Dr. Pauric Travers:

This is quite a specific issue, but the bread and butter of the ERC is assessment and evaluation. There has been an explosion in educational research over the last 25 years, but assessment testing and evaluation is quite a specialist area and one has to ensure one has the necessary expertise. It requires, for example, input from a number of different disciplines, including mathematics, statistics and so on. It is important to ensure there is a flow of people who are well qualified to ensure we can conduct high-level research at national and international level. Ireland has been well served by the centre because not all countries have consistently participated in the PISA, TIMSS or PIRLS, but the ERC has been very consistent in its approach. That is a tribute to its founding director, Dr. Tom Kellaghan, who was the director for almost 40 years and his successor, Dr. Peter Archer. That is one specific challenge. Our business is assessment, testing and evaluation. What happens in the classroom or in practice is a matter for the Minister, the Oireachtas, the teacher and all the different groups.

One of the more interesting developments over the past ten years has been a strong emphasis on formative rather than summative assessment for learning, that is, evaluation that feeds into the learning process, rather than waiting until the end and then testing what one has achieved. This is about evaluating and assessing children at different points, such as at entry, and then see how they are progressing, so that one can change direction as appropriate. That is a challenge for teachers. All of the new teachers coming out from colleges over the past decade should be well versed and well trained in that area, but it presents challenges for teachers. It is quite demanding, but it is very rewarding in terms of the impact it has, because one is responding directly and in time to the problems that arise, rather than discovering five years later that we let something slip through, or that there is a major problem in a particular area. One of the assessment findings that came out of some of the international studies in relation to maths, for example, that Irish students were very good on numbers, but not quite so good on shapes, or the geometry side of things. That is something that can be addressed on the ground, but the teacher needs to use those assessment tools for learning. That will give better outcomes in general, but specifically for target groups or individuals. Very often, when a child has a difficulty early on, if it is not addressed in a timely fashion, they will always have that difficulty, whereas if one intervenes early and effectively, the problem will be resolved and that student will have an equal chance of prospering within the education system.