The school discipline crisis, overcrowding, and inadequate health and safety procedures are all creating huge problems in second-level schools here - with work-related stress accounting for more than one in three teacher absences from schools.
These are among the main conclusions of an Association of Secondary Teachers Ireland (Asti) survey of 270 second-level schools which says stress is now the number one occupational hazard for second-level teachers.
Meanwhile, delegates to the Asti conference next week are to vote on a motion calling for the rights of teachers to teach "free from disruption, intimidation and abuse" to be enshrined in legislation. The motion also calls for Asti to seek to ensure that highly disruptive pupils can be removed from class.
Asti says students and teachers are at risk because schools are breaching health and safety legislation by doing little to address "glaring gaps" in the way problems are dealt with.
The survey finds that just one in 10 schools has written policies on sexual harassment and bullying of staff. Some 31 per cent of teachers also said inconsistent implementation of discipline policies in schools was a health hazard for them.
Students and teachers may also be at risk because 27 per cent of schools have not conducted a fire drill in the past year, the survey finds. This has prompted concerns that schools may be facing a legal "time bomb" in the future, as the existence of formal policies and procedures in a school would be a key consideration in any legal action.
Asti also says it is greatly concerned that many of the survey's findings indicate that little has changed when it comes to the health and safety of teachers in the four years since its previous survey on the issue.
Among the other key findings of the survey to be presented at Asti's annual conference in Cork next week are:
• 37 per cent of teachers cited stress or anxiety as the reason for their their absence from work;
• 19 per cent of schools have no safety statement in place, while half have no elected health and safety representative;
• 82 per cent of teachers received no training or advice on stress management in the past year;
• Although the physical environment in most schools was considered satisfactory, classrooms and staffrooms were considered least satisfactory, with overcrowding a problem; and
• After school accommodation, the second most-common concern of respondents was the school climate, with poor student discipline regarded as a key negative factor.
Asti acting general secretary John White yesterday called for the re-establishment of an educational welfare service for teachers, which previously operated on a pilot basis.
"Other civil servants and the gardaí have a welfare service, but it was disbanded a few years ago and has never been re-established," he said. "Fifty-five thousand teachers do need a welfare service where they can get advice on issues such as stress."
Other major motions call for Asti to reject any move to require teachers to assess their own pupils, as well as for a review of parent-teacher meetings which take place outside school hours in order to focus on the health and safety issues these raise.
Delegates will also vote on motions calling for Asti to ballot its members on rejoining the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, and on an amalgamation with the Teachers' Union of Ireland.