Eamon Scanlon (Sligo-Leitrim, Fianna Fail)
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267. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the position regarding the timeline for the completion of junior certificate reforms; the arrangements for provision of training to teachers in the implementation of the new junior certificate curriculum for the school year 2018-2019; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [43364/18]

Joe McHugh (Donegal, Fine Gael)
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The Junior Cycle Framework encompasses learning in all subjects or in a number of subjects and short courses. The new curriculum and assessment arrangements are being phased in to accommodate the development of new specifications for subjects as well as the provision of professional development for teachers and school planning. The first phase commenced with the introduction of the new specification for English for students entering 1st year in September 2014. New subject specifications have been introduced in each of the past 3 years with the final phase due to be introduced in September 2019 with all subjects under the framework examinable in June 2022.

Junior Cycle for Teachers (JCT) is a dedicated support service of the Department of Education and Skills and was established to support schools in implementing the Framework for Junior Cycle (2015). JCT has worked with schools, including school leaders and teachers annually since the 2014-2015 school year, and continues to do so.

In the 2018-2019 school year the following are the main continuing professional development supports being provided by JCT:

- Dedicated subject specific continuing professional development (CPD) workshops are being provided for teachers in local education centres nationwide between September and November 2018. These workshops are repeats of the subject workshops provided during the 2017-2018 school year and are aimed at those teachers who were unable to attend the 2017-2018 workshops due to their attendance at their other teaching subject workshop during that year, or if they simply missed the opportunity to attend the workshop during that year.

A new wave of subject CPD workshops for the 2018-2019 school year for all subject teachers will commence nationwide in November 2018 and will run until April 2019. These workshops are provided on a school clustering basis whereby between 6-10 post-primary schools in a geographical region will close on the same day to students while all of the teachers come together in their subject groupings for dedicated CPD.

- This arrangement is catered for in DES circular 0015/2017 and will take place on a continuing basis nationwide throughout the school year.

-  Two separate workshops are being provided for school leaders by JCT during 2018-2019. The first of these workshops is set to be rolled out nationwide during November and December 2018. The focus of this workshop will be the reforms taking place in the context of reporting on students’ progress to students themselves, and to their parents/guardians. The second workshop will be facilitated nationwide in March and April 2019 and the focus of this workshop will be determined by the needs of school leaders, Principals and Deputy Principals.

- JCT provides a wide range of elective CPD opportunities for teachers which take place in the evening times and at weekends, generally in education centres nationwide. These workshops focus on a range of topics including Subject Learning and Assessment Review meetings, utilisation of management resource hours by schools in supporting the embedding of junior cycle, STE(A)M, Arts in Junior Cycle, DesignSKILLS and much more. These elective workshops are proving very popular with teachers.

- JCT provides online supports for schools. The service provides a wide range of live and interactive webinars for teachers across all of the different subject areas, while all of their teaching and learning resources and materials are provided on their website for download by teachers, www.jct.ie.

JCT also works closely with various teacher associations and groupings and will regularly attend national conferences and other events to facilitate dedicated CPD workshops.