Ms Sinéad Dooley:

I could listen to Ms Waters all day. If nothing else comes out of this forum, it should be that her message would be taken on board. Her many years of experience have shone through. I was purposefully quiet because I am in awe of the experience of Ms Waters. She said exactly what every rural community group represented by Irish Rural Link is saying, in particular, on reaching women in communities. I am not being sexist. A number of education and training boards do a wonderful job in terms of the courses, apprenticeships and training they provide. However, there is a significant gap in society because many women of my age group and younger do not realise the benefits of returning to community education. As the Chairman is aware, I have 25 or 30 years of experience in community education and as a former public representative. None of this means anything unless one has a piece of paper or degree. Community education instils in people a confidence and ability to find self-worth. Even if they do not move into employment outside their community, they bring back to their local community expertise and experience. Continued multi-annual funding for community education is the key to unlocking disadvantage. When children see their mother or father returning to education, it instils in them a willingness to do better and remain in the education system.

I was envious of two of the other witnesses who arrived with cycling helmets as it occurred to me how nice it must be to be able to cycle to this meeting. However, there is no point in lying because I probably would not cycle even if I was living close to the Oireachtas. It calls to mind one of the major barriers in rural areas, namely, the lack of transport, especially affordable transport, to access community education facilities. I fear that those of us who live in rural areas are facing a return to the 1980s when parents had to choose which of their children would go to third level education. The costs involved are a serious barrier to people living in rural areas because all of the universities are located in cities. While we have some wonderful institutes of technology on our doorsteps, if a child in a rural area aspires to attend university, his or her parents are forced to play God and choose which of their children they can afford to send to college. I did not expect rural areas to return to the economic position in which we found ourselves in the 1980s but that has occurred.

Dr. John Cullinan in NUIG did a study recently with some of his colleagues which found that for every 10 km someone must travel to access a third level institution, the likelihood that he or she will go to college reduces by 2.7%. When one translates this to a requirement to travel 50 km to third level college, the person will be 13.5% more likely not to go to third level. We do not need this.

Dr. Bissett made a wonderful, passionate contribution and he is correct that people should not be geographically displaced or disadvantaged in education in any country. In Japan, cost is not a factor in education and the country is considered to be the best educator in the world for this reason. I acknowledge that Japan has a low level of third level participation for different reasons, but in terms of providing equal educational opportunity from birth until the end of second level, cost is not a factor. It should not be a factor here.

I was surprised by a comment made by Deputy Martin on self-evaluation of teachers in the sector. The Deputy is right that teachers' innovative and entrepreneurial spirt will be quashed if the work they are doing is not evaluated or valued in the educational system. A report by the European Commission provides examples of measures aimed at preventing people from leaving school early. Poland has a very good programme, known as the GOLDEN5, in which teachers engage in self-evaluation by choosing five or six ways to make the classroom more congenial and build better relationships. A 16 week programme is then run in the school which selects students it believes would benefit from the programme. GOLDEN5 has had tremendous outcomes and effects, not only for participating pupils but also for the teachers who see the positives and benefits of self-evaluation.

I referred to the task force in our submission. Arising from today's meeting, I believe we must remove competition and have more cross-departmental and cross-agency support. Solutions are available and we should remove competition and have everybody sit down and produce solutions for resolving the issue once and for all.