A fifth of second-level teachers have experienced cyberbullying, survey finds 

Some 63% of those who experienced cyberbullying did so at the hands of students, with parents or guardians the next most culpable cohort at 20%. Most such bullying was a once-off, according to the survey.

ASTI assistant general secretary Moira Leydon said: “It is not because students are any nastier [than they were], it’s that they have access to technology which enables them to bully much, much more readily."

She said while anti-bullying procedures had been in place for students since 2013, there are as yet no such specific policies in place for teachers.

Of those educators who had experienced such bullying, just over half said they responded by informing their principal or deputy principal, while 32% said they had ignored it.

In terms of holding social media companies to account for bullying content placed on their platforms, ASTI deputy general secretary Diarmaid de Paor noted “we need very strong legislation” to provide for the tracking-down of perpetrators of bullying.

He said schools could be advised to copyright their own logos, “because if it’s a copyright breach, the platform will take it down instantly”.

The survey noted second-level teachers were “enthusiastic” users of technology in education — notably in terms of artificial intelligence and its applications — but they are also challenged by a lack of basic resources in schools, including access to computers and technical support.

The study likewise noted the post-covid trend of electronic communications between teachers and students or their parents since the pandemic ended.

Some 79% of the teachers surveyed said they regularly received emails from students outside their standard working hours, with 15% of those receiving such mails on a daily basis.

In terms of communications from parents, 45% of educators said they were receiving emails, 10% of them on a daily basis. More than 40% of teachers said those communications served to add to their workload, and said their work-life balance was being undermined by them.

Recruitment crisis

In terms of the ASTI convention, ASTI general secretary Kieran Christie highlighted the recruitment crisis among teachers, saying there were 602 vacant posts nationally at present.

“That’s one-plus per school, one classroom in each school where the students are there and there’s nobody teaching them on a daily basis,” he said.

Union president Geraldine O’Brien said the agenda would be dominated by two issues: the redevelopment of the senior cycle curriculum away from a ‘one size fits all’ model, and the fact oral exams are once more to be held during the Easter holidays, a further hangover from the covid period.

She said Education Minister Norma Foley had last December confirmed the orals would be held at Easter despite the fact research commissioned into the policy had yet to deliver its findings.

Meanwhile, a separate study from the Irish National Teachers Organisation, which represents primary level teachers and which also has its convention next week, found that 58% of respondents reported experiencing physical aggression in schools in the last year. 

That was broken down to 96% of respondents working in special schools, 61% among those working in mainstream schools with a special class, and 42% of those working in mainstream schools.

50% of those exposed to aggression sustained physical injuries, with 41% of those injured requiring medical attention. The union said 11% of teachers affected missed more than three days of school as a result of physical aggressions.