There has never been a more challenging time to be a school principal, says George O'Callaghan. As the head of an organisation that represents the management of two-thirds of the State's schools, he should know. He talks to John Downes

George O’Callaghan of the Joint Managerial Body (JMB), which represents the management of the majority of secondary schools in the Republic of Ireland, is arguably one of the most influential figures in Irish education today.

Involved in many of the national negotiations on education issues, he is also in daily contact with principals and school management across the State. He is perfectly positioned to know what things are like for those working at the education coalface.

One of the most striking developments for the JMB’s members in recent years has been the significant increase in the demands placed on principals and school managers, he says. Changes in the legislation governing schools, including the introduction of the Education Act in 1998, mean the role of the school principal is increasingly a multi-faceted one.

"These days, the school principal has to be quite a lot of things. They have to be an expert on legislation, both educational and employment and health and safety. They are also managing, in business terms, what would be regarded as a significant business enterprise, because they manage a fairly large budget, and they have to account for that. So they’re also an accounting person as well.

"Principals have a pastoral role, not only with the students but also with the teachers, in terms of supporting and assisting them in their teaching in the school. And obviously in terms of managing both parents, pupils and teachers, they have to exercise the skills of a diplomat as well."

But there is another aspect of the Education Act which O’Callaghan feels has had perhaps an even greater impact on the role of principals.

Section 29 of the Act, which deals with appeals against long-term suspensions (those of over 20 days) and expulsions, has put new demands on schools in terms of paperwork, documentation and procedures that must be followed. There are distinct discipline implications as well, says O’Callaghan.

"One of our concerns with regard to the appeals system is that quite often schools make decisions about expulsions in the interests of the general school population," he explains. "What many schools have been finding is that very often pupils they have decided should be expelled from the school for good and sound reasons are being sent back to the school with the consequent difficulties that causes in terms of managing  the situation." This is not helped, he adds, by a shortfall in the necessary resources that the school might require to deal with the situation.

While the appeals board might indicate that supports such as counselling and/or assessment should be provided, the reality is that they rarely, if ever, follow.

"It’s a funding issue generally in the system," he says. "If there is a balance to be kept in the system, whereby it’s felt that such students should not be removed from school and should be given a second opportunity, then, obviously, the root cause of why they were being removed in the first place has to be tackled."

As the discipline issue underlines, balancing the rights of pupils with what is good for the school-going population as a whole is not always easy. Add to this the input of parents, and school managers can sometimes find themselves faced with a tricky balancing act.

"One of the big things for boards of management – and for school managers and principals – is this issue that the rights of students and parents have come very much to the fore. That’s not necessarily a bad thing in itself," O’Callaghan agrees.

"But what it has imposed on people is the need for a form of due process with regard to any decisions that are made. And there has been an extremely high learning-curve required on the part of schools in order to achieve this."

Another problem his members encounter is what he describes as a "lack of synchronisation" between the introduction of new initiatives and the lead-in time allowed for this.

The recent high-profile disagreement between the Department of Education and the teaching unions on the question of parentteacher meetings seemed to ignore one important aspect: the introduction of the parent-teacher meetings was structured in a way that was, he says, almost unworkable for school managers.

As a result, he says, it led to timetabling difficulties for schools and school services. For example, where school buses are running at the same time each day, students would be released with no way of getting home.

One important element of the parentteacher meeting dispute was the link the Department made with the payment of the proposed benchmarking awards to teachers.

So how can the problem of underperforming teachers be addressed, since benchmarking is meant to bring with it enhanced productivity?

"Part of the problem, and this idea has seemed to develop over the past  years, is the notion that there are more bad teachers in the system than there actually are," says O’Callaghan. "People tend to focus on the negative aspects, rather than the positive aspects.

The Irish educational system is much praised and much lauded, and rightly so. What seems to be being promoted is dealing with it in a very mechanistic way."

According to O’Callaghan, "If a teacher has difficulties, then they need some support, and some measure of retraining. I think if that element was introduced into the system you are then dealing with a very tiny number of people, who, ultimately, it may be found are not best suited to teaching.

These people may need help and support, I suppose, in that journey. I don’t think waving the big stick is the solution to the problem, in any situation like that. It’s too simplistic a solution."

O’Callaghan also believes that, up until now, the Government has benefited from a "first-class education at a bargain-basement price".

Indeed, one of the JMB’s major campaigns in recent years has aimed to ensure that funding for voluntary secondary schools is on a par with schools in the other sectors, an issue where he believes much remains to be done.

One possible way of increasing the resources allocated to schools might be to abolish State support for teachers’ salaries in the fee-paying sector. Perhaps understandably, however, given that some of the schools affected would be members of the JMB, O’Callaghan does not support this step and says it would do little to address the problem of lack of resources in schools.

"I don’t think that would really solve the problem. It would only shift the goalposts in many respects, because the result would be that the schools would have to increase their fees significantly," he says. "And it would make it unaffordable for many students to attend those schools, with the result that they would obviously go to schools in the non fee-paying sector. The Department would then have to pay the salaries of the extra teachers required there. Effectively, they would just shift the requirements from one side to the other."

In the future O’Callaghan sees the JMB’s role as one of support for the management of schools, in particular in helping them to develop the necessary skills to respond to the legislative change that will continue to occur.

He is, however, under little doubt of the size of the task ahead, citing the proposed Education for Persons with Disabilities Bill as one example of legislation that may raise the expectations of parents while ignoring the need for the funding to match the delivery of those expectations.

"Very often what happens is that schools get notified of late changes, and they have a week to respond – and that is the problem.

"We would like to see that with any changes that are being brought in, that schools would be notified, that there would be a lead-in time to allow schools the opportunity to develop a proper response to those changes."