Intern / Teacher

PaleRider

Can a intern be employed as a teacher. My primary school in losing a teacher. Would it be allowed that this post is filled with a intern teacher. My own belief is that this would be good for the intern teacher as a position may come up in the future. What do you think/advice.

Concerned parent.

ian87

Short answer no. A teacher must be Garda vetted and registered with the teaching council to teach. In order to register, a teaching degree must be obtained. Also union directives dictate that teachers in the INTO are not allowed to teach alongside unqualified staff. School could theoritically be picketed.

PaleRider

Sorry, I mean can a teacher fully qualified take up a intern / work experience position

ian87

But a fully qualified teacher wouldnt need work experience. They would have done that in college. In theory yes they could do it but it would throw a lot of problems.
If a person was to take a class for the year as a volunteer they would be cutting themselves off from paid employment as in subbing or getting a paid full time job. (Assuming they committed to a full year) The chance of getting a paid position would be slim if the school lost a teacher anyway.

Another fairly substanial issue would be the above problem causing further problems for the principal. Ms. X comes in as a volunteer teacher for 4th class. In October she gets a permanent job elsewhere. Who does the principal replace ms. X with? Technically the class doesnt exist. so the principal is faced with moving that 4th class in with other classes or finding a new volunteer. The damage done is huge to the children. It takes up to 2 months for kids to settle into a new class situation. This would lead to significant behaviour issues etc etc

I know my scenarios are a bit extreme but its a factor that would be inevitable

PaleRider

What your saying it could work. There is always the risk of losing a teacher. It has some merit - do you agree.

bdoo

PaleRider wrote: »

What your saying it could work. There is always the risk of losing a teacher. It has some merit - do you agree.

it may well work but the unions will not countenance it. and rightly so.

why would anyone allow somebody into their workplace to do a job for nothing. its a race to the bottom. and in the long run kids will suffer.

E.T.

It sounds very like the Jobbridge scheme, which the INTO have already issued a directive about. They've asked members not to co-operate with it.

It's a recipe for disaster long term. Schools all over the country are losing teachers because of the rise in pupil-teacher ratio. If the cracks in they system are papered using a scheme such as this, schools run the risk of the government turning around and saying that they seem to be coping fine with the loss of the teacher.

As bdoo says, it's a race to the bottom. Why would anyone getting close to 500 points in the Leaving Cert want to choose to enter a profession where they'd end up working for the dole plus €50 a week?

I don't think the scheme has any merit.

PaleRider

Thanks for all the replies. I think we have not reached the bottom yet. But would it not be better to do some work - anything to keep sane. However I do agree with the replies.

But would a young qualified teacher be delighted to have any job? We have to be careful that the people that have the jobs - can afford to have principles.

E.T.

I doubt any qualified professional would be delighted to have a job that signs them up to the dole plus €50 a week, then has to watch as any subbing in the school goes to other teachers, who'd earn the qualified rate. Especially if they've done a course like Hibernia, or any of the postgrads, and have a €10,000 loan to pay back.

If somebody is signed up to this scheme, they can't sub in that school (obviously can't leave their own class, but it's also against the rules of the scheme). It also means they can't sub in other schools as they aren't free to do so because of their own class.

There's been a lot of thought put into criticisms of the scheme, from teachers, for many reasons. I'm not involved in the INTO, just a run of the mill member, but it's one directive that I fully support from them.

Again, I strongly believe it's a dangerous route, jobs are being cut, and schemes like this introduced. It cuts costs, but also creates unsuitable situations as ian87 outlined above from the point of the class, and I've outlined from the point of the teacher.

ian87's point is dead on, what on earth happens if a teacher who's signed up to the scheme does get a proper job, with full pay, during the year? It's a crazy thought, and would cause huge trouble in a school.

rainbowtrout

PaleRider wrote: »

Thanks for all the replies. I think we have not reached the bottom yet. But would it not be better to do some work - anything to keep sane. However I do agree with the replies.

But would a young qualified teacher be delighted to have any job? We have to be careful that the people that have the jobs - can afford to have principles.

You mean they should be delighted to work for the dole? Why?? If they managed to get a full time job on minimum wage anywhere they would still earn more and have rights as a tax paying employee.

Let's look at the scenario here, the school your child attends has lost a teacher, so perhaps it's a relatively small school and classes are combined next year. Let's stay 3rd and 4th class. So the school advertises an intern position through the job bridge programme for a teacher and they get an unemployed teacher desperate enough to get some experience to take the job. So 3rd and 4th classes aren't combined, parents are happy, children remain in two smaller classes.

So the intern bails out part of the way through the year because they can earn more money in the local supermarket/ heads off to Australia/ gets a job where they are paid a proper wage. School can't get another intern because no one wants to work for the dole. Fourth class are lumped back in with third class because the school doesn't have an allocation for a teacher for that class. Third class teacher has to change their programme of work for the year to accommodate the two class groups in the room.

Other scenario. Intern is sick, breaks a leg etc and is out for a few weeks. The job doesn't actually exist because the school doesn't have the allocation for a teacher for that class so who teaches the class? School therefore can't hire a sub to cover the class. Throw them back in with third class? Leave them unsupervised for a few weeks with no teacher?

Dole is 188 + 50 for intern work so that's €238 per week. Assuming 4 weeks in a month and 10 months for working in a primary school, do you value teaching as a profession and your child's education so little that you are happy to see a fully qualified teacher be 'paid' approximately €9.5k to teach for the year, while doing the same work as their counterparts who are paid a proper wage and have contracts etc?

Race to the bottom indeed. If our wonderful government actually allowed this to go ahead, they could freely push up the pupil teacher ratio year on year and remove properly paid teacher positions from schools all over the country and replace them with people paid dole money.

I would be telling any teacher on the dole to maintain their dignity, do some subbing if they want to be paid a proper wage for their skills and qualifications.

johnners2981

PaleRider wrote: »

But would a young qualified teacher be delighted to have any job? We have to be careful that the people that have the jobs - can afford to have principles.

I dislike this attitude, it may be necessary for some people to get experience but why would they be delighted to work for free?

It ends up with some employers taking advantage of desperate people and the people who have jobs (who can afford principles:rolleyes:) will soon be watching their back because their employer is looking for someone to do the job for free.

PaleRider

Thanks to everyone for posting. I'm very happy to have the chance to discuss with you this problem. I appreciate all the advice / opinions expressed.

Thanks

RealJohn

rainbowtrout wrote: »

I would be telling any teacher on the dole to maintain their dignity, do some subbing if they want to be paid a proper wage for their skills and qualifications.

While you mostly raise good points, there's no dignity in being on the dole when you could be doing something useful.

I agree that unemployed teachers taking the place of a teacher as an intern is not workable but I think they should be allowed (and indeed encouraged) to take up roles as classroom assistants and the like. That way, if they get a better offer they don't have a severely negative impact on the school while doing some good and getting classroom experience at the same time.

rainbowtrout

RealJohn wrote: »

While you mostly raise good points, there's no dignity in being on the dole when you could be doing something useful.

I agree that unemployed teachers taking the place of a teacher as an intern is not workable but I think they should be allowed (and indeed encouraged) to take up roles as classroom assistants and the like. That way, if they get a better offer they don't have a severely negative impact on the school while doing some good and getting classroom experience at the same time.

Oh I totally agree, I just don't think unemployed teachers should have to go in and do a full week's work and get paid peanuts and basically be exploited. If other paid work is available in the education sector by all means go for it. There are a lot of intern positions advertised in that job bridge thing that are a farce and some businesses are taking advantage of cheap labour. Saw an ad for a position for 40 hours a week where the person would gain 'valuable experience in learning how to set tables, clear dishes, take orders, wash dishes etc'. Basically it was a cafe or small restaurant looking for a waitress or person to work in their kitchen for nothing. I'd hate to see teaching go down this route.

Cailin CoisFarraige

Personally I'm not a fan of the JobsBridge thing, but as an NQT I have to be honest and say that if a school were to offer me a class in which I could complete my Dip year and get paid €50+dole, I'd jump at the chance. It's harsh to say that we should be delighted to have any job at all, but if it was an opportunity to do the Dip, I'd take it.

That said, I don't have loans, rent or anything like that to pay. I understand the point made earlier about repaying Hibernia/postgrad loans and I could imagine it wouldn't be an option for such a teacher.

bluebell86

Just wondering if there is any teacher on this forum who has/ is doing jobbridge and completed the dip?

Did you approach schools or did one approach you?

i'm just out of college and considering jobbridge...mainly to get the dip out of the way. the job situation is dire.

afkasurfjunkie

bluebell86 wrote: »

Just wondering if there is any teacher on this forum who has/ is doing jobbridge and completed the dip?

Did you approach schools or did one approach you?

i'm just out of college and considering jobbridge...mainly to get the dip out of the way. the job situation is dire.

What if you had your dip and still didn't end up in full time employment? Would you still consider job bridge then?

Lord TSC

I don't get why any parent would value their kids education so little, they'd want to see teachers working for free. "Kids, here's your new teacher. Not the best. Just the cheapest".

2011abc

Its headed this way in England now,apparently someone quoted their principal over there saying having a qualified teacher in a classroom was an 'antiquated notion ,desirable but not essential '!

bluebell86

no i wouldnt. but without the dip i know some schools just cast aside those that do not have it as they do not want inspectors coming to the school. some advertisments request those who are probated need only apply. so surely having the dip done would be boxed ticked when applying for a job.

I do not know, just looking at my options. tired of just waiting for the phone to ring.