The INTO has criticised cuts in the number of teacher-training places for graduates.
It has claimed that courses in the traditional colleges of education were being scaled back because of the new privately run online course run by Hibernia College.
The Minister for Education, Mr Dempsey, announced that he had approved another 18-month, full-time postgraduate course for primary teaching to be delivered in the colleges of education. This will provide a further 280 places for students with a degree who wish to qualify as primary teachers.
But the INTO said that this represented a cut of 180 places from courses in St Patrick's, the Froebel College and the Marino Institute of Education in Dublin and Mary Immaculate College in Limerick.
The INTO general secretary, Mr John Carr, said: "The reduction in numbers . . . clearly shows that the Hibernia College course is being used not to produce additional badly needed primary teachers, but to scale back the courses in the colleges of education. The INTO is deeply concerned by this development and calls on the Minister to reverse the cutback and restore the numbers to their previous levels."
More than 170 graduates have enrolled for the €5,500 graduate diploma course run by Hibernia College.
In his statement, Mr Dempsey said that 2,193 places had been made available on primary teaching postgraduate courses in the colleges of education in the past six years.
He continued: "I am pleased to announce this further course as part of the expansion in teacher-training promised by this Government."
The Minister also said that the number of undergraduate intake places stood today at 1,000 per year, which was double the number of places available in 1996/97.
"There are now just over 3,000 undergraduate students in our teacher-training colleges, with another 460 on an existing postgraduate course," he said.
In acknowledging the assistance of the colleges of education in facilitating teacher-training numbers, the Minister said: "Their co-operation in increasing the output of primary teachers to meet the needs of schools arising from significant additional teacher allocations in recent years is greatly appreciated."
The new postgraduate course will begin in the colleges of education in January/February 2004.
The INTO general secretary has claimed that Irish class sizes were the highest in the EU. Addressing an education conference in Letterkenny, Mr Carr said teachers could not focus on individual children when they had classes of up to 30 pupils.
