-
Better Teaching for Better Outcomes
https://www.idonate.ie/fundraiser/WalkBeyondBorders2025MaireandLeo
I have been working with SeeBeyondBorders for many years both as a research collaborator and more recently as their volunteer academic advisor. SeeBeyondBorders is firmly focused on addressing the education crisis in Cambodia by enhancing teacher capability through in-service professional development.
Cambodian education has been in crisis since the awful killing regime of Khmer Rouge (1975-1979) and subsequent civil wars up to the turn of the millennium. These events devastated the knowledge base for teaching and learning across the whole country. Schools are still feeling the effects today:
- 65% of teachers in Cambodia do not have a formal teaching degree.
- By the age of fifteen, 97% of children are unable to demonstrate proficiency in literacy and maths.
Without substantial improvement of teaching and school leadership the education prospects for children in Cambodia are extremely bleak. Research has established a clear link between the quality of teaching and the educational outcomes for children. Our research on enhancing teaching in Cambodia means we have a good understanding of how what needs to be done. We now need to put in place the people and infrastructure to achieve this at scale.
You can help! Máire and I are participating in the WalkBeyondBorders to raise funds to support education in Cambodia. We kindly ask you to consider making a donation to support the work of SeeBeyondBorders. Every little helps to ensure a better future for the children of Cambodia and a better world for all of us!
-
Every Child Should Have a Good Teacher
The Value of Education
It’s easy to overlook the obvious. We assume that childhood and schooling go hand in hand and you can’t have one without the other. Our experience during the pandemic reinforced our appreciation of the value of education. More than ever, we regard schools as fundamental to the proper functioning of society and teachers as essential workers.
Why do we place such a high value on the quality of education especially for the young? Most would say that it’s obvious; our children deserve to be nurtured and developed so they can be successful and fulfil their potential as people. Children love to learn as much as they need to learn.
Without doubt, once basic and home needs are satisfied, access to a fully trained, well resourced teacher is the single most important ingredient for childhood flourishing.
The Education Crisis in Cambodia
- The average Cambodian child will spend less than 5 years in school
- Less than 3% of children reach the internationally accepted minimum standards for maths and literacy.
- Most teachers (79%) have no graduate qualifications.
- The situation has worsened since the pandemic. International tourism, a major contributor to the weak economy, has been devastated and the schools have been closed for 170 days and counting.
Teachers are Key
The Temples at Angkor Wat – a big tourist attraction are now quiet Access to good quality teaching is at the heart of the solution.
Throughout the notorious Pol Pot Khmer Rouge regime – which started in 1975 and did not really come to an end until 1998 – teachers, professionals and academics were systematically targeted and murdered. It was a forceful and concentrated effort to deny education and stifle opposition to the ultra marxist idealism of Pol Pot and his followers.
The damage continues to impact on the children of Cambodia today.
Imagine if all our teachers and university lecturers, including those who train teachers, were wiped out!
Apart from the obvious human tragedy there would be a devastating loss of know-how and expertise. Any attempt to rebuild and reinstate an education system would be seriously hampered by the absence of experienced teachers at all levels. This is happening in Cambodia.
The loss goes well beyond the technical skills and competences of teaching. There is also trauma to the professional identity of teachers. To put it quite bluntly ‘how can you know what it means to be a good teacher if you have never had access to one’.
Furthermore, teaching is not a commodity, it cannot be exported, imposed or substituted by technology. Every society needs its own teachers. That is the essence of education. As John Dewey in Democracy and Education puts it:
Society exists through a process of transmission quite as much as biological life. This transmission occurs by means of communication of habits of doing, thinking, and feeling from the older to the younger. Without this communication of ideals, hopes, expectations, standards, opinions, from those members of society who are passing out of the group life to those who are coming into it, social life could not survive. (p 6)
Irish Educators Can Help
As fellow teachers and educators, we need to embrace our colleagues in Cambodia. They have suffered an absolute loss of pedagogy. However, it can be recovered through appropriate training and support.
Cambodian teachers grapple with the economic and social challenges of living in one of the world’s least developed countries. Yet they are passionate and committed to the success of the students in their care.
For many years, Irish teachers have been involved in supporting the professional development of teachers in Cambodia. Maire and I visited SeeBeyondBorders in Siem Reap in 2019.
From left: Pov Pheung, Maire Ni Bhroithe, myself and Colm Byrne, SeeBeyondBorders was founded by Kate and Ed Shuttleworth in 2009 and since then it has developed a network of supports for schools and teachers in Cambodia.
As they state in their mission “Our biggest priority is to create positive, systemic, and sustainable change in Cambodia.”
SeeBeyondBorders is already established as a charity in Australia and the UK and just recently it registered as a charity in Ireland. Colm Byrne is an educator and teacher and now CEO of SeeBeyondBorders in Ireland. He is based in Cambodia and is best placed to describe the significance of the support of the Irish educator community.
Here is a Linkedin post where Colm Byrne describes the work they are doing.
Here is a link to the Mick Clifford podcast featuring Colm Byrne.
There is also an event next week called Conversations about the impact of inequality on education on July 7th at 10am Irish time. You can use this link to register.
-
Education, Lifelong Learning and the Transformation of Society
There is much anger in the world today. People rage against injustice and inequality. Tempers flair as we struggle to protect the planet. Societies change and evolve and our values are transformed over time.
Many practices such as slavery, colonialism and capital punishment were deemed acceptable in the past and considered abhorrent by today’s standards. Our current laws on discrimination and tolerance were hard fought and did not come about without argument and persuasion. Even with these, we know there is still much to do.
The progressive process of transforming values in society is essentially an educative endeavour. Consider how our collective values have changed, even in the course of, for example my own lifetime: My eldest sister had to leave her job when she got married, it was ok to hit children in school, homosexual acts were deemed criminal offences and university fees excluded many from achieving their potential. The situation today is not perfect but it has improved considerably.
However, we do not live in some privileged time when our values have evolved to a pinnacle. We continue to question how we live with each other and strive to make it better.
In this vein, it is not unreasonable to assume that at some point in the future our understanding of the purpose of education and the nature of lifelong learning will be transformed.
Today, many people think of education as simply a process of preparation: as the preparation of the young for adult life, or the unskilled to become competent, or of human capital in the interests of the supply of labour. Despite its prevalence, this is an impoverished view of education and a flawed model of learning.
Education involves more than preparation; as we learn we are already participating. Our world is transformed by journeys from peripheral to central areas of practice, from novice to expert and from passive acceptance to deep questioning of shared values.
Two significant UNISCO reports, Learning to Be (Faure 1972) and Learning: The Treasure Within (Delore 1996), affirm the transformative power of education on the lives of individuals and societies as a whole. The so-called ‘four pillars’ derive from these documents:
Learning to know,
Learning to do,
Learning to live together,
Learning to be.
These statements go beyond the purposes of education to embody the values that underpin the transformative power of lifelong learning.
Notice how they build and connect with each other. “Learning to know” is perhaps the most obvious and commonly associated with the preparation model of education. In recent times we are increasingly aware of “learning to do” as an important function of vocational and professional education. However, it is only when we connect these with “learning to live together” and “learning to be” that we grasp the progressive nature of learning.
In ‘learning to live together’ we are challenged in a different way – to recognise and respect all other people and to share our competence and collaborate for a better world.
Through these actions – learning to know, do, and live together – we move toward the goal of ‘learning to be’. Each person achieving their full potential.
This is the ultimate aim of education and lifelong learning. Perhaps at some time in the future these values will be shared by everyone. That’s the power of transformative learning!
-
Essential Questions for Educators Everywhere
‘Essential Questions for Educators Everywhere’ is a summer course over five days at National College of Ireland in association with Mercy College New York between the 26th – 30th June 2017 .
As the title suggests, the goal is to interrogate essential ideas that underpin our understanding and practice of what it means to teach and learn in the world of today.
You can get further details at www.eqfee.org
The programme is designed for qualified and aspiring learning professionals in areas such as early childhood education, schools, further education, college, university and adult learning settings.
Through debate, discussion and critical dialogue, participants will explore issues such as the nature of learning, the purpose of schooling, the goals of lifelong learning, the qualities of teaching, and the relationship between democracy and education. These questions are relevant for teachers everywhere – regardless of country or context – all the more so for the changing times we live in. The history and evolution of Irish education, including the influence and involvement of religious institutions will also be explored. Participants will be encouraged to ask questions, compare systems and discuss alternatives throughout.
As teachers everywhere, we have much in common and it is natural to ask what makes us teachers. Participation in this summer school will consolidate our professional thinking and address core questions that concern us all.
These are challenging times for educators everywhere. Teachers, professors and learning professionals are more and more, being subjected to external forces and manipulative expectations. Every educator will understand the nature of learning. It is a complex, gradual, often challenging and always unique process. It is built on a framework of communication and support, it relies on natural empathy and it is rooted in the ideals of social justice and democratic participation.
At the heart of the student-teacher relationship is the intellectually intimate process of making learning happen. This is what educators do.
There are as many paths to learning as their are people. Great educators help others to find their path; this is true for early childhood educators, school teachers, college lecturers and learning professionals everywhere.
Learning has been such a potent force in society that it has always been politicised and protected by the powerful elite. We have seen this in the past when institutions of learning were set up as extensions of the state and when literacy and access to literature was confined to the privileged few.
The situation today is not much better. There is progress toward universal access to school, college and university education. However, there are also counter-educative forces at work: the dysfunctional view of education as a service that can only justified on the basis of the need to satisfy the labour market; the de-humanisation of education through micro-management of outcomes and ‘one size fits all’ approaches; the power to buy privilege and manipulate perceptions of quality through league tables and conformist media.
All the while, educators are tossed and turned. As a teacher I know describes: “It’s like being a bottle in the sea during a storm. Wave after wave of change and expectation coming from outside the classroom”. It seems to never stop. We do not get a chance to take ‘time out’ and think about what it really beans to be an educator. This is why we have developed a summer course called ‘Essential Questions for Educators Everywhere‘.
-
We Need New Stories in Education
The Seven Basic Plots is an interesting book by Christopher Booker, the main argument is clear from the title; we have a limited number of story lines and regardless of context or medium, we like the familiar, predictable and comforting. Fairytale, folklore, epic novels and modern film scripts all use variations of basic narrative structures; resilience in the face of onslaught, heroic journeys, monsters and dragons and of course, the struggles of good and evil. The argument is not unique, many thinkers have pointed to a form of collective intellectual comfort blanket. We welcome stories that reinforce pre-existing assumptions and avoid those that challenge our biased views and require re-jigging our model of the world.
The ‘basic plots’ phenomenon is much in evidence when we talk about education. Whether it is media reporting, policy discourse or public commentary, we return time and again to the familiar blandness of the comfort blanket.
I’m tired of hearing about the epic journey of the Leaving Certificate, I’m done with the struggles of the science and engineering to attract and charm the young people of today, I no longer need the wisdom of employers, I’m fed up with tales of cash strapped colleges, disgruntled unions and skills deficits. It’s time we moved on from the great myths of technology and unsupported open learning. I know these stories and I’m sure they will be around for a while but isn’t it time we introduced some new topics and debates? We need new stories in education.
So here is my suggested starter list of four new stories in education. When I say they are ‘new stories’ I am not suggesting that they have not been around before now – far from it, many are as old as education itself, what I mean is they seem absent or under-represented in the public discourse. So here they are, first as a list and then a short paragraph on each:
- Education and Democracy
- What Do We Mean by Learning?
- What Makes a Good Teacher?
- Learning Throughout Life
Education and democracy – now more than ever we need to discuss the connection between these two ideals. Is it possible to have a functioning democracy without open, informed and truthful discourse among the citizenship? Perhaps we are so busy ‘training’ people to develop instrumental, economically viable skills that we overlook the ‘skills of democratic participation’ such as reasoning and critical literacy. Trump, Brexit, far-right movements … need I say more.
What do we mean by learning? – We use the same word ‘learning’ for the many ways in which we extend our knowledge and develop skills and this variety in itself often leads to confusion. We need to develop a better way to bring the conversation about learning forward. Nobody has all the answers, especially academics, but we do need a common language and fundamental framework for understanding what we mean by learning and how to make it work better. In this way we can have sensible debates and together we can learn-about-learning for our own sake and that of our children.
What makes a good teacher? – Teachers are everywhere not just in schools. I don’t just mean this as a trite point to make us feel better; it is more fundamental than that. If we were not good teachers we would not survive as a culture and civilisation. All societies are concerned with the means of passing on from one generation to the next, the ‘way-of-doing’. So what makes good teaching? Is it specialist knowledge and deep expertise? Is it about passion and inspiration? Is it about explaining and making things easy? Is it about inclusion and bringing everyone along. Is it empowerment? And what makes a teacher ‘good’? Is it a moral value or a technical skill?
Learning throughout life – Learning has traditionally been associated with nurturing the young and as preparation for life and work. However, it is better to regard learning as part of life itself, it is something that we continue to do so long as we live. Learning may be regarded as a gift we give to our future selves and so long as we have a future we will need to learn.
Let’s talk about the issues and questions outlined above. They are important and I’m sure there are many different viewpoints to be considered and many new stories to tell.
Time to move on.
-
Ready to Learn – Taking the First Step
Oh I was just wondering have you got a moment, I just want to ask you about something‘ she had arrived at NCI reception and they suggested I might meet with her. ‘No problem at all‘ I assured her while thinking how much I had to do that afternoon.
Five minutes later she sat in my office. She was very nervous and I thought I noticed a slight trembling in her voice. Her name was Susan.
‘It’s like this‘ she said ‘I was thinking of doing a course here but I am not sure if I’d be able for it‘. She went on to tell me her story. She left school at sixteen without a Leaving Cert. She worked in the retail sector for the last twenty five years and now she is a manager. She is married with three kids and two of them are in college. She reads a lot and is well liked by her colleagues. Generally, she’s happy.
But there’s always been a niggle. An unease and sense of being often left out, ignored and taken-for-granted. ‘Sure what would Susan know‘ she once overheard a younger colleague remark.
Susan explained that she has been thinking about college for years but had never taken the first step. Recently she floated the idea of doing a course with her friends and family ‘Yeah go on why don’t you give it a try‘ they would encourage her. But deep down she was nervous and didn’t know where to start.
‘So I don’t know Leo why I’m here, perhaps it’s just a crazy idea, I mean, I don’t even have a Leaving Cert and I was crap at school, this is a terrible idea, sorry for wasting your time‘. I just listened, it was like I was the audience for her inner debate. ‘But I can do it! I’m good with words, this is for me, this is my chance!‘
‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ I asked, eventually finding something I could be useful at. ‘Yes that would be great‘.
Later we talked about adult learning and how she was not that unusual. College, especially National College of Ireland, is not like school. Adults are welcome and treasured as they bring valuable life experience to the classroom. We discussed how people like Susan make a conscious decision to learn and often thrive when they go to college. They find new ideas, make new friends and find new meaning in their lives.
Years later we were standing at the conferring ceremony in the National Convention Centre, Susan was all gowned up and proudly clutching her parchment. She introduced me to her family and there were smiles all round.
‘Do you remember our first meeting?‘ she asked. I nodded ‘yes’. ‘Well! I just want to say thanks for the tea. You make a good cup of tea‘ she grinned ‘one that will last a lifetime!‘.
-
Education Cuts Seem to be Inevitable
It seems to be on the cards that there will be cutbacks in education as Ireland struggles to put together a four year budget plan to grapple with the financial debt crisis.
I like to talk about learning rather than politics or economy in these posts but it seems that cuts will have to be made – indeed are being made – and these cuts will effect all our learning futures and therefore warrant consideration.As an educator I believe that, after the basic needs such as safety, health and sustenance are met, the primary task of any nation is the provision of education. Education is the means whereby culture and societal practices are developed and reproduced. Once we fail to educate then we fail as a society.
Furthermore, as John Dewey pointed out, the provision of open and accessible education is essential for the proper functioning of democracy. When we suppress education we undermine the process of developing new thinking, critical awareness, communicative discourse and creativity.However, I do not believe cutbacks in education can be avoided; particularly if spending on health and social welfare are also going to be curtailed. So here are three ideas where money can be saved with minimal negative impact on peoples lives and future potential.
- First, we could seriously revamp the functions of the State Exams Commission. This would involve abolishing the current Junior Certificate as a compulsory requirement for those remaining in school and its replacement by an expanded Leaving Certificate with a range of levels. The State Exams Commission should be renamed as the State Assessment Commission and its principle task should be to provide assessments for all pupils, regardless of age and ability, once they exit the school system. Assessments should be spaced through the school year and e-assessment technology should be harnessed to streamline the process.
- Second, we could redirect much of the spending that is currently provisioned for training into programmes that are more educational – instead of focusing on specific skills for the unpredictable jobs market it is better to develop generic skills such as problem solving, entrepreneurship and creativity. The third level sector, college’s such as National College of Ireland, are better placed to deliver appropriate provision for adult learning rather than the troubled state training agency of FAS.
- Thirdly, its time we looked more seriously at the potential of blended learning and the use of technology to support learning at all levels. I suggest that good pedagogically designed blended learning programmes can be more effective and engaging for learning. At the same time there are opportunities for more cost-effective delivery models. Currently at NCI and as part of an EU project I am working on new designs for learning in the workplace at college level. I believe this is an important area of future development for the sector. In my opinion, blended learning can structured so that student engagement is enhanced rather than diminished.
All of the ideas discussed above have the characteristic of a win win situation – such reforms would improve rather than diminish education while at the same time contribute to the financial savings that seem to be required.
-
“Grade Inflation” Getting Everything Wrong
This is a really important issue for Ireland and for everyone in the education sector. It is vital that get a clear understanding of what the problem is and what we need to do to rectify it.
First of all, the problem we need to solve is not “Grade Inflation” and it would be a huge mistake if we were all to get in a muddle comparing the numbers of first class honours’ degrees or 600 point Leaving Certs in the past few years.
Just like all measures based on our social circumstances, such as the spending power of the average weekly wage or the average life-expectancy, over time we should expect to see a gradual improvement in similar measures of quality and achievement in our education system.
Today, we are educating more people to a higher standard than ever before and I will be surprised if the emperical evidence from the soon-to-be released study will not show this to be the case.
But I do not believe we should be congratulating ourselves – there is a problem and a new challenge and we need to get to the heart of it.
Let me use one source Dr Craig Barrett, former CEO and Chairman of Intel and a frequent visitor to Ireland:
“Your primary and secondary schools are only average,” he said. “It is no longer good enough to be average. You have to be excellent at what you do … at the end of secondary school your young people are average. Your education system is being challenged by improvements in the rest of the world. Things have changed, the educational attainment of other countries have been increasing, and that increases competition for attracting investment.”Source: http://www.examiner.ie/opinion/columnists/matt-cooper/for-ireland-to-make-the-grade-we-need-radical-education-reform-111903.html#ixzz0h0o2hsCx
Barrett is providing us with a global perspective and he, rightly in my opinion, points to the progress made by other countries. Later in the same interview Barrett lays down the challenge:
“It is possible for Ireland to continue to be successful, but you have to worry about the capability of your workforce and what it does,” he said. “Why not a race to the top? Why not have more capability and jobs where you can add value? Increased capability and education is where you increase value.”
Later”Teachers should not be just competent but masters,” he argued. “How do you excite children about a subject? By having high-quality teachers. You must treat education like any quality service you aim to provide. Your employees have to be good and get paid on the basis of performance.”Source: http://www.examiner.ie/opinion/columnists/matt-cooper/for-ireland-to-make-the-grade-we-need-radical-education-reform-111903.html#ixzz0h0qGJr4JNow, let me make plea: let’s not get ourselves in a flap over grade inflation or comparisons between institutions. Let’s talk about what really matters – quality of teaching and quality of assessment.
It is a not sufficient for the Department of Education and Science to look to the State Exams Commission (note “exams” not “assessment”) to produce year-on-year comparisons of Leaving Cert grades – why don’t we look at what the Leaving Cert is really measuring – mostly memory, recall and strategic learning. Genuine problem-solving and creative thinking are not nurtured and not sufficiently recognised.
Similarly, in third level we are certainly guilty of over rewarding students who do not ask questions, suggest alternatives, write critically or challenge the norms of society.
This is the real threat! In short, it’s not that we are giving too many high grades in exams, it’s that we are not measuring what we should be measuring.
Certain skills are more important for competitive and connected workplaces – these include inquiry, problem solving, technical and scientific skills, critical thinking, research, collaboration, presentation and good writing.
These skills need to be nurtured and measured at all levels of education. This is the real challenge. -
The Meaning of Work – Aronowitz on Schooling in a Time of Crisis
On Tuesday I had the good fortune to attend a seminar (in NUIM) by Stanley Aronowitz – he is Professor of Sociology at City University in New York and has written extensively on many topics to do with knowledge, education and economy.
His ideas are radical and challenging and yet timely.
He presented his analysis of this “first truly global crisis” based on his experience (in the US steel industry) and many years as an author and teacher. Aronowitz posed critical questions that challenged our conception of labour in developed economies. He pointed to the structural changes in industry evident since the seventies when high numbers of workers were employed in big industries such as steel production. Faced with the challenge of a militant, frequently striking (US!) workforce and a troublesome trade union movement, the response by industry was to reduce labour through mechanisation and to move labour by a process of outsourcing and financialisation (build now pay later).
Aronowitz sees our current predicament as the inevitable outcome of US economic policy and the globalisation of the industrial model for developed economies. His outlook is gloomy – there will always be a struggle – they will always want more (government and employers).
Don’t worry – so the current rhetoric would have us believe – in Ireland we live in a Knowledge Economy. Our economic future is pinned to a belief that knowledge is a sure thing and our most recent strategy for growth is called Building Ireland’s Smart Economy.
We’ve never really had a large industrial base, little reliance on steel or automobile manufacturing. Our ‘new’ economy is built on software, internationally traded services and high-tech-brought-in manufacturing like HP and Intel.Well I am worried!
Not just by Aronowitz’ analysis but also by our collective acceptance of an illusion – the unsubstantiated but soothing notion that all we need to do is to be smarter than the Chinese and we will build our future by design; design of goods and services to be manufactured elsewhere in places like Mumbai and Beijing. What arrogant rubbish!
At best, we may experience a temporary opportunity for wealth generation by positioning our competences higher up the manufacturing chain. However, this fragile position of advantage will quickly be undermined as the fluidity of global manufacturing economics inevitably takes effect.
If there is real competition for smartness, I for one, would not like to take on the wisdom of the East or the passion and commitment to education in places like the Philippines and Jordan. I have visited both of these countries and as a result, I will always challenge that, equally unquestioned, myth proposing that education in Ireland is especially valued and our recent, short-lived, economic boom was a consequence of our highly educated workforce.
What then is the alternative? Aronowitz hints at new possibilities – shorter working days, time to participate in democratic structures, a renewal of learning. These are just ideas – developed outside the current orthodoxy – nothing clear-cut or strategic. That’s probably his point – the current system is not working we need alternatives and in seeking these alternatives we will need to extend our thinking. I agree but it’s hardly grounds for hope.
Aronowitz titled his talk Schooling in a Time of Economic Crisis and we had to wait until near the end before he addressed the issue of schooling. Schooling is not education. His use of the term schooling extends through kindergarten to further and higher education. Aronowitz regards schooling as an instrument of the state – a means of extension of the dominant ideology in our case capitalism.
What is the function of schooling? One might say – to prepare people for work. This is the great myth. The notion of middle-class investment – schooling now for quality employment in the future; all the more sensible when we consider ourselves as living in a Knowledge Economy.
Who should control schooling? Obviously, one might think, as we are concerned with our economic well being, we should look to employers, economists and policy makers for guidance on what skills we will need for the future. This is the real danger and it will lead possibly to future despair – not success.
Education is about learning for life, not necessarily paid employment. Yes we should be concerned with learning for the future but the question is – how best can we prepare for the future? John Dewey, a great American philosopher and educator suggested that in order to prepare people for the future we should teach them how to experience the present to its fullest extent. I take this to mean that we should be critical (questioning) of the world and that we challenge all our assumptions especially our interpretations of what we need to learn and how best to secure our future prosperity.
I suggest that we should direct our scrutiny at the current discourse on knowledge and economy and we open our minds, in the present, to ideas such as tabled by Stanley Aronowitz.
