Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail)
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31. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills when the report of teaching supply will be published; and how he proposes to deal with the severe shortage of teachers in key subjects and the surplus in other key subjects. [17092/17]

Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail)
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I have raised this issue previously, but I think it bears continued examination. The Minister is aware that there are key shortages of teachers in certain subjects at second level. I suspect that these shortages are most acute in languages, including Irish. There are surpluses of teachers of other subjects, such as business studies. A report on these issues is sitting on the Minister's desk, just as it sat on his predecessor's desk. We need action now because there are serious concerns in schools about how children are going to be taught some subjects on a continuous and proper basis.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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The report of the technical working group that was set up by the Teaching Council to formulate advice on teacher supply focuses on the development of a model of primary teacher supply and outlines the work that will be required in the future to establish a model of post-primary teacher supply. I intend to publish the report shortly. While the Department of Education and Skills has no evidence of an overall shortage of teachers, it is aware of certain pinch points to which the Deputy has adverted. The aim of the Department’s policy is to achieve a balance between the supply of and demand for teachers. When the report is published, the Deputy will see that this is a particularly complex issue at post-primary level because of the absence of a central mechanism for matching the overall subject need requirements of schools with the output from the initial teacher education providers. In addition, schools have significant autonomy in providing a mix of subjects and choices for students. The final report of the technical working group sets out an approach to planning which scopes out the work needed to develop a model for forecasting teacher supply in the medium to long term. Engagement with the providers of initial teacher education programmes will be necessary to ensure supply meets demand and we have the correct balance of teachers in the each of the various subject areas.

The report is of value in regard to building data models for predicting future requirements in the longer term. However, it does not address the short-term issues to which the Deputy referred. In the meantime, I am committed to advancing short-term measures to address teacher shortages, including the employment by schools of retired teachers and those on career break, and an increase in the number of days per school year that a post-primary teacher on career break may work as a substitute.

Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail)
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The citizens and students of this country will be disappointed to hear that the Minister is again falling back on retired teachers, because that has created controversies over the past number of years. If that is the Minister's answer to this problem, it is deeply unsatisfactory and very worrying. This is a serious issue.

The Minister said his Department does not have evidence, but there is significant anecdotal evidence. Any teaching organisation or principal will tell the Minister that there is a major problem. They simply do not have the teachers they need.

Career breaks are being refused left, right and centre. This is not central Government policy, rather it is a practical reality for school principals at second level. If they advertise a career break post, which is temporary, they will not get any applicants, except perhaps for business studies. They would rather have a teacher leave a school completely and advertise a new role.

Things are at crisis point. Principals are engaged in a balancing act. Teachers are not available for key subjects. The problem is very serious in gaelcholáistí freisin, mar nach féidir leo múinteoirí a fháil a bhfuil Gaeilge ar a gcumais acu na hábhair uilig a mhúineadh.

It is a problem throughout the system. The principals to whom I have spoken are worried about what will happen next September.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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I acknowledge there is a problem in key subject areas, but there is no problem overall. Training of teachers involves about 3,800 students, which is split roughly half and half between post-primary and primary schools. About 1,600 teachers retire each year. There is a substantial net increase in supply each year. We are recruiting more now than we were. The current levels are far in excess of those of previous years, and we are now moving to match those levels.

The technical working group has not offered any open and shut solution. It said that planning to develop a model is extremely complex and we need to check and develop new data sources and invest in a mini CSO for teaching. This is not a quick or easy fix.

We will consider putting on short-term courses, as happened in the case of mathematics in the past, in order to meet particular pinch points. We will consider initiatives that are put forward. If the Deputy is aware of specific initiatives, we will examine them in order to fill identifiable gaps.

Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail)
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There seems to be a problem with certain business studies teachers. As far as I know, a permanently employed business studies teacher can study a maths course that will bring him or her up to the required level. However, those not in permanent jobs face a difficulty. The retraining of business studies teachers offers a significant opportunity.

The Minister could easily offer a number of solutions. One would be for the Minister to advise students of the subjects for which there is a surplus of teachers. I will not name them on the floor of the Dáil because I would rather the Minister provide official statistics. Perhaps the Minister could encourage people to study maths or provide them with more opportunities to upskill in other subjects in order to improve balance. At the moment, the system is skewed.

Fundamentally, the Minister needs to in some way take control of the second level teacher education system because it is too open. The colleges have too much autonomy. The Minister is supposed to be setting national priorities for key subjects for the national education system and economy. The truth is that the Minister cannot stand over any particular targets on languages, maths, business or coding because he does not know what teachers will be available to teach those subjects.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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There is a difficulty because, as the Deputy said, people enter into subject areas without explicitly committing to a future in teaching. It is only when they do a masters that they enter the teaching channel. The working group examined whether it could introduce a model which could identify an objective intake for subjects such as chemistry, physics, maths or business studies that would feed into the system. So far, it has been unable to produce such a model.

I am open to considering specific subject areas where we could have particular interventions. The difficulty is that to say with absolute certitude that we do not need a certain amount but-----

Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail)
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We will always need maths teachers.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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We will always need maths teachers. We will produce a response to the report and a specific response to the STEM work done by Professor Brian MacCraith. That is on our agenda for the current year.