Sir, - Liam Banes (November 19th) rightly expresses the frustration, disappointment and anger felt by numerous students and providers of adult education at the treatment they have received from a succession of governments for the past 20 years.
During the 1980s, as the only paid adult literacy organiser in the country, I travelled all over Ireland in a rickety old van, owned by the husband of my part-time assistant, providing one-day training courses to hundreds of volunteer literacy tutors recruited by the new adult education organisers. We ran these courses in draughty old halls, parts of schools that were never used, people's houses, Portacabins and anywhere else we could find. We did them on Saturdays and at nights so we could get our day work done as well.
We campaigned and lobbied and our success was marked by the first Adult Literacy and Community Education Budget in the mid 1980s. It was £400,000 divided between 38 VECs.
We brought illiteracy out of the closet. When we quoted a Department of Education report (never published) suggesting that 400,000 Irish adults had literacy difficulties, we were castigated for exaggeration. Meanwhile our volunteers provided an average of 90 free hours of tuition per head in venues nobody else would use. Each year we went to the Department of Education asking for tiny funds to support our work. Each year we were told resources were scarce; young people come first; wait, be patient; times will get better. On a wing and a prayer we hung in there, believing in the importance and necessity of adult education, waiting for the times to get better.
Fifteen years on, times have truly got better. Ireland is awash with money - but for whom? The Adult Literacy and Community Education Budget stands at a meagre £2 million at a time when more than £2 billion is spent on education. A Government has seen fit to allocate £250 million to technology education and £250,000 (0.1 per cent as much) to adult literacy.
Some 500,000 adults have literacy problems, according to the recent OECD Report. Eighty per cent of adult literacy teaching is still done by volunteers. Thousands of women still come to adult education classes in draughty old halls, parts of schools that were never used, people's houses, Portacabins, anywhere they can find.?
This time there is no excuse. The resources are there. Could it be that the Government are taking the Rhett Butler approach and don't give a damn! - Yours, etc., Berni Brady, Director, AONTAS, National Association of Adult Education, Earlsfort Terrace, Dublin 2.