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THE STATES EXAMINATIONS Commission hired 1,049 retired teachers to ensure exam halls are adequately staffed this year, despite its stated wish to recruit unemployed and underemployed teachers for superintendent roles.
The jobs are filled by the SEC following public advertisement but this year the body was explicit in its promise to prioritise applications from non-permanent teachers, including the unemployed and substitutes.
Of the 4,861 superintendents hired, 1,049 are retired teachers but just 250 are unemployed. A further 766 are classified as non-permanent, substitute teachers.
According to the SEC, just 14 applications from unemployed or substitute teachers were not successful.
“Those in these categories not appointed to date may not otherwise have met the terms and conditions for appointment (e.g. registration with the Teaching Council) in which case they were ineligible for appointment. Alternatively, their application may have been received late in which case they would only be included on a reserve panel,” the body told TheJournal.ie.
Although the provisional figures compare favourably to last year (when 1,311 retired teachers were taken back, while just 726 non-permanent teachers were hired), there is still dismay among some young teachers who failed to obtain the post.
One Galway-based teacher told TheJournal.ie his application was unsuccessful but that he had been placed on a ‘replacement panel’ and therefore must have fulfilled the conditions for appointment. He is registered with the Teaching Council and returned the application ahead of the deadline.
“I was told the number of applicants was so high that I was put onto a panel. I don’t see why a retired teacher was given priority.”
The young teacher, who says five of his non-permanent colleagues had the same experience with their applications, works across two schools, both of which had retired teachers working in the exam centres this week.
It adds to the financial woes of underemployed teachers who can work for as little as three hours pay a week, he claims.
“My pay was supplemented last year with supervision and substitution but that has been taken away now. And we can’t get the dole as we are receiving a small amount from our employer.”
For many substitute teachers, that small amount is between €60 and €70 per week.
In a statement, the SEC said the work is traditionally offered to second-level teachers as they are considered to have the required skill set, including classroom management capabilities.
“The SEC has a long-standing policy of prioritising applications from non-permanent teachers (i.e. unemployed teachers; substitute teachers) provided the applicant meets the conditions for appointment. For the 2013 examinations the SEC has made this policy more explicit by including information on our website and in an e-mail sent to schools.”
Teachers’ union ASTI believes priority should be given to unemployed teachers, part-time and fixed-term teachers and serving teachers.
“We have stated this position repeatedly to the SEC,” it said in a statement to TheJournal.ie.
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If your retired then your retired. These jobs should be given to unemployed teachers.
If you’re retired !!
That is so true and highlights everything that is wrong with this country. It is always who you know. The saying the more things change the more they stay the same is so true in this instance. Do you really need to be a ‘teacher’ to supervise these exams? It is not as if you can help them in any way so therefore jobs should go to any unemployed person if they pass a competency test. I am sure the rewards are handsome and it would help on a CV as well.
It’s the State Exams Commission not schools who hire them. Most unemployed teachers work as scribes or readers in school, the ow paying one while retired teachers get the supervision jobs.
Kerry, did you even read the article? Teacher’s are employed to supervise the exams as they have the required skill set ie. classroom management skills.
Jobs for the boys
There is very little skill involved in exam supervision, anyone who has been through secondary level education knows whats involved and expected. I’m not a teacher and I suspect I could do it easily – its handy work and everyone knows it.
@ Dave. There is a big difference between supervising summer exams in a school and supervising State exams and there is a lot more responsibility involved than simply handing out papers.
You should have only used one exclamation mark, the second one was pointless.
Skeyes thats rubbish. These jobs should be open to all, the only skills needed are proficiency with a scissors and an ability to tell the time :-)
Sure you’re only feckn flat out!
And we have young teachers who can’t get work.these people got a lump sum to retire and a nice tidy pension too.how much money do theses people need.
Most of my Education class (including myself) are moving to England (or the middle east) because the chances of getting any teaching/ subbing/ exam correction etc. is slim to none. I’ve heard horror stories of teaching graduates only getting 12 hours substitution over the course of the year,
Jobs of this nature in Ireland have always been used by people wanting to look after their own. There appears to be nothing transparent about the hiring process. The exact same applies to election counters where it appears civil servants, retired civil servants, ofrthe children of civil servants get the jobs with little opportunity for others to apply.
Also the last census was full of civil servants and retired people who were given priority over the unemployed. The opportunity to give temporary work to unemployed people for even their own sanity and it’s been missed. Get people back working me hole!
It’s not just in education this is happening, nurses and plenty of other civil servants are taking big redundancy packages and going back into their old positions on temporary contracts, because recruitment embargo won’t allow newly qualified people fill them
i know a woman retired years from the health service and she still works w.ends for cash in a psychiatric hospital.
Thank Allah that teachers stay away from politics, judging by this blatant display of cronyism and nepotism, imagine what it would be like if they were involved in running the country.
Many of our recent cabinet ministers and senior politicians are teachers. This is partly why as a country we ran into a big mess. Are their teacher jobs still being held open for them, if they fail to get re-elected?
The irony of what you say is not lost by some of us. Sure isn’t Enda a bloody teacher?
If I tell people I’m a teacher they say I shouldn’t be in politics.
However if I just tell them I have a degree and a masters it’s “oh you bright lad! Why don’t you run for election!”
We had a crash because we had an unsustainable building boom and lax regulation. Bertie Ahern and Cowen weren’t teachers. Only reason you’d blame teachers for this mess is if you’re too lazy to think properly about the reasons behind it,
@kairnbury to answer your question yes his teachers position could be left open to him. Have a look at any of the newly elected or appointed political figures who are teachers watch them back in the classroom after the next election. But who am I fooling they will probably get some sort of department job.
You should not be in teaching AND politics like Enda was…holding on to a job in case the politics fell through.
I dont blame teachers for the mess we are in. I blame all the people who appoint somebody to these positions of power in state departments as they know them Through their University or old Fee paying schools. it was these department s who we hold to Govern us with legislations taxes etc. They stood idle when the OECD and EU told us to cool down our spending. The politicians were there puppets If the truth be told
People lost the run of themselves during the boom. The only people who didn’t were homeless already. We all play the typical Irish thing of Blame Someone Else
We voted in the politicians in years ago and they represent us. A point I like to say is in keeping with where we were and where we are now!
Where is the irony Peter?
And you know all this for a fact. Peter? I swear I will swing for someone if one more gobaloon says “we all lost the run of ourselves, yada yada yada”. I for one did not take on any mortgages or debts, invest in property or adopt a tock star life style. There are hundreds of thousands more like e who, despite not indulging in any excesses, find ourselves much poorer and due to become poorer still. Stop parroting the tripe spouted ny Kenny and a supine media.
To the Sheik
So you didn’t live a rock star life eh.
No mortgage either?
I assume you are a thirty something still living with mam and dad getting pocket money every Friday night?
This twit is exactly who I am talkin about. Lol
Or the temps within the system. This is madness.
Fully agree but I assume due to the timing of the the exams it excludes primary level teachers as they don’t finish till the end of the month.
Primary level teachers wouldn’t be asked anyway, as they would have no experience with either of the certificate exams, the same way we second level teachers have no experience with the Sigma or Micra tests.
…. Isn’t the article about exam hall staffing…..
SEC are just feathering their own nests as are those in Government & they are nothing short of being bloody liars the lot of them
Why are the youth & unemployed of this country sitting back & taking it all on the chin – they should revolt.
retired teachers are taking teaching posts all over the country while experienced unemployed teachers are left on the dole, don’t believe the spin that they are the only ones with experience, food mate of mine is in his 40′s and has applied for every teaching job going. NO RETIRED teachers should be given easily that can easily filled by experienced unemployed teachers!
The same goes for the several thousand ‘vote counters’ used in elections, the routine seems to be using currently serving or retired cival servants, shows the true idiocy of a government or system when we have a list of 400k people unemployed all over the country.
This is a problem with our welfare system, get paid work for a month & you have to reapply for the dole which can take 12 weeks … What we need is a mechanism that allows people to apply for short-term approved schemes like gov jobs and repeating yearly once offs and allow them to retain their med cards etc.
Bet most unemployed / underemployed didn’t apply due to this reason
Cronyism. That word just sums up this country over the last 5 years in my opinion. No matter how skilled or qualified you are, it’s all about who you know in the end
Think its been going on a lot longer than 5 years
@terry as the article states, it’s not about offering advice to students, it’s about “classroom management”. You need to be able to control up to 50-maybe more- kids at a time. A fight broke out at my Leaving Cert Geography paper because a kid bumped into another kids table and they came to blows. I think everybody was glad the chap in charge had good management skills. It was over immediately as he stepped in brilliantly and the exam went back to normal without any fuss. Teaching isn’t just about teaching content to children from a text book. The ASTI have a point, but so do BOM’s or whoever does the employing, to ensure the exam goes smoothly for these stressed out kids. That’s the most important thing.
Was his name Mr Chuck Norris!
That would have been deadly.
It was Jeremy Kyle!
It’s a boys/girls club. Ask anyone who teachers and they will be able to point out retired teachers who are back in the classroom. One I was made aware of recently was a recently retired deputy principal who us retired on at least €650 after tax back ‘helping out’ their old employer as a part time teacher. This is rampant throughout this country not to mention nepotism so unemployed and underemployed teachers shouldn’t expect exam supervision to be any different.
I don’t know of a single school where this is “rampant”.
In my school the staff informed the Principal that we did not want retirees re-employed. He complied.
I know of other schools where the same agreement is in place.
I know of no school where retirees are regularly employed.
And I am “anyone” who teaches.
Not surprised the young people r leaving IRELAND !!!
There is a level of maturity required for the role and can understand why they wouldn’t give it to a school leaver from last year who has failed to gain employment
But that’s not the point Rehabmeerkat, it’s that there is bucketloads of young unemployed/underemployed qualified teachers who would jump at this opportunity, yet these jobs have been given to people already in receipt of a comfortable pension.
My point is, loads of people from my Education degree are moving (primarily to England). A fair amount of us would be willing to stay here if we could get these kind of jobs (in addition to subbing and exam correction) while we try to find something more long term.
unemployed young teachers only should have work there .Retired teachers should not be hired because who they know . its so wrong and i didnt say a bad word i like to call them worse
Its like politics unfortunately. For so long as the old guard remain in charge in the Dept of Ed, these old practices of jobs for the boys/girls will remain.
Maybe we should get all the ex-teachers in the Dail to supervise the exams.
They doing fcuk all else anyway!!!
Well come the next election they’ll need a bit of work somewhere.
David, sadly i don’t think we’ll get rid of all of them and if we do, it’ll probably be FF that fills their place… *sigh*
Are unemployed people going to sign off for what might be as little as eight day’s work, bearing in mind how hard it is to sign on again? The pay is rubbish so will they not tell us they’re better off on the dole? Hint: If they’ve a wife and a couple of kids they will. Added to that scribes/readers are also supervising, often only one child and those jobs are given out by the school. My Principal actually couldn’t get enough non permanent teachers to cover our place so he had to look outside. And the SEC position on retirees is to only employ them in the year of their retirement unless absolutely necessary. In other words this is basically a non story.
And if you think you could do the job try answering the following questions without googling the answers.
1. What do you do if you open the wrong pack of papers?
2. What do you do if a Junior Cert candidate wants to change levels on the day?
3. Are there any newspapers you cannot bring in to the hall?
4. What do you do if you suspect a child is using his mobile phone?
Very good points. And, people on the Dole also need to bear in mind it could be months before they’re paid for this job.
Plus applicants need to undergo Garda vetting before filling a post involving childcare (as exam invigilators are acting “in loco parentis” . Some may have been cleared before, otherwise it can take ages. Hardly worth it for the temporary nature of these jobs.
Well ya have me beat! You’d need a Masters Degree to answer those questions!
As regards Garda Vetting also, it has to be done EVERY time you are involved with a different organisation, which is great, but can be very time consuming. Basically, your Garda Vetting for working in a school doesn’t clear you for Foróige, or SEC, etc.
Alan what about the following:
A) what do you do with external candidates
B) what do you do at the aurals with regards the different levels, Ard/Gnath v Bonn.
C) what do you do with the project work the schools exam secretary hands you during a geography exam for example.
D) what do you do if a candidate has to be hospitalised during the exams.
I could go on.
At the 3rd Level Institution I Supervise/Invigilate Exams at it’s an Open Door policy.
Surely 2nd Level should be fair game for non-teaching (retired or unemployed or neither category) staff.?
I was Unemployed when I answered the Ad in Local Paper for Invigilators and it was open to everybody.
Perhaps the Dept. of Ed. ought look into this way of recruitment?
Should this work not be done by employed teachers?
Should this work not be done by employed teachers?
What!!! and ask them to give up 2 weeks of the summer holidays.
Are you serious?
Not all employed teachers get paid for the summer, or any, holidays!
These jobs should be filled by qualified teachers who don’t have a permanent job, such as sub teachers, or those covering sick leave maternity, or recent graduates.
And who will be held responsible for this shambles! Nobody, it’s Ireland.
The more mature among the electorate are usually the most active at election time. Alas the political apathy among the young is well documented across most of the Western world. Ergo, give the job to the older candidate = secure yourself a vote.
this type of thing is happening all across the board, just look at any polling station on election day and you will see the same faces every time. Most of them having taken the day of work to do the job, yet when I applied I was told that unemployed people got offered first, which is rubbish, as I know people who applied when the were out of work, but never even got a reply to the application. In some cases you will see several members of the same family, now how can that be fair.
Honestly? People use the ridiculous excuse that state exams have nothing to do with schools when arguing that the teachers in those schools should not be supervising exams. What rubbish. Let the teachers in the school supervise exams. They’ll still get two more months off every summer than I do.
maybe they are unemployed for a reason? because they are too lazy to take jobs like this offered to them?
It might help if they were first actually offered the job Katrina, plenty if unemployed teachers ARE applying for these jobs but the jobs are actually gone before interviews even take place!! My friend HAS applied, he doesn’t care about Garda vetting or the long wait for payment, he just wants to work and I’m sure he’s not the only one.
have your say