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This article is about challenges facing Irish-language schools. You can read it in Irish here.
FIVE DECADES AGO, Ireland had only a smattering of Irish-speaking schools outside the Gaeltacht – ten at primary level, and just five at secondary. Now there are 150 Gaelscoileanna and 44 Gaelcholáistí across the 26 counties, with demand far exceeding the number of available places.
Bláthnaid ní Ghréacháin of Gaeloideachas, a representative national body for education through the Irish language, points to a steady growth in interest from parents over recent years. “One of our biggest challenges has been the lack of new schools to meet that demand, and then dealing with parents’ disappointment about not getting their school of choice,” she says.
Cormac McCashin of An Foras Pátrúnachta, a patron of Irish-medium schools, finds that a lot of parents now appreciate the value of a bilingual education. “People became more open to the idea as new schools opened and they saw a neighbour or sibling with a child in a Gaelscoil, and saw the excellent education they were getting. Some parents think it isn’t for them because of the language, but only a small percentage of students in Gaelscoileanna speak Irish at home.”
The establishment of new primary schools previously involved open competition for patronage – a process said to have disadvantaged parents wanting education through Irish. An intervention by the Irish language commissioner led to a new approach being introduced in 2019, resulting in Irish-medium schools being prioritised in areas without a Gaelscoil. But the projected sharp fall in the number of primary school pupils over the next decade will mean few opportunities to open new schools in the coming years.
There are also still significant barriers to post-primary education in Irish, with many graduates of Gaelscoileanna having no Gaelcholáiste to attend locally. McCashin points out that there are six Irish language primary schools in the Tullamore area, but not a single Irish language secondary school. “The state is investing in something only for that investment to be lost at second level,” he says. “Students are losing the Irish they’ve become so proficient in at primary school because they don’t have the option of a secondary education in Irish.”
Advocates argue that the selection system for new secondary schools is still skewed against Irish-language education. “The patronage competitions are a first-past-the-post system whereby we, as a minority choice, are put in direct competition in terms of numbers with the English-medium option,” says McCashin. “How are we going to win any of those competitions?”
Ní Ghréacháin acknowledges that establishing secondary schools “is much more complex than primary”. Securing teachers with subject expertise and Irish language proficiency is “a real challenge”, she says.
The Department of Education points out that there are multiple factors at play in the patronage process. “Parental preferences from parents of children in the school planning areas concerned, together with other considerations such as the extent of diversity of provision currently available in these areas (including Irish-medium provision), are key to decisions in relation to the outcome of the process,” a spokesperson said.
Options
One approach followed by the Department has been to set up Irish language units within English language post-primary schools. The unit, or aonad, operates under the same management board and roll number as the school in which they’re hosted. A spokesperson for the Department said an aonad “may be appropriate in certain circumstances”.
However, Ní Ghréacháin says that approach is far from ideal. “The aonad system has now become the default model of provision, but they don’t provide the full immersion experience for students. Some have a stronger identity and ethos than others through having their own building away from the English-speaking part, for example, with no contact or interference when it comes to the language of communication or instruction. Unfortunately, that’s not usually the case.
“Schools that follow an immersion programme should be standalone schools with their own patron and board of management. We have no roadmap from the Department on how these units are to become a fully-fledged independent school, which should be the ultimate aim.”
Advocates compare the system here to places such as Wales, which has set ambitious future targets for education through the Welsh language. McCashin says there were more Gaelscoileanna than Welsh-speaking schools in the early 1980s, but that Wales now has much stronger provision. “The support for schools there is grounded in legislation and not just lip service,” he says. “I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve had to tell parents, ‘You have a right to education for your child, but not a right to Irish-medium education.’”
Several schools in Wales have also moved away from English as their language of instruction – something advocates would like to see replicated in Ireland. Synge Street in Dublin 8 switched from English to Irish in 2017, and Gealoideachas is hoping to encourage others to make that change in the coming years. “It’s an easier route to take than establishing a new school, especially in areas that don’t need any more schools,” says ní Ghréacháin. “We’ve been looking to Wales to see how that’s been managed, and what we can learn from them.”
McCashin says governments in other European countries tend to have a better understanding of the benefits of bilingualism and multilingualism. “The places where immersion education and minority language teaching are blossoming are places where the state puts their money where their mouth is, so to speak. We’re constantly fighting with the Department of Education in relation to the provision of Irish-medium education.”
A department spokesperson said that a working group has been established to progress a new policy for Irish-speaking schools outside the Gaeltacht. The spokesperson said the policy would be informed by a public consultation as well as a review of national and international literature on minority language education.
But the question of how to get children speaking Irish beyond the classroom still hangs in the air. “Schools can only do so much,” says ní Ghréacháin. “Children need to have opportunities to do what they like to do through the medium of Irish, whether it be with clubs or other social outlets. We know that the use of Irish among students in Gaelscoileanna often stops the minute they pass the gate of the school. How do we get people to want to socialise in Irish? We want that to be a natural choice for people rather than something that’s enforced by a school or system.”
This work is co-funded by Journal Media and a grant programme from the European Parliament. Any opinions or conclusions expressed in this work is the author’s own. The European Parliament has no involvement in nor responsibility for the editorial content published by the project. For more information, see here.
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Maybe it’s me…my friendships must be different…but why, would you send a video of yourself having sex to your friends???? Are ye going to sit around making suggestions or getting ideas!??? The last picture I got from a friend was a pic of a dress she got and wondering about what shoes to match ? I obviously live a sheltered life!!
@Blah blah: Probably a stupid thing to do yes, but by no means was the rest of the country justified in passing it on and making her an object of derision.
And what was hi name??
A stupid thing to do alright but did she deserve to die? Privacy is going to be a huge thing in the next decade we already have an 18 year old suing her parents for putting pictures of her up on Facebook without her consent. We should be teaching children from an early age about the Internet, consent and their rights. Poor woman. RIP.
@Blah blah: Sounds like victim blaming. Doesn’t matter if it was stupid or not, whoever she sent it to had absolutely no right to share it. May she R.I.P.
Give it a rest. Victim blaming is a myth, however personal responsibility is real.
There was a video posted online recently of by a dad proudly filming his son after buying a girls toy in a toy shop. The dad boasts that he doesn’t care as his son can choose whatever lifestyle he wants. I just thought fair enough, but what about the choice you didn’t give your son when you posted a video of him online playing with a girls toy your moran! I’m delighted that kid is suing her parents. Parents who put pictures or videos of their kids online as sad, shallow and selfish gee bags…
I know a lot of this was this ladies own doing but to push it to the point that she takes her own life is just so sad .
None of it was her fault. What she did certainly wasn’t clever but she was the victim. It’s the doing of whoever (presumably the ex) spread it online.
Didn’t she send the video to him, as an act of revenge or to make him jealous, or to hurt him / rub it in his face???
If so she gave the video to him in the spirit of aggression…..
She was obviously crazy
@hellogoogletracking, that’s a lame & similar argument to “Sure wasn’t she wearing a low cut top to show off her cleavage. Clearly asking for it”
Trying to make someone jealous is a massive step away from putting a video up like that online. While it was the most clever thing for the woman (not “obviously crazy”) to do, that retaliation was way too much.
@JC:
I disagree
She actively sent the video, intentionally……to an ex boyfriend. You tell me the rational reason to do such a thing…..and also to other friends????
It makes no sense whatsoever, unless a malicious act on her part…..this is the internet age, and there are obvious considerations before spreading a video like this……she compromised her own privacy.
If it was the case someone stole the video, or she was the victim in some way i would understand.
The video should not have been uploaded, but she bears 100% responsibility, and acted i a very crazy way in my opinion.
I feel her death is tragic, however it should not effect the objective analysis of events……the message should be….don’t be stupid and crazy and sent private videos of yourself, and publish them online to friends, without expecting them to appear online……should that be the case, no…..is it the case yes.
She didn’t publish them online to friends, she sent it to friends privately. Similar to comments below, strange relationship with friends to send such things BUT if I send a photo/video to someone privately, that is not permission to post it publicly.
If I put it online publicly to share with friends, well that’s a different scenario
@HelloGoogleTracking!: I kind of feel in those situation you just need to own it rather than run from it.
Hello, How can she bear “100% responsibility” for someone else’s action?
@Dave O Keeffe:
She bears 100% responsibility for her actions, which were 100% responsible for the consequences.
Sending the video was a hostile act, and compromised her own privacy, if she was concerned about privacy she would not have sent the video.
Ignoring this and painting her as a victim, is wrong….uploading the video was also wrong, but was a direct consequence of her own actions. Therefore she can be held 100% responsible for all that happened afterwards. I.e. if she had not sent the malicious video to begin with, she would not have suffered….
I agree it was a hostile act and wrong but uploading the video was 100% his decision and he should face the consequences of that. To say she’s 100% responsible for his actions is ridiculous.
Sure Hitler said the same thibg
Hello google, don’t ever become a lawyer because you would be bad at it. You are wrong!
Have to agree with HelloGoogleTracking. Did she for one moment consider her ex’s feelings in sending this revenge tape? Obviously not. What she did was intentionally hurtful, malicious and wrong. Many are assuming it was her ex that posted it online, it could have been any one of her ‘friends’ she sent it to that was peed off with her narcissism. There are always consequences to every action, this one didn’t go her way.
@molly coddled: Totally agree, I was thinking that the video she sent to him could have easily pushed her ex over the line and caused him to take his own life.
Darren that’s exactly what happened to a lad I know, it wasn’t a tape but his ex would parade her new boyfriend on an almost daily basis mauling him in front of her ex, in the shop he worked in, in full view of customers and his colleagues – one day he had enough and tried hanging himself, he survived but is now brain damaged, his whole family is now suffering the consequences of the action by this piece of filth. She subsequently got barred from the shop too little too late I’m afraid.
Molly coddled those two scenarios are no comparable whatsover!
She should taken a leaf from Paris Hilton or Kim K, they both made a fortune off theirs and earned ‘celebrity” status. She let the negative side get the better of her instead of using it to her advantage.
If he had taken his life then she would have to shoulder the blame so why not the other way around?
Careful lads. This is the journal. It’s always the victims fault. The commenters are, of course, perfect.
Deborah, I didn’t see mentioned in the article that ‘he’ posted it online?
You don’t want a sextape on the internet, don’t make one.
Poor girl we all make mistakes in life we regret hers just happened to be put up for the world to see
How does one not get raped? Dont have genitalia?
One tragic mistake. And she literally paid for it with her life, so sad. But teenagers need to look and learn because naked or semi nude pictures sent from phones to other users is rampant. There will be many regrets in the years to come when these kids grow up. If only they could be made to understand how foolish they are now. And that once sent, these images go into the public domaine….for ever.
Terrible tragedy.
The woman was 31 years old not a teenager though.
People need to not maliciously post embarrassing videos of people online.
Or maliciously send videos without thinking, of course giving a video like that is a risk and should not be done.
If she respected her own privacy their would not be a problem, by sending the video she compromised her privacy herself
Crazy to sent it, crazy to commit suicide, but of course it is not her fault…:she is a victim…..of herself????
Was just thinking the same a tragic mistake she probably did it in the heat of the moment (no pun intended) and when she thought about it rationally she obviously regretted the decision she made and tried to have it removed but as Margie says she literally paid for this lack of judgement with her life. Poor girl RIP
While this young girls loss of life is sad she should never have sent the video.
@ray.farrelly: Hindsight is a wonderful thing.
Trevor. Common sense is better.
@ray.farrelly: Unfortunately Ray, everyones life isn’t fault free like your own.
Trevor. Where did I say my life is fault free. I made a comment. Get over it.
It is indeed tragic, but why is a 31 year old woman being referred to as a “young girl”?
Neal. She is young and she is a girl/woman.
Well if that’s the case, how come the man (or young boy?) in the video wasn’t done for statutory rape? (Rhetorical)
She was a grown adult woman, not a young girl, those are the facts.
Describing her as a young girl is deliberate to absolve her of responsibility and increase sympathy, casting her as some delicate innocent soul, abused and the victim of malicious actors.
Of course the truth is she was a grown woman, who sent and desalinated the videos herself, irresponsibly, and stupidly, and is directly responsible and knew exactly what she was doing…….and did it to be mean and evil
And got exactly what she deserved eh?
“Her death came a year after she sent a video of herself having sex to some friends, including her ex-boyfriend, to make him jealous.”
Im guessing she had issues beyond the video.
Pretty much I’d say. It’s not fair to her family either that she’s being trolloped all over the worlds media rather then being remembered as yet another tragic victim of suicide.
Genuinely not trolling here but a dog with a mallet up his hole would tell you that making and sharing a tape is just about the stupidest thing ever. Once it’s out there, it’s nigh on impossible to reign in. Silly tragic pretty girl.
Well put, Adrian!
@Adrian O’Donnell: When trolling, it’s quite appropriate to mention the ould dog with the mallet up its hole, but when you’re just making an ordinary comment in good faith it’s fine to leave it out.
Beautiful woman,But the fact remains she put the video in public by sending it to numerous sources.
Sending it to the ex boyfriend to make him jealous was never going to end well,he could of commit suicide himself.
Tragic that she committed suicide but sadly this nightmare was of her own creation.
What was she thinking sending the video to multiple people,there was only ever going to be one outcome,sounds like something she might have done while drunk!
Why on earth would she send sex tapes to her friends to make them jealous?
not really… she created a video to taunt an ex – a foolish mistake. but a society that allowed her to be shamed for doing something natural because she was a sexual women in a repressed misogynistic society. have no doubt, if she was a man, it wouldn’t have gone so far, and Italy’s judges would have awarded the victim cash and punishment for the distributors. but we all know you object to sexual women, and would blame “slane girl” if the same thing happened to them. thankfully, we are growing up as a society, and you are in the minority.
Eh, she was the distributor. She sent it to multiple sources. She was using her sexuality as a weapon to do emotional damage to someone else. They decided to take revenge. Neither was right, he was more wrong.
She was more wrong.
@Alien8: Jebus A8 you got that inside out. She, perversely, issued the revenge tape video. She put it in the public domain. This is not a matter of growing as a society, or if it is, this was growing pains. The unfortunate girl made a mistake, a big one, she paid a horrendous price.
Byt don’t blame society or men or judges. It was a mistake.
@Alien8: Yeah this nothing like slane girl, she was filmed without her knowledge doing something stupid, this girl sent the tape to her ex, It is sad that she committed suicide, that should never be the outcome, but she made that mistake and it ended up everywhere, I don’t agree with the abuse but this was nothing to do with societies narrow view of female sexuality and everything to do with her doing something spiteful and it backfiring horribly on her
yep, she shared it, not distributed it. no problem with that, people can do what they want, and suffer the consequences of wanting infamy. the issue was with Italy not protecting her when she was openly ridiculed on national television long after it had died down, something which didn’t occur when guys released revenge sex tapes (apparently it happens a lot). the comment was in response to joey, who made it that it was her own fault, which it wasn’t. even if there were underlying issues, we should not think goading people to the point of suicide is acceptable, especially when the reason for the infamy was not the revenge, but rather an attractive women having sex.
@Alien8: If no one is allowed ti know the identity of “Slane girl”, what about the poor unfortunate guy who ends up marrying her?
Why would he be a poor unfortonate guy? What happened was one incident in her life and she should not be condemned and shamed for it for life. She is far more than what happened that day.
@Eamon Mac Gowan: And why would he be a “poor unfortunate guy”? Because she isn’t a perfect innocent virgin? Because she was the unfortunate victim of online shaming to an extreme degree? Should she have to disclose that up front to everyone in case some poor unfortunate guy has his delicate sensibilities offended?
When you date, do you also tell your prospective partner every sexual encounter, every teenage indiscretion, up front?
: Slane boy had death threats, had the cops come to him for questioning, was physically assaulted and had to move house. But yeah, Slane girl had it real bad.
@Kate Mooney:
But the guy who uploaded it has to be shamed and condemned for the rest of his life…..
Or does he get the benifit of your compassion too…….it was one incident that he did, uploading the video, he is fr more than what happened uploading the video….
Lets hold no one responsible for their actions, everyones a victim eh?
Did I suggest the guy who did it should be shamed for life? I asked why her prospective future husband should be pitied.
@Kate Mooney:
Yeah right, I’m sure you’d love to see your son to be walking up the aisle with that kind of woman.
@UndieGrundy: Lad I know him…. that never happened
@Eamon Mac Gowan: She gave some guy head she didn’t murder anyone
@embarrassing: Ha ha, I’m sure there was more than one guy.
What a moron.
Is a sex tape really that humiliating? Dont make it or own it.
Link to video – or it never happened
It usually goes like this, “link to so and so or GTFO” In your case of poor trolling, its GTFO for posting that comment in first place.
@TommieB: I thought Van’s comment was funny.
She is the result of narcissistic sociopathic behavior seen all over social media. She paid the ultimate price with her life choices.
That’s the thing about online privacy. There isn’t any.
She didn’t put it on line.
I didn’t say she did. I was referring to the headline at the top of the article regarding the debate on ‘online privacy’. Look before you leap please.
Have you ever told someone something and then said “don’t tell anyone” it’s your friend so you expect them to keep your secret, and they do, they just meet their other friend and say “guess what” and they say “don’t tell any one” and on and on it goes, there is no such thing as a secret if you tell 1 person, similarly she may have sent the video to a friend not expecting it to be shared but they sent it to their friends and on and on it went, but to send it to get back at her ex was reckless beyond belief.
What’s a tape?
It’s when someone hacks your twitter and tweets love haikus to all your ex boyfriends and/or girlfriends. More commonly referred to as a twape.
I sympathise that this woman was driven to suicide, but with so many cases of sex tapes of really famous people (much less the Joe Soaps) going online for years & the everyday threat of ‘revenge porn’ being such a well known danger, that to send a sex clip of yourself to people is just stupid. How did it not occur to her that this might happen, especially with an ex?
If anything, in this case, she made the revenge porn. Or at the very least turned it into such.
I think we can all agree it was a stupid, stupid thing to do. Fathomless to most of us but what we have to ask is did she deserve the torture that drove her to take her life? She wanted so bad to be forgotten, her mistake to be forgotten, anonymity, should our mistakes be allowed to follow us around for the rest of our lives?
The story is a bit more complicated than that.
a) she had an history of father never been present in the family. Her background was quite difficult on a first place
b) the mother claims she was driven by her boyfriend to make that video, Apparently he liked to watch her having sex with others. It appears she was psychologically fragile.
c) she was the first handing over the video to 5 “trusted” people.
I’m not going to the defend her, though.
If you’re 31 in 2016, you should know that there are no “trustworthy” people on such matter. If you hand over the video out, you know it’ll go viral, eventually.
If you want do it, keep for yourself. Or don’t do at all.
When I was a kid, I was complaining to my teacher that a school mate revealed a secret I confided him. She replied: “you said out loud on a first place. It’t not his fault. You should have choose more carefully who you trust”.
She definitely has to take some of the blame but not her life.
My problem is trying to understand why she would post a video of herself having sex,even if it was to friends. Very emotionally unstable in the first place.Not as clear cut to believe she was a victim in all of this.People need to be very very careful videoing these very personal events.jealous boyfriend or girlfriend, doesn’t matter.
Her reasons for posting the video in the first place left her open to having the video circulated. It was posted to hurt the feelings of a former boyfriend. Internet never forgets. If she had been a bit more savvy she could have patented the phrase and used the income for herself having taken her decision to post it. It is very sad that she ended her life over it given that one third of material on the Internet is pornographic. Looks like an unfortunate catalogue of errors. Maybe her country should take a leaf out of the Saudi censorship of Internet content.
Poor poor girl. It just goes to show how shame takes over people. It’s crazy to think there are countless people who release these sort of videos and revel/get rich off it and are totally shameless.
What did she expect to happen? Shitty end n’all but seriously like, c’mon.
Idiot.
Taking God out of the picture and Sin caused this. A few years ago you will think that we will have a discussion anout guys using women bathroom in America? If you were Cristhian you know that a woman should have sex only with her husband and you know also that recording yourself for another person to see will make that person sin because you are having sexual fantasies with a woman that is not your wife. Cristhian should also know that bullying is wrong and that one should forgive their neighbors and attempting to your live and killing yourself is a sin too, one need to faced the consequence of oneself acts and ask God for forgiveness regardless of what other people think of you.
Yawn
No sympathy in this case!
She would have got on well with Bubba the Love Sponge.
Tragic story though.
Where the link to the video?
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