Irish Vocational Education Association

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Blocking of AEO and Programme Teacher posts
05 May 2009
Statement by General Secretary, Michael Moriarty: The moratorium on public service numbers announced on March 27th has taken a devastatingly cynical twist as it now appears that VEC educational leadership and teaching posts in out-of-school educational programmes cannot be filled.
The Department of Finance appears to have decided to extend the moratorium to all VEC educational programmes* which target learners outside of the regular school context, many of whom come from socially and educationally disadvantaged backgrounds.
Member VECs have been unable to fill recently vacant Adult Education Officer posts. Such post-holders act as the principals of the VEC adult education services. These posts are akin to the school principal posts, which can still be filled when vacancies arise.
Adult Education Officers are leaders from a teaching background. As is the case with school principals, Adult Education Officers are charged with the delivery of front-line services. The blocking of appointments to current vacancies in Adult Education Officer posts is a clearly discriminatory development. If this is educational policy now determined by the Department of Finance, then it is to be utterly deplored.
It appears now that Department of Finance officials, with no knowledge and little comprehension of educational structures and programmes, are determined to also block appointments to teacher posts delivering educational programmes. These are teachers employed from educational programme budgets devolved to VECs by the Department of Education & Science and which have already been subject to funding cuts. It seems that while teaching posts in schools can be filled, the filling of programme teaching posts are being blocked, notwithstanding the fact that such posts are focussed on a range of marginalised and disadvantaged learners.
I am aghast that a clear distinction is being made between school and non-school teaching appointments. Government policy statements have reiterated that front-line services will be a priority, yet if the moratorium is upheld in these cases, the Department of Finance would seem intent on creating a policy distinction between teaching and principal education posts in a school as against similar such posts in a non-school setting. To continue to block appointments to Adult Education Officer and programme teaching posts will result in serious damage to an entire cohort of non school students so dependent on these teaching services. If this policy continues, it can only be construed as class discrimination.
While the Department of Education and Science understands this dilemma, approval of staffing decisions rests now with the Department of Finance, which seems intent on dismantling non-school provision despite the government's declared intention to preserve front-line services. If school principal posts are to be filled, then the post of principal of adult education services must be allowed to be filled. If teaching posts in schools are to be filled, then teaching posts in education programmes must be filled on the same basis of justice and equity.
IVEA will now seek immediate clarification from the Minister for Education and Science on why the filling of these educational posts are being blocked. Rather than equity, there will be discrimination in appointments policy. Minister Batt O'Keeffe must now directly intervene so that VECs can proceed to fill these vital educational and teaching posts.
* NOTE: VECs are provided with funding block grants to deliver a range of educational programmes such as:
The Irish Vocational Education Association (IVEA) represents the interests, at national level of Ireland's thirty-three Vocational Education Committees (VECs).

The VECs are statutory education authorities currently delivering educational programmes up to 100,000 second level pupils and 200,000 adult education learners. The day-to-day administration of the association is carried out by the secretariat, headed by the General Secretary, Mr Michael Moriarty in the IVEA's head office in Dublin.
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