choices - a view (despite the politically correct times in which we live) evidenced by the overwhelming female majority in teacher-training programmes today.
One might expect that the teaching profession would be apologising for its embarrassing failures and seeking to implement improvement strategies. Instead, we are confronted with the spectacle of teacher unions arguing for compensation for missing the "millennium day" which occurred during one of their many extended holidays; for early retirement rather than dismissal for those teachers who have most obviously failed their students; for a ban on any form of performance appraisal; and, most unbelievably, for a 30 per cent salary hike! Failing capitulation by the public on these points, our dedicated professionals will apply the screws of industrial unrest to the students entrusted to their care - by disrupting exams!
Am I the only one who thinks that the much maligned Christian Brothers and their likes may have a lot less for which to apologise than their modern-day successors? - Yours, etc.,
Ted Mooney, Mount Eden Road, Dublin 4.