Michael Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate and thank my colleague, Deputy Charlie McConalogue, for tabling the motion to which it relates. When my party raised this serious issue which relates to what is happening within the grant awarding body, SUSI, on Thursday morning last, the Tánaiste dismissed our concerns. If they were honest, every Member of the House would state he or she has been inundated with queries from families clearly under the limit relating to grant aid in respect of the paperwork to be submitted to SUSI. The families to which I refer find the process completely frustrating. There is also another group of individuals who have not yet been contacted and consequently do not know where they stand.

A raft of issues arise in respect of this matter. I refer to student grants, access to third level education, encouraging individuals from different socioeconomic backgrounds to pursue higher education courses and ensuring people are able to obtain the grants for which they qualify in the shortest possible period. However, there is a particular issue to which I wish to refer and it relates to project maths. The Minister should learn from the disaster that was his introduction of project maths on a phased basis. Many of those from the education sector who have approached me about this matter have indicated that the main beneficiaries of the introduction of project maths were book publishers. It has taken years for the new syllabus to be fully introduced and students have been obliged to buy new books each year. These books are unsuitable to be passed down to siblings or sold second hand. Maths teachers throughout the country have shelves of books on the new project maths course. They have not been given adequate in-service training or sufficient information on project maths and were not consulted on its implementation.

Do people know that the teachers to whom I refer are unaware of the format that next year's leaving certificate maths paper will take? Do they know that the students who will sit the leaving certificate examination next June have not yet received sample copies of the examination paper from the State Examinations Commission? Even if that paper was issued today, it would be one month before the publishers interpreted it and produced sample examination booklets for students. Are the Minister and the Government aware of this problem? Teachers have not been provided with the sample paper, the format the examination will take or a breakdown of the marking scheme. Effectively, they are working in the dark and the Minister is concentrating his energies on dreaming up phased changes to the junior certificate programme. Again, these changes were launched without the major partners in education being consulted.

Are teachers not important enough to be consulted? Is their opinion and their contribution to such a change not necessary? It is very unfair to introduce such a large charge without consulting one of the most important partners in the education sector. Will the Minister immediately inform leaving certificate students as to the format and the marking scheme for next year's leaving certificate maths examination? We are facing into the third week in November. The students are studying for their important examination next June at the end of a two-year course but the Minister and the Department of Education and Skills have not given the format of the examination. It shows a lack of awareness on the part of the Government. The same lack of awareness was apparent last week with regard to the student grants issue and there is now a sudden realisation on its part. It is important that the mistakes made with regard to this process and the awarding of grants are not being made in other sectors of education. Grandiose notions must be changed to action. There must be fairness and proper procedures. At this late stage it should not be beyond the Minister to inform those preparing for the leaving certificate as to the format of the examination in June 2013.

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