Teachers Themselves

Bridging Classrooms and Policy with Máirín Ní Chéileachair

• Dublin West Education Support Centre • Season 2 • Episode 2

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Meet Máirín Ní Chéileachair, a passionate educator, influenced by family legacy and a community rich in scholastic virtues. In this inspiring conversation, she grants us an intimate look into the stepping stones that propelled her from a classroom teacher to an advocate within the INTO and NIPT, all while holding fast to her intrinsic zeal for education that flourished beyond the traditional learning environment.

Navigating the labyrinth of education policy can be as challenging as it is crucial, and Máirín guides us through this terrain with the wisdom only a seasoned Principal and policy influencer could possess. 

Throughout this podcast episode, the dialogue turns to the silent reverberations of policy decisions within the walls of our schools, impacting those at the heart of education—our teachers and students. Máirín candidly discusses the balancing act between being an educator and an administrator, the essence of maintaining passion amidst increasing deskwork, and the stark realities of intertwining political aims with the true goals of education.

Finally, we venture into the realm of the Irish language, where Máirín's love for Gaeilge blossomed into a commitment to its preservation and elevation in the educational system. 

Looking ahead, we celebrate the epochs of progress in teacher support and CPD, and the promise they hold for the emerging generation of Irish educators. 

Join us for an exploration of the stalwarts and the strides taken in a field that continues to evolve, carrying with it the hopes and dreams of dedicated educators like Máirín Ní Chéileachair. 


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Teachers Themselves is a DWEC original, produced and created by Dublin West Education Centre produced by Zita Robinson.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

Welcome to the Teachers Themselves podcast. I'm your host, Ultan Mac Mathúna. This podcast is brought to you by Dublin West Education Centre. We're located on the grounds of TU D Tallaght, serving and supporting the school communities of West Dublin and beyond. Welcome to season two of Teachers Themselves. Episodes this season will feature informal chats with some of the experienced dedicated educators who are working in Irish schools and the broader education sector. People who are making a big difference to the world of education in Ireland.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

I love education. Every aspect of it fascinates me and interests me, and always did. From when I was a very young teacher. I always wanted to know more. I want to know how the system worked and how decisions were made and why things happened that way, and it's always fascinated me and continues to do so.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

Welcome to this week's episode of Teachers Themselves. Joining us this week is Máirín Ní Chéileachair . Máirín is Assistant General Secretary and Director of Education, Equality, Research and Learning in the INTO. Máirín has spent her career in education as a primary teacher and a primary school principal. However, she's also worked as the National Coordinator of NIPT and Director of the Dublin West Education Centre. She's also lectured widely. So a varied past, Máirín. A varied past.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

A varied past, Ultan, as my sister likes to say, I still haven't decided what I want to be when I grow up.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

Tell me this and tell me no more Máirín, you're from Youghal, County Cork.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

I am.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

How has Youghal formed you?

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

Oh, I think it's a completely integral part of who I am Youghal, back to sea, not like a Cork person to say that.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

Not like a Cork person to say that. No, I was brought up on the sea. I sailed from a very young age with my dad God rest him and loved sea, loved the water and need to get back to the sea for my soul and my spirit regularly. So I travel to Youghal most weekends. Still I'd say there were people in Youghal who think I never left, but it really did, I think, for me in a lot of ways. I was thinking recently we got a very good education in Youghal from the nuns, the presentation nuns and the Loretta nuns, and the boys had the Christian brothers. My grandfather taught in the Christian brothers school all his life and I suppose he put the teaching hand on me and there were my sister and several of my cousins are teachers. So there was a family business. A skipped one generation but it landed in the grandchildren, did you always?

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

want to be a teacher.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

Always I'm absolutely stereotypical Always wanted to be a muinteoir. Lined up my dolls and my teddies and taught them. Would have had the name of being very bossy. When I was a child I'd say, if you asked my, if you asked my neighbours, my old neighbours from childhood, she was very bossy. So I always had that muinteoir bit in me, I'd say. But I never wanted to do anything else ever. I was going one direction and that was into education. I love education. Every aspect of it fascinates me and interests me, and always did. From when I was a very young teacher. I always wanted to know more. I wanted to know how the system worked and how decisions were made and why things happened that way, and it has always fascinated me and continues to do so.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

So it was your we refer to say, possibly Máirín, that it wasn't only your profession, it was probably your pastime as well. It was yeah.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

Going back to my sister who's a teacher, she likes to salsa dance herself and her husband. She told me one time I needed a hobby and I said I have a hobby. That's not a hobby, that's work. And I would have been on the committee here in Dublin West for years, as you know, and just loved being involved in education. Before I worked for the INTO, which I'd done for the last number of years, many years ago here in Tallaght, I was on branch committee, I was on district committee, I was on the board at one stage for quite a number of years and loved that. So I've always been really interested in different aspects of education, being on boards of management and that kind of thing. So it was a pastime and again continues to be.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

If you were starting out again. So you've come up from Youghal. you went to. Did you go to Mary I or did you go to?

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

No, I went to Carysfort actually which no longer exists.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

I went to.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

Carysfort and I suppose when I was making the decision that I was applying for a training college, I didn't know anyone in Limerick, I didn't know anyone in Dublin and I figured from out as well being the capital. So I came to Dublin in 81, 81 to 84, I was in Carysfort and I went home. I never saw myself staying at Dublin. I went home. I wanted to teach at home and that didn't work out for me. There weren't a lot of jobs in the 80s and I subbed a lot and I had temporary jobs and I really wanted to stay at home and in the end economic necessity drove me back to Dublin.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

I was working in Lismore for a year and we had a principal there, Sister Maureen Glendon, she was very good to me and she gave me a day off to go around the Gaelscoil and in Cork with my CV, because that's where the jobs were, the Gaelscoil and I were eight months old I could say four, but then I had spent time in the Gaeilscoil in Youghal and when I came back she said to me there's two jobs in Dublin, have you any CVs left? And I said I have two. And she replied to me and I said I don't want to go back to Dublin and she'd go on humor me she said. So I applied for a school and Scoil Santain and heard from them again and they interviewed me and gave me a job and I came back to Dublin in 88.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

And I suppose I would never have had the life I've had if I didn't come back to Dublin. I'd have had a very different life if I stayed in Youghal. So you know what's for you won't pass you, as a lot of people say, and I suppose I was meant to come back. I utilized what Dublin gave me and that I educated myself. I did a lot of qualifications in law, I did my master's in Maynooth and I had the opportunity of doing things that I would never have had if I had stayed in Youghal because I would have had to travel to Cork City or something like that. It was about 30 miles away.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

So sliding doors, really, you know.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

Sliding doors absolutely.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

If that nun hadn't encouraged you to throw the CV in, you could have lived your life below in Youghal, had a job come your way and a completely different life.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

Completely different life and you know, I think you should grasp those opportunities. I went out in Secondment in 2015 to be the national coordinator of what was the International Induction Programme for Teachers and is now Oide Droichead Induction Programme. And I again a friend of mine rang me and said Mary Burke is retiring from NIPT. And I said I know that. And he said would you not apply for that? I said no interest.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

The only secondment I wanted was the director's job in Dublin West, which I subsequently did. But he just put me thinking and I said you know what? I fill in the form and I'll throw in that application, which I did. I had four days in which to do it and I put my best into it and when I was interviewed and got the job, I went yeah, you know, it's no direction, something I never thought of. Doing. New adventure, try that. And it was very controversial at the time. Droichead was very controversial at the time of primary, but I really believed in it. We had piloted it in school previous year ourselves and I just thought this is the way to go. So again, it was just something somebody said to me. Sometimes people are meant to cross your path.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

Well, to be fair, maybe sometimes people see things in you you might not see in yourself and you're fortunate enough to have somebody prod you along to the next step because they've seen that in you. And when you respond to it, then you're really just fulfilling what they thought was already there, that you hadn't realized yourself perhaps.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

And sometimes you don't think outside the box. I do know the things but never really did for my own career Like I always wanted to be a teacher. I knew I wanted to be a principal when I had been subbing around the schools my first few years and you see schools that really work and you see schools that don't and you learn very quickly the importance of school leadership and I always wanted to be a principal and I loved being a principal and I loved my school and I think people thought I would be carried out of there in a box because I started that school and I was the first principal in that school in Maynooth. But opportunities come along and it's great to be able to grasp them and to try it and to take that chance and to do it. And I suppose from that point of view secondment is great because you still have the insurance policy of your job waiting for you to go back to. So NIPT was great because it was secondment and here in Dublin West was secondment as well.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

And then when the INTO job came along again that was by chance. Again Deirbhile Nic Craith, who had the job before me, was emailing education. I just sent the ad to email to education centre directors to see what they'd be interested in and again landed in my inbox and I opened it and went, oh, that looks interesting and said, why not? I said I would apply for that and love it, absolutely. Love what I do Again completely different to anything I've ever done before, but all the learning I've done so far has been great and all the people I knew got to know and all the contacts I made and the understanding I have of the system has been really invaluable to me in this current job.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

So all the changes you made along the way where you stepped outside the comfort zone, be it in work or in studies or outside of work. What's the motivating factor in that morning? Why do you do it Like it's easier to go for a walk of an evening or sit at home and watch strictly come dancing or whatever it is? Why do you keep doing that to yourself?

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

I'm nosy, but I think I have a huge curiosity about how things work, how the system works, why people make decisions. I remember quite a long time ago I think it was around the SSE guidelines, I think, before they were issued first being at a meeting on Gaelo ideachas I think it's a very small organization at the time so the board members were sent to meetings and sitting around a table in the department listening to what was happening. And I went the decisions that are being made here are going to impact my life as a principal and my teacher's lives in their classrooms. And I remember saying at the time now, hang on, this is going too fast. You're all making decisions here that it were gonna impact myself and my teachers and the teachers and all the other schools, and you're all going back to offices. I'm the only one here that's going back to a school Now. I'm the one that's going back to the office now that's making some of those decisions.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

But it fascinated me that how this is how policy is made. It's such things that affect the lives of teachers in classrooms and the lives of children in schools. This is how it happens. It happens at tables like this, in meetings like this, where people have ideas which may or may not be good ideas, and I really wanted to have a part in that. So it's an innate curiosity and also I think it's important to me personally to make an impact, to make a difference, and, be it that with a child in a class or a teacher on your staff, that you've had some kind of a positive impact on their lives or another facet of education. That's important to me as well.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

Tell me this Máirín, any teacher listening to this would want to know those meetings in the lofty rooms of the Department of Education or wherever else, and the people at them who are going back to their offices. Have they the first clue what's going on in schools? Do they care? Have they a background in teaching? Do they really want to make a change or does it just faceless bureaucrats making a decision based on what's politically correct at the time?

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

It's both. You have people who have never stood in the classroom since the day they left it as a pupil and you have people who have experience in schools and who are incredibly interested and who really want to make things better. Now, a lot of the public servants I have met on an individual basis are wonderful people who really want to make a difference and who want to make things different and want to make things better. They might be going around what you or I might think is the right way. What I have found about INTO since I went into INTO and people were saying, oh yeah, she would say this, wouldn't she? But I found it's an incredibly member driven organisation and everything comes back to how is this going to impact our members. And I found that with other stakeholder bodies as well principles, representative bodies, management bodies all of those stakeholders are thinking how is this going to impact our membership? And we're very member focused and I think there is an awareness now that wasn't there before among public servants and those in the Department of Education. There is a huge piece around teacher workload and there is an acknowledgement that there is huge workload in schools and that we really can't be asked in schools to do any more and that we need to look at doing things differently. But I do think, to answer your question, there is a mixture there.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

There are people who want and policy comes from all sorts of directions at you.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

It can be politically motivated the minister says and the minister wants and the minister gets and even if the people working for the minister don't agree with the minister of the time, if the minister wants it and it might not always be coming from it might be coming from a political imperative rather than educational imperative and that can be a very difficult space to work in.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

And in my current role I get to work to sit on the National Council for National Council for curriculum assessment and say the impact of the minister's announcements around senior cycle have had a huge impact on the work of the council. That was never envisaged before she made those announcements about new subjects for senior cycle, so that can have a huge impact on. You might have a work plan and suddenly that work plan is is out the window and things like the review of the primary language curriculum, which would be scheduled to happen, are not now happening this year because senior cycle subjects have to be designed that the minister announced were going to be in place. So it has an impact when somebody makes a decision further up the food chain on on not all of those decisions, I suppose, are taught through completely and the impact they're going to have.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

Are they aware of the critical juncture at which school leadership finds itself at the moment?

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

I think there is a real awareness that we we are coming to a crisis again, but this isn't new. Like I remember, say, 15-20 years ago, when you know the average application for a principal's job or something like an average application of 2.5 or 2.8 applications or something, and at the time it was small schools were suffering and more, more principles were applying for jobs in bigger schools. Now, senior management in schools aren't applying for jobs because they're looking at the job of the principal and seeing it is completely unsustainable and while the official line still is old, the principal is the leader of teaching and learning the governance and the administration burdens on principles have gone absolutely crazy in the last number of years. I left my principal ship in 2015. I'll be eight, I'm eight years out of my school since November and the job has changed completely since I left and a friend of mine told me recently he said all the joy is gone out of it. You know, for him there was real joy in his principal.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

For me, definitely, when I was a principal, there was real joy in my principal ship, because he feels the joy has gone out of it. Now I think a lot of principals feel that, that the joy has gone out of it that they are, but brought them into it, which was a real love of teaching and learning and all that transfer of knowledge and skills and that, you know, making lives better for people has suddenly been overtaken by form filling, accountability, making sure you have an absolute policy for everything that all your eyes are dotted and your teeth are crossed. Now that is important, and I spoke to a principal the other day who said to me you know, thanks be to God, I had a policy to fall back on when there was an issue, but I do think that the burdens are huge and the expectations are just very, very high for principals.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

Do you think that a lot of the fun has gone out of every workplace? Are schools no different to anywhere else? I think back to you know we both started in teaching around the same time. There was great fun and great crack, but there's a lot less accountability. Maybe those two things were related. But has the school and every school in Ireland? Is there less fun to be had than there was years ago? And is that related? Just it's the culture of workplaces in the time we live in.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

That's interesting. I don't think it's less fun for the kids because we still hear parents saying, oh my God, children love school and they go and smile in their face every morning. And you know, in a lot of schools in the guys' school and in the educated together schools and whatever there's a different kind of relationship. I was always called Máirín most of my career, whereas my sister would have felt, you know, she was Mrs Mullins or she was Mrs Kelleher and to call her anything else would have been, you know, disrespectful, whereas there was a relationality. I always felt I'd been called Máirín. So I think there's a different relationship in a lot of the schools now between the kids and their teachers. But I think maybe for the teachers there's less fun.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

I think there's a lot of pressure on younger teachers that was not on us when we were younger teachers. I think the culture of social media is a huge pressure. I think I've spoken to a lot of young teachers who talk about the pressure they're under from what we call the Insta teachers all these perfect teachers online with perfect classrooms, selling wonderful resources, making a very good living out of it, and they feel, oh my God, my classroom should look like that. So I'm to a teacher recently and she was saying you know, you know, you wake up in the morning and there's something in it. Oh my God, it's rolled dahl day. I never knew which was rolled dahl day. I'm not prepared for roll dahl day. Rather than it's Tuesday, just get through.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

All I need is Roald Dahl day.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

No offense to Roald Dahl, but I think they're under a lot of pressure. I think there there is a greater access to the teacher than there ever was before from parents, particularly after COVID. I think that there's a higher expectation of what teachers are expected to do. There is a higher expectation both of the system of parents, of the children themselves expect more from their teachers than ever was expected from us when we started off. Some of that is good, but some of that puts huge pressure on younger teachers. I do feel that, as you're saying, probably a lot of the fun has gone out of it. We did have great fun, we did have great crack. We. I remember sitting knitting in staff rooms or sing songs, session ceoil and some of the schools that I worked in. If there was musicians they might be a bit of music. Somebody might have a guitar or a break. Tell them there might be a song. You don't see that a lot now.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

I think in schools I often actually think back to. I worked in England for a year and at lunchtime on a Friday we'd all go down to the pub and you'd have two pints. It's unthinkable now. It's unthinkable now.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

There was a little pub around the corner and we would ring them about 12 o'clock and say that three or four of them, or three or four of us, were coming down for our lunch and they would have it on the table and we would have it. We didn't have the pints, it would have been frowned on.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

Yeah, yeah.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

But friends of mine did, particularly secondary school teachers, so much of it in an hour for lunch went and they had a pint. And when I worked in Lismore there was a little cafe that was only open on a Friday and Saturday and we all ran down on Friday for our lunch because they did lovely cakes, and we ran back up again and it was three quarters of an hour lunch because the nuns had to go back to the convent for their dinner in the middle of the day. So we had 45 minutes for lunch so you could afford to run down the town in Lismore. But no, those kind of things don't happen anymore, I think.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

No, no, To use a sailing term with which you'd be familiar. I'm going to change tack a small bit here.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

Right lad.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

And we've listeners with varying degrees of gaeilge. But you have a real passion for the Irish language and you spent the majority of your career doing what you could in schools for the Irish language and I'm sure you've left an indelible marker on a lot of students for a grá for the language. Why?

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

Well, Ultan, I like to say it's Ghertyrra Sór Timpistach Aví Onam, an accidental tourist in Arnol, the Gael school yachta. My mother went to what was called an A school. That was an Irish and all Irish post primary. But I knew nothing Gaelscoil, Gaelscoileachta. And when I was in college there was a lady there, a mature student, whose kids went to school at Orcombe. But that was my only contact with Gaelscoileachta. But the year before I left college a Gaeilscoil opened in Youghal and when I went home and I was looking for subbing there was a girl there who had very bad asthma and while I never wished any ill on the girl, I used to be delighted when I heard she wasn't well because it meant she was out for two weeks and I'd get a bit of work. But my first subbing job out of college was Nínón Hínchur, senior infants in Gael school Korón in Ocál, and I went into this room with all these littleies in it and I was just I say the word of rodig and triachtul a boant lesh. It was utterly magical the way these little children had assimilated and soaked in this language and completely effortlessly on their part, and they were more confident speaking Irish than I was coming out of training college and I went oh my God, I have to do this. So I got a lot of subbing there and I loved it. I absolutely loved it and I joined Conor Noguilge and I brought down the average age quite considerably on the committee when I joined. There's a lot of more compatriots of my parents and remembered my grandfather being in Conor Noguilge. But that built up my confidence with Irish because there were suddenly 12 or 15 people who in the matchdown, the street and you all spoke Irish to you because you were at the Conor meeting on the Thursday night. And I got a job then for a year in the Gael school. One of the girls went on career break and that just cemented it for me that that was the way my career was going.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

And the following year I didn't work through the medium of Irish. I was in Lismore but the principal had said to me no, back to the Gael school. No, they're growing. There were jobs there. And then I ended up in Scoil Santain for two years school Kathleen, maud or Fashach and Lena and then I went out and started the Gael school in Maynooth and I was there for nearly 20 years but it was very, very special all together and it's an amazing community.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

Lothan the Gael school I mean Lothan the Gaelge are there are special community anyway, I think, but within that people who are really passionately interested in education and people only go to work in the Gael school if they're interested in going to work in a Gael school. So you get these teachers who are really interested in what they do and they're there for a reason. It's not just the school around the corner. They've made an actual choice. I'm sure educate together and the CNSs get the same thing. People make that choice.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

But you have to have the Gaeilge get to go to work in a Gaeilscoil and we discovered over the years that if you can learn it when you come in, if the junior infants can learn it, the Muinteoirí can learn it as well.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

And I spent a lot of time trying to demystify Gaeilscoil for student teachers and I got the opportunity to do that in Froebel for a couple of years and that was great to say to people. You're going for a week and see, you know, if junior infants could do it, you can do it. And one or two people came to me afterwards and said you know, I'd never applied for a Gaeilscoil, only for what you told us and you know. He said to us to go in and Froebel have a Tahi Gael school, which I think is great. The students go in for a week and it's not marked, it's just experience and they do, and then they'll wash the paint brushes or they'll do, but it's just to soak up the atmosphere and see what happens. But there is a magic to it and I still believe there is a magic to it.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

So, Máirín, to jump to your other. Well, one other great passion in your life Dublin West Education Support Center, now Dublin West Education Center, dwec. You have a long, long, long standing commitment to Dublin West. Could you tell me how you got into it and why you stayed in it?

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

How I got into it. Well, as a young teacher I was always interested in what's now called CPD, but I just did courses after school. And when I to Scoil Caitlin Maud in particular it was around the same time that the what was then called the School of Psychological Services was being piloted and they were based in Brookfield and they used to run courses in the evenings and the afternoons after school for teachers and I started doing that and that was very interesting Because we're dealing with a very disadvantaged cohort of pupils and we had no training in that and we, god almighty you, do anything you know to see what's that you could do to help the kids. So I got used to being involved in just doing courses. And then the department then started a pilot scheme called Teacher Counselors and are now the support teachers and they're still looked after by Dublin West and Dublin West was given the responsibility for the CPD, for the teacher counselors, and we were taken out of school and we were given really good training in counseling and in circle time and various other interventions with children.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

And Don Heron, who was the first director ever here in Dublin West Education, came in one day and he said look, we're going to be responsible for the CPD. We'd love a teacher counselor on the management committee. If anybody is interested in doing it, would you let me know? And I I went back and I said to my principal, porico the year, who I didn't know but was on the Management Committee here at the time, and I said Don Herron said Well, I'm actually on the Management Committee too, so why don't you come to the meeting on Monday night and see how it goes? So I did and the rest is history, and that is nearly 28 years ago. But I can see the power of continuous professional development. You know, you can see the teachers gathering in groups and the richness of that interaction and the chat and the talk. And you know I tried this or I tried that, or somebody helped me, or teachers are incredibly generous to each other and the learning that happens when teachers get together is just phenomenal. So I got involved in the Management Committee, loved it, because Dublin West was involved in support services and that gave you a kind of a view of what was happening in the education system, because you knew what was coming down the line and you knew what was happening and what was being developed, got involved in delivering CPD myself and delivered here in Dublin West and a couple of other education centres and through that then I was invited to work in St Pat's as a part time lecturer and I was there for about 12 years and then went from there to Fribble where I stayed until last year.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

But the demands of my current job mean I can't always guarantee you I will be there in the new at four o'clock on a Thursday, so I'm going to have a wait another while for me.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

But I just have a complete commitment to the education centres, completely part of my life, and even when I was in school they would have just said are you going to your second home, you know? And when I started working with the induction program we were in St Pat's and we moved over here and nobody was a bit surprised Because I said where else would you have gone more in, you know? So I've really enjoyed my time here. I've. Dublin West has been really good to me and I've learned so much as a member of the management committee here and the support I've got from colleagues, people down the years, like Gerard McHugh who was the director here, John Williams, yourself more recently, and all the other members of the management committee, who are completely empowering of each other, and people from Dublin West have gone on to do great things all over the place, you know, but have always maintained, I think, the link and the loyalty to the centre.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

Yeah, it is exceptional, Máirín, really, that I suppose the energy, the buzz, the camaraderie that exists here in the centre and I think when, when teachers come in here, they can feel that we're here for them. That's our raison d'etre is to be, here for them, but anyway.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

So I suppose you've seen it all and you've still got a good road ahead of you. What makes you hopeful for the future of teaching in Ireland at the minute? What are the little pointers? You say Look at that now, see the direction we're going in. Isn't that fantastic?

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

I know that special ed is very controversial at the moment and schools feel very unsupported, but I do think it's one of the we actually do inclusion very well in Ireland. Through projects with Dublin West and my current job, I've had the privilege of visiting schools abroad and we do, we do special education very well here. We had policy advice recently which basically says we will continue to have a menu, we will continue to have special schools, we will still continue to have special classes. It needs to be supported by other services and that piece is very broken at the moment. So that makes me very cross, it makes me very angry. Schools are the only service that can say to you I'm sorry, we won't be here tomorrow, I'm sorry your teacher is going maternity leave, we'll see you in a year. Whereas you know, speech and language therapists are not replaced. Occupation therapists, psychologists, snp psychologists, cenos are not replaced when they go in maternity leave and that's a huge, huge barrier to our system. But I'm very hopeful that special ed we, that we will sort it out because um well, I'm to you are holding a special ed conference soon on the future of special education in Ireland and just the other day there was a very interesting kickoff project meeting. Ourselves and the fins actually are both looking at our special education systems. They're revising theirs as well and you, the EU, will will fund the two systems to collaborate on the development of a new system. I'm very hopeful about that.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

A couple of other things.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

I see, small things that I think could make a huge difference.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

There's a lot of talk about teacher agency and people say it to me oh yeah, that's just another buzzword, but I really do think that teachers are incredible professionals and they are really dedicated to what they do, but they need to use their voices and they need to.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

I think for a long time, we have felt, oh, I need someone to tell me how to do this. I'm never a kind of person who waited for someone to tell me how to do it. I really believe in trying it for yourself and being able to articulate, being able to articulate your ideas and your practice and why you're doing something, the way you're doing it, and I really think that I can see that coming in the younger teachers now, that confidence of being able to say well, I'm doing it this way, because I'm trying it this way, because that's really, really important. Another piece I think is really interesting and I think really important is the whole concept of student voice and many years ago I remember having a conversation with what we're called remedial teachers at the time and we were talking about with a parent about a fifth class child that we were terribly, terribly worried about and the child turned around and she says why don't you ask me?

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

No.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

And that was a completely profound moment for me. And there she was and we were all chatting away about what we thought was best for her and she said why don't you ask me? And she sat there then and she told us I find this very hard and I find that very hard, but I found this easier and I like doing things this way and it was the first time that this was about nearly 20 years ago and just don't want to be like why didn't we ask her? Why did nobody ask? It's a no brainer, it's a complete no brainer. And now this, all this talk about teaching student voice.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

And a number of years ago I got involved in the Beacons project and that was really interesting because it brought together school communities at local level, pupils, parents, teachers and some outsiders and that was really powerful because the children were so amazing and so able to articulate how they saw education, what they wanted from education, what their worries were, what their hopes and dreams were, and it blew us all away.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

And from a policy point of view and a paperwork point of view, ireland is very, very far ahead of the posse in Europe on policy on including the voice of children. I'm not so sure that the practice has cut up with the policy yet, but we see things like the Chief Inspector now issuing a newsletter to children to tell them what the inspector's doing schools, and we see inspectors engaging with students and pupils and young people when they go in to do inspections and schools. And I think that's amazing because we need to ask them and we need to hear what we want, because we're at a certain point in our lives where I, you know, maybe the best years of my life are behind me, maybe they're yet to come.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

Not a chance, Máirín.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

I haven't as many of them left, I'd say, as the 12 year old or the 14 year old or the eight year old, and they can be very profound about how they see education and what education needs to do for them, what we need to do for them, and I think that is a very nice chink of light that I would like to explore.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

Nice one. I'm going to wind up here now this series. I'm asking all of the interviewees to give me a question that I can ask somebody else. So one of the other interviewees had said a good question to ask and to finish up on I'll ask you what's the single fondest memory you have from your teaching days that brings a smile to your face. So you know, when you look back at when you were teaching, is there a little memory in your mind you go, ah, remember that, and it brings a smile to your face, a little interaction or a little something that happened.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

There are thousands of them, but there is one that sticks out in my mind. One was in the Gaeilscoil in Maynooth and my mum had passed away and went back in after my bereavement leave and one of the kids special needs child who was very fond of, still very fond of, came up and he put his arms around me and gave me a big hug and he said I have to give you a barróg tá brón orm le do Mhamaí.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

Like Janey Mack.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

And I just went. That's what it's all about. You know, that's what it's all about.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

That has been absolutely great chatting with you. We've shared lots of chats, but this has been a little bit different.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

Slan.

Ultan Mac Mathúna:

Tune in next week for another episode of Teachers Themselves and if you're enjoying this season, go back and find episodes from season one - all around CPD. Don't forget to hit that bell, like and subscribe, leave us a review and share it with colleagues and friends. We want to hear from you. Your feedback informs the show, so look out for the episode, questions and polls. You can follow us across our social media channels Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook. The links are in the show notes. If you have any thoughts on today's episode or suggestions for future topics, email Zita here at zrobinson@ dwec. ie. Oh and, as always, don't forget to book your CPD. Go to our website, dwec. ie. That's dwec. ie. Have a great week. Slan tamaill.

Máirín Ní Chéileachair:

Teachers Themselves is a DWEC original, produced and created by Dublin West Education Centre.

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Ultan Mac Mathúna

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