The Department of Education has revealed last week that school pupils in Northern Ireland played truant more than one million times in the past year. The rate of unauthorized absence for secondary pupils is higher than anywhere else in the United Kingdom. Overall through both legitimate and agreed absence, 7.7% of all classes that pupils could have attended were missed.
A reduction in truancy levels would assist in improving the overall prospects of our young people. Many in our society still fail to make a connection between a good education and prospects later in life. There are families where for generations no o
ne has held down a regular job, and it is very difficult to break such an established cycle. Those without basic skills and training will find lifelong barriers to obtaining work.
We have to make education more relevant to the lives and expectations of those from disadvantaged backgrounds. What they are asked to learn in school has to be relevant to them. Greater exposure to vocational opportunities at the earliest possible stage would be useful so young people can see where their learning can be put to practical use. Schools should have greater freedom and flexibility to deliver a tailored, choice driven education within the context of the curriculum requirements. Local industry and the business community should be encouraged to support learning more in these neighbourhoods.
We must ensure all abilities are catered for in education in Northern Ireland. Clearly it is crucial for the province's ambitions to foster a high-skills high-tech economy that we retain academic excellence and by extension our successful grammar schools. However we must also ensure that those less academically gifted have the best possible opportunities. That is why in our proposals to break the logjam over selection we sought to protect secondary schools as school rolls plummet.
* Read all of Iris Robinson's column in tomorrow's paper.
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