Youthreach Resource Vs Teaching

Looney1970

As a Youthreach Resource Person that has been in Youthreach since the stone age, I would like to make the following points.

Youthreach was originally set up as more of a Training Centre than an Education Centre. They did not want qualified teachers working in Youthreach. They wanted qualified carpenters teaching woodwork, qualified IT people teaching IT, qualified chefs teaching catering, etc.
However, qualified teachers applied for these positions and were accepted by ETBs (VECs at the time) that either did not know about Youthreach or did not care. Some of these qualified teachers could not get more than 5 to 10 hours teaching and decided to apply for full time resource persons positions instead.
As more and more qualified teachers were hired, to teach in an organisation that was set up to be different from school, they pushed the unions to fight for equal status with teachers in mainstream and the Department gave in.
We now have a situation where qualified teachers applied for and accepted a position that was meant to be unqualified, they are now seeing their colleagues getting long holidays and they are trying to change the conditions of the job. Its a bit like a Surgeon applying to be a cleaner and then asking that all cleaners get the same conditions as surgeons.
I for one do not support this cause and would strongly fight against it, because if the Coordinators and Resource Persons get 3 months summer holidays, the students will lose out.

Youthreach is able to bring in Tutors during the mid-terms and the summer to run short courses or help supervise on trips out. If your Coordinator is telling you there are not enough hours to do this then they have not managed their allocation of hours properly. This happens when the Coordinator does not teach despite 15 hours being taken from the budget for them every week for 42 weeks. They have not given enough teaching to the Resource Person despite 20 hours being taken from the budget every week for 42 weeks or they have put on too many groups, e.g. a 25 trainee centre having 3 groups of 6 and 1 group of 7 instead of having 2 groups of 8 and 1 group of 9.

I would also like to ask, why are ETBs taking 21 teaching hours for Resource and 16 for Coordinators under Haddington Road when we are suppose to be working our extra 2 hours free of charge?

CraftySue

Originally there was two slants to youthreach. fas ran a youthreach with a more training focus, and VEC a more educational / exam focus. I know I applied for a job as a resource position with the VEC, and the advertisement looked for teaching experience and teaching qualifications in a teaching website. I was under the impression that it was like resource teaching, and we were told we had the same conditions under memo V7 as teachers, and the interview was very much based on teaching and classroom management. Other staff had went for a teaching interview for a specific job, and did not get that job but we're offered a resource position under the impression it was teaching. The VEC in my area only hired teachers as resource people, and we always were under the impression that the teaching was recognised as teaching. The unions and VEC always said they considered it teaching, it wasn't until people went to move jobs did people become more aware that the department did not recognise the teaching, and felt mislead by unions and VEC

CraftySue

Its a bit like a Surgeon applying to be a cleaner and then asking that all cleaners get the same conditions as surgeon[/QUOTE]

I'm afraid I have to disagree with this, I feel it's more like a Surgeon applying for a surgeon position and then been told they are now a cleaner. Resource people applied for teaching positions as qualified teachers and then were told there were administrators.
In addition it's highlighted in many reports many students attending youthreach have literacy, numeracy and special educational needs, they deserve a quality education just as much as there counterparts in mainstream education, and deserve the surgeon (teacher) rather than the cleaner.

Shoebox1926

Im sure there are lots of very good untrained tutors who are excellent at their jobs but what is the point in spending thousands on a teaching qualification if you can get a teaching job without it and get all the same perks that a trained teacher gets? I just think it undermines the profession and may stop people from training to become teachers as they can walk into a job without the qualifications. Ive worked along side a few tutors while training to become a teacher and they hadn't a clue how to teach and it was the students that suffered while the tutor sat at his desk all day and received a nice big wage and great holidays while qualified teachers cant get a job. Ive been turned down for so many jobs yet ive friends with no teacher training getting jobs in Youthreach. What are schools and ETB's looking for? Im at a loss at this stage and now theyre giving tutors teacher status. Whats the point in even trying in this profession?

Looney1970

CraftySue wrote: »

Originally there was two slants to youthreach. fas ran a youthreach with a more training focus, and VEC a more educational / exam focus. I know I applied for a job as a resource position with the VEC, and the advertisement looked for teaching experience and teaching qualifications in a teaching website. I was under the impression that it was like resource teaching, and we were told we had the same conditions under memo V7 as teachers, and the interview was very much based on teaching and classroom management. Other staff had went for a teaching interview for a specific job, and did not get that job but we're offered a resource position under the impression it was teaching. The VEC in my area only hired teachers as resource people, and we always were under the impression that the teaching was recognised as teaching. The unions and VEC always said they considered it teaching, it wasn't until people went to move jobs did people become more aware that the department did not recognise the teaching, and felt mislead by unions and VEC

Unfortunately, that is the fault of your VEC and not the Department or the Youthreach you work for. Youthreach was originally set up to have qualified trades people training the students that attended Youthreach, working along similar lines as Adult Ed. It was felt at the time that students going to Youthreach were not suited to the school system and not quite ready for work. The youthreach week was placed at 35 hours per week as that was the average working week and well above the school week. The year was 209 days long, 42 days more than a school. The guidelines state that qualifications would not be stipulated so as to allow each VEC hire steff that were flexible and experienced in working with disadvantaged students with behavioral issues.

It was never meant to be for qualified teachers, unless the qualified teacher was willing to be flexible and work extra hours, evenings, weekends, mid-terms and even during the summer. As we have discovered, the majority of qualified teachers are not willing to be flexible and really only care about their own working conditions and not those of the students.

And before you have a go at the so called unqualified tutors in youthreach, I have to state that many of them are over qualified for the job they are doing. I myself am a qualified IT Person that could earn a lot more money than I am earning in youthreach, but I love working with the young people in youthreach and I feel they deserve to have hard working, flexible and understanding adults working with them and not people that are more interested in long summer holidays.

I do however understand your situation and I do have empathy for you, but you and your union should be taking this matter up with the ETBs. You were misinformed as to the requirements of the job and therefor you should be transferred to a school under the conditions you are looking for.

Take a look at all the ETBs websites and see where Youthreach has been placed on their site. That will show you that the so called qualified people working in the ETBs don't know or care about Youthreach.

Looney1970

Shoebox1926 wrote: »

Im sure there are lots of very good untrained tutors who are excellent at their jobs but what is the point in spending thousands on a teaching qualification if you can get a teaching job without it and get all the same perks that a trained teacher gets? I just think it undermines the profession and may stop people from training to become teachers as they can walk into a job without the qualifications. Ive worked along side a few tutors while training to become a teacher and they hadn't a clue how to teach and it was the students that suffered while the tutor sat at his desk all day and received a nice big wage and great holidays while qualified teachers cant get a job. Ive been turned down for so many jobs yet ive friends with no teacher training getting jobs in Youthreach. What are schools and ETB's looking for? Im at a loss at this stage and now theyre giving tutors teacher status. Whats the point in even trying in this profession?

Using the word untrained is more insulting to a tutor than the word unqualified. While they may be untrained teachers and unqualified teachers, they are not untrained or unqualified. The majority if not all of them are vastly qualified people that have worked in Jobs they are training the young people for. They have worked 40 to 50 hour weeks and they have worked 48 weeks of the year.

I would never dream of putting a teacher down or demeaning their job or their qualification, but I and many of the tutors that I have worked with have trained just as long and paid just as much for their qualification, some of them have paid a lot more.

Tutors in Youthreach are not getting teacher status. They get paid less per hour and they do not get paid during Christmas, Mid Terms, Easter and Summer. What happened is that qualified teachers were hired in Jobs that did not require teaching qualifications and they were given parity with the teachers in schools which meant Youthreach is left with only 2 or 3 staff for 8 weeks of the Youthreach year. Qualified teachers also applied for a Resource Person or Coordinator position which does not require a teaching qualification (it requires a level 8 qualification) and they now see their colleagues with the same qualifications as them working shorter weeks and shorter years for the same pay or maybe more and they are not happy. The Resource Persons contract states quite clearly what the hours, holidays, duties, requirements and pay is. So contrary to what someone else said earlier, it is like a surgeon accepting a cleaner or nurses job and then asking for the same conditions as a surgeon.

Shoebox1926

Looney1970 wrote: »

Using the word untrained is more insulting to a tutor than the word unqualified. While they may be untrained teachers and unqualified teachers, they are not untrained or unqualified. The majority if not all of them are vastly qualified people that have worked in Jobs they are training the young people for. They have worked 40 to 50 hour weeks and they have worked 48 weeks of the year.

I would never dream of putting a teacher down or demeaning their job or their qualification, but I and many of the tutors that I have worked with have trained just as long and paid just as much for their qualification, some of them have paid a lot more.

Tutors in Youthreach are not getting teacher status. They get paid less per hour and they do not get paid during Christmas, Mid Terms, Easter and Summer. What happened is that qualified teachers were hired in Jobs that did not require teaching qualifications and they were given parity with the teachers in schools which meant Youthreach is left with only 2 or 3 staff for 8 weeks of the Youthreach year. Qualified teachers also applied for a Resource Person or Coordinator position which does not require a teaching qualification (it requires a level 8 qualification) and they now see their colleagues with the same qualifications as them working shorter weeks and shorter years for the same pay or maybe more and they are not happy. The Resource Persons contract states quite clearly what the hours, holidays, duties, requirements and pay is. So contrary to what someone else said earlier, it is like a surgeon accepting a cleaner or nurses job and then asking for the same conditions as a surgeon.

Im not suggesting for a second that the majority of tutors aren't well educated as I know that most of them are but theyre still technically untrained to teach as they haven't completed the year or two year teacher training. Thats not to say they cant teach, many of them are excellent at their jobs and likewise theres many trained teachers that aren't particularly good but with that said, theres allot to be said for completing a teacher training course, the courses are intense and give a deeper insight and knowledge into teaching, methodologies, curriculum and an understanding of issues which effect students that you don't get through experience alone.

I also wouldnt compare teachers and resource persons to surgeons and cleaners, anyone whose worked in Youthreach knows how challenging it is, Youthreach staff deserve a medal for the work they do, I know qualified teachers desperate looking for work who have walked out of Youthreach jobs, some wont even apply for them as the setting can be so difficult.

Flynn17

Can anyone shed some light on what the Level 3 restriction for Further Education & Training means when it says ‘Escalating appropriate protective measures’. What have Youthreach centres in Dublin done as a result of being put on Level 3?