School patronage

Hotblack Desiato

expectationlost wrote: »

it amazing what access to Ministers aviation millions to fund lobbiests get you https://twitter.com/equateireland/status/821023976591945728

as long as your more then willing to be co-opted by the Minister

I thought you were being a bit hard on Equate, but that was before I heard they'd "done an Iona"

Despicable behaviour on their part and shame on TV3 for caving in to any guest who would try such a thing.

mikhail

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

I thought you were being a bit hard on Equate, but that was before I heard they'd "done an Iona"

Despicable behaviour on their part and shame on TV3 for caving in to any guest who would try such a thing.

Can you elaborate? I really don't understand what you mean.

robindch

mikhail wrote: »

Can you elaborate?

"Equate gives TV3 ultimatum to remove Jane Donnelly of Atheist Ireland from interview":

http://www.teachdontpreach.ie/2017/01/equate-tv3-ultimatum/

TeachDontPreach wrote:

TV3’s Ireland AM has invited and then removed Jane Donnelly, Human Rights Officer of Atheist Ireland, from an interview this Tuesday morning about the Baptism rule in Irish schools. TV3 told Atheist Ireland that Michael Barron of Equate had issued TV3 with an ultimatum that Equate would not appear on the show if Atheist Ireland was also represented.

Equate had said the Minister’s announcement represented a great day, while Atheist Ireland had said it would strengthen religious discrimination. TV3 said that Equate did not want their position to be contradicted on air by Atheist Ireland. On that basis, TV3 removed Jane Donnelly from the show, and replaced her with Seamus Mulconry, the General Secretary of the Catholic Primary Schools Managers Association.

[...]

looksee

robindch wrote: »

"Equate gives TV3 ultimatum to remove Jane Donnelly of Atheist Ireland from interview":

http://www.teachdontpreach.ie/2017/01/equate-tv3-ultimatum/

:eek: :rolleyes: Why on earth would TV3 bow to that kind of pressure?

expectationlost

looksee wrote: »

:eek: :rolleyes: Why on earth would TV3 bow to that kind of pressure?

because https://twitter.com/equateireland/status/821023976591945728

looksee

expectationlost wrote: »

because https://twitter.com/equateireland/status/821023976591945728

What am I missing? I do not see any reference to TV3 in that link?

expectationlost

looksee wrote: »

What am I missing? I do not see any reference to TV3 in that link?

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=102298863&postcount=4280
the minister for some reason decided to announce plans at this one lobby groups seminar.

expectationlost

Removing 'Baptism Barrier' from schools still an uphill task https://www.rte.ie/news/analysis-and-comment/2017/0118/845852-baptism-barrier/ Emma O'Kelly

But would the introduction of a catchment area policy change much?

Apart from the complicated matter of creating school catchment areas across the entire country, the children of minority or non-religious families would still be discriminated against.

They would still be second class citizens when it comes to accessing their local school.

Unless school catchment areas are very small indeed, then parents would still feel obliged to baptise their children simply to ensure access to that school.

Professor Emeritus of Education at UCC Aine Hyland reminded attendees at Monday’s event that the Equal Status Act, which gives religious run schools their exemption, is only 16 years old.

"The church never had a legal right to exclude children before 2000", says Prof Hyland, "the mystery for me is why that derogation is not just taken out".

Cabaal

Not sure if already posted or not

https://www.facebook.com/foilarmsandhog/videos/10158070439475335/

expectationlost

committee on religion in schools just before xmas https://www.kildarestreet.com/committees/?id=2016-12-15a.7&s=protesters#g57 jane Donnnelly points out that opt-out isn't good enough

expectationlost

I was nearly goigng to criticise ET for not seeing beyond itself, in statement in response to Bruton's announcement

If the Government really is serious about making the Irish education system more inclusive, then it should focus its energy on providing both equal access to schools and equal respect within schools for all children. A national network of Educate Together schools, which welcome and cherish all children, is what is needed and what would truly serve the common good.

until I read back to their previous statement after the oireachtas committee linked above http://educatetogether.ie/media/national-news/major-concerns-governments-education-bill

Educate Together recommends an independent state authority (managed independently of the school patrons) to ascertain parental demand for different school types and enable the state to allocate buildings and resources accordingly.

so I should be disappointed is that all they want is network of private schools, mainly them.

expectationlost

Role of Religion in School Admissions - Department of Education and Skills Consultation
http://www.education.ie/en/Parents/Information/School-Enrolment/Role-of-Religion-in-School-Admissions.html

consultation doc seems designed to find ways the department/government not to be morally or legally responsible for schooling ie description of Option 4

recedite

Education Equality group has submitted its opinion re the consultation document.
Section 7(3)(c) of the Equal Status Act 2000 is identified as the main problem. It needs to be repealed.
Everything else in the consultation document is just "beating about the bush".

Hotblack Desiato

Wonder when I'll get to wear my EE t-shirt again! This Bruton plan can't be allowed to just happen.

Two very bizarre, unjust and wrong things about it:

Public money going to the RCC as 'rent' for the schools we built/maintained/extended, while the RCC will still control the religious curriculum in the 'divested' schools.

ETB acting as a judge in their own case. 'Surveying demand' for divestment and choice of patron, while also being a patron themselves.

recedite

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

Public money going to the RCC as 'rent' for the schools we built/maintained/extended, while the RCC will still control the religious curriculum in the 'divested' schools.

ETB acting as a judge in their own case. 'Surveying demand' for divestment and choice of patron, while also being a patron themselves.

Yes, these two aspects are very disturbing. It seems that a decision has already been made to "divest" a certain number RC schools, but in name only. The govt. presumably thinks this will allow them to head off the growing criticism from EU and UN sources which lament the lack of choice for parents who don't identify as RC.

Mr Bruton said that, unlike the previous process, the new scheme did not envisage schools amalgamating or closing before a new kind of school was opened using the same premises.
He said this had given rise to complexities, including legal complexities.
He said his model envisaged the "live" transfer of existing schools, complete with existing boards of management.

So, same old BOM, same old religious indoctrination and communion classes during school hours, AND the taxpayer now gets to pay rent to the RCC for the use of the school building, as well as paying all the salaries and upkeep costs.
The bishops must be rubbing their hands with glee. Way to have your cake and eat it!

However, EQUATE says clarity is needed on how the "completely fair and independent" transfer of schools is to be achieved....


The minister said he did not agree with criticisms of the plan expressed by multi-denominational patron body Educate Together.
Educate Together has criticised the fact that, as the largest provider of multi-denominational education, it was not asked to have any input into the formulation of the new policy. It said it was concerned that the process would be run by the ETBs who would themselves be candidates for running any newly transferred schools.
Educate Together said there appeared to be no robust process whereby the wishes of parents to define the choice of school would be taken into account.

However, Mr Bruton said this morning that it was natural that the State would choose to use its own local statutory authorities to run such a process.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2017/0130/848629-school-patronage-bruton/

expectationlost

equate finally released that survey they've been trailing for ages, 1 in 5 say they baptised just to get into school https://www.equateireland.ie/single-post/2017/02/15/EQUATE-research-highlights-parents%E2%80%99-voices-on-religion-and-schools-and-identifies-their-desire-for-change

survey 400 parents online according to the Irish Times, Reaseach now is an online surveying company, I think they conduct pop-up polls of internet surfers.... its not great in terms of numbers and variety but its not simply a yes/no online poll.

expectationlost

Richard Bruton at yet another conference with Equate, son of a millionaires money makes the world go round http://www.irishtimes.com/news/education/exclusion-from-schools-for-religious-reasons-may-breach-rights-1.2982572

recedite

I heard that German theologian, ex UN guy, speaking on the radio. He thought using discriminatory admissions policies in state schools "may" be a breach of human rights. But I think that was already pointed out at UN and EU level in the past.
Then he said he was all in favour of religious indoctrination during school hours, but not against peoples wishes. While admitting he knew nothing about the situation in Irish schools. His position wasn't very well thought out.
Not sure why RTE had him on really, I suppose with being German and ex UN they thought he was worthy of "tugging the forelock" to.

expectationlost

SSI won their case at the court of appeal http://www.irishtimes.com/news/crime-and-law/courts/high-court/secular-school-firm-wins-appeal-over-patronage-application-1.2995476
they refused to allowed continue to apply for patronage of a school because they didn't explicitly agree to commitments, but they said their application implied they agreed. The court ruled the dept of ed was wrong.

Fleawuss

expectationlost wrote: »

SSI won their case at the court of appeal http://www.irishtimes.com/news/crime-and-law/courts/high-court/secular-school-firm-wins-appeal-over-patronage-application-1.2995476
they refused to allowed continue to apply for patronage of a school because they didn't explicitly agree to commmitments, but they said their application implied they agreed. The court ruled the dept of ed was wrong.

Court slated the dept. Said it couldn't even follow it's own guidelines!

Hotblack Desiato

It was easier for them when they had the bishops telling them what to do.

recedite

Interesting to look back on our earlier discussion now that SSI have been vindicated in court.

Peregrinus wrote: »

A “fair procedure” is for the Department to stick to the processes, deadlines, etc stated in the request for tenders, and to do so uniformly for all tenderers. If Departments bend the rules, and allow one tenderer more time to indicate compliance with the requirements than has been allowed to the other tenderers, then they tend to get sued by the other tenderers, on the grounds that they have been subject to more onerous requirements while the favoured tenderer was, quietly, given greater latitude.

It seems from the Patronage Assessment Report that I linked to earlier that all tenderers were required to confirm that they would comply with seven stated requirements, and were invited to comment further in relation to any of the requirements. (Presumably this was an invitation to comment about how they would comply with the requirements, rather than about why they wouldn't.) A commitment to comply with all of the requirements was mandatory before an award of patronage could be considered. Three of the tenderers committed to all seven requirements; SSI committed to only one.

Nothing in the newspaper reports suggests that SSI are making any claim that they were unaware that a commitment to all seven was a condition of tendering, and none of the other tenderers appear to have been under any misapprehension about this.

The big unanswered questions are “why did SSI not commit to all seven in their initial application?”, and “on what basis will they claim that they should have been given extra time, and more time that was given to other tenderers, to do so?”. Until we know what SSI said on these points, we can’t really say whether their application to set aside the award of the tender could succeed. Frustratingly, the newspaper reports do not deal with the arguments made in court by SSI, or by the State in response. But based on the little we know now, it looks to me that SSI are fighting an uphill battle.


If SSI succeeds, there are three possible outcomes:

1. Department is told to start the entire process again, and issue a new request for tenders.

2. Department is told to reconsider the four tenders already received, but without excluding SSI’s tender at an early stage, as they did the first time around.

3. Payment of damages to SSI to compensate them for the costs of participating in a flawed tender process, but the award of the tender to CETB stands (for pragmatic reasons; the school opens next week).

If expectationlost is correct, SSI may actually be hoping for the third outcome. They may not be geared up to run a school just yet; they are simply seeking to establish the principle that a secular tenderer cannot lawfully be excluded.

It’s wild speculation on my part, but what they may argue is not that they should have been allowed extra time to commit to the seven requirements. Rather, they may have objected to six of the seven requirements on the basis that they were in some way inconsistent with SSI’s secular ethos, and they may have commented to that effect in their submission. So their argument would essentially be that, rather than ruling us out, the Minister should have taken our comments on board, recognised that it was improper to impose conditions which excluded secular patrons, not insisted on commitment to the conditions, and perhaps talked to us (and to other tenderers) about a modified commitment that would accommodate our secular concerns. And if the outcome of the case is (a) CETB is still patron of this school, but (b) the court declares that the Department cannot in future impose tender conditions which exclude secular patrons, SSI will be delighted.

Such an argument makes sense, given where SSI are coming from. But it is difficult to reconcile with the facts. For example, how is a requirement to accommodate special education facilities inconsistent with secularism? Or a requirement for the school to have “up to three streams, subject to demand”? In relation to several of the requirements that SSI failed to commit to, there doesn’t seem to be any obvious secularist reason for objecting to them.


I don’t think so. There’s no requirement that the Dept has to give the school to the patron with the most pre-enrolments (and, in fact, they didn’t). Diversity trumps popularity, in the Department’s system. What clinched it for the ETB is that there was no community national school in or adjacent to the feeder area, whereas there were both Catholic and ET schools.

It seems to me that, had the SSI tender been considered, it too would have been offering a unique school type. It would then come down to a choice between CETB and SSI, I think. We don’t know whether SSI had more or less pre-enrollments than CETB, but that wouldn’t necessarily have been the deciding factor. As far as pre-enrollments go, all the tenderer has to do is “demonstrate that there is a demand” for the school type they offer, not that there is a greater demand for this school type than for the types offered by other tenderers. If enough parents indicate a willingness to send their child to the school to suggest that the school will have enough pupils to be viable, demand has been demonstrated.

Some questions remain unanswered. Did the whole fiasco happen because of a simple lack of communication, or were the Dept. of Education so arrogantly dismissive of SSI that they thought they could just swat them away by informing them their application was invalid?

Would SSI have been allocated a new designation; the first publicly owned "non-denominational" school in the country? Would this have been too much of a headache for the dept. officials to even contemplate?

Now that SSI have said they don't intend to unseat the current patron, does this mean they will be awarded damages?

Will SSI try again for another school?

magicbastarder

this begs the question; did the headline writer write it knowingly?

http://www.irishcatholic.ie/article/schools-urged-be-vigilant-amid-reports-targeting-%E2%80%98cult%E2%80%99

robindch

magicbastarder wrote: »

this begs the question; did the headline writer write it knowingly?

On the grounds that religion is an irony-free zone, I'm going to say "No".

Hotblack Desiato

Breda O'Brien's latest is a largely nonsensical rant against ETs.

http://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/breda-o-brien-educate-together-disingenuous-on-disadvantage-1.3032384

expectationlost

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

Breda O'Brien's latest is a largely nonsensical rant against ETs.

http://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/breda-o-brien-educate-together-disingenuous-on-disadvantage-1.3032384

partly related to the ongoing dispute about how they cater to disadvantaged
‘Factchecker’ forced to change verdict on Catholic schools http://www.irishcatholic.ie/article/%E2%80%98factchecker%E2%80%99-forced-change-verdict-catholic-schools

which they did http://www.thejournal.ie/catholic-primary-schools-diversity-divestment-facts-ireland-3252590-Mar2017/ but I think fact checks can miss the point, you can't compare one small provider to the dominate one

recedite

Its a peculiar little spat, which each side trying to claim they have more "disadvantaged" people than the other. At least it makes a change from the usual league tables such as the type that secondary schools sometimes publish, where schools try to "talk themselves up".

Ultimately though, it is a pointless little spat. Everybody agrees that RC schools discriminate on religion. If the average catholic is less wealthy, or more wealthy, than the national average, then the schools should reflect that.

I notice nobody mentions the CoI schools in all this. Probably not too many of them qualifying for Deis school status. However, that does not mean that they discriminate against disadvantaged people. They discriminate on a religious basis.

J C

One thing that is ironic in all of this is that the 'secularists' want all schools to have an irreligious ethos (which perfectly reflects their worldview)
... but they won't tolerate schools having a Christian ethos (which reflects the worldview of most of the population).

It's a new form of 'reverse discrimination' ... which discriminates against the vast majority of the population to satisfy a minority of the population.

In theory, all kinds of minorities, could also demand this ... but, for some reason, I don't think that their demands will be listened to, if or when irreligion fully holds sway in schools!!

BTW, at present, any group of people can set up a school ... so there is nothing stopping the secularists doing so ... but what they want instead is to take-over and/or shut down church-run schools ... and replace them all with irreligious schools, of their own liking.

recedite

I'm not sure what your definition of "irreligious" is but it sounds like it might be "anti-religious".
But that would be quite different to "secular" which is simply neutral towards religion.
If we say that state funded schools should be neutral towards race and religion, then you should be able to get the general idea.

J C

recedite wrote: »

I'm not sure what your definition of "irreligious" is but it sounds like it might be "anti-religious".
But that would be quite different to "secular" which is simply neutral towards religion.
If we say that state funded schools should be neutral towards race and religion, then you should be able to get the general idea.

... that might be OK if aggressive Secularism was 'neutral' in it's attitude to religion ... However this clearly isn't the case ... and the fact that Secularism is actively campaigning to wipe out all church influence in the schooling of Christian children and to take-over all church run schools certainly doesn't exhibit any 'neutrality' or indeed tolerance by Secularism of religion in schools.
Indeed other campaigns by Secularists to privatise religion, in general, and remove it from the public domain shows no 'neutrality' by Secularism, towards religion ... in or out of schools.

So, I'm sorry, but secularism isn't some kind of 'neutral' player in all of this ... it is very much an active protagonist in promoting the take-over of all church-run schools with the objective of converting them into centres of irreligion where neither priest nor pastor will be allowed to cross their thresholds during the school day ... but free reign will be give to the irreligious worldview within these schools ... with no opposing voices allowed.