‘I don’t think league tables are valuable in any shape or form’
By Mary Dennehy
SENATOR Lynn Ruane has criticised school league tables which, in her opinion, do not affect any positive change or inspire discussion on how the educational playing field can be levelled.
Recently, The Sunday Independent published its school league tables, which revealed the top performing schools nationwide.
This follows on from The Irish Times’ feeder schools table for 2017, which, published in December, is an annual list of every school in the country and the number of students they each send forward to third level education.
Speaking with The Echo, Senator Ruane questioned the purpose of school league tables, and asked why schools that are placed at the bottom are not asked why?
“I don’t think the league tables are valuable in any shape or form,” Senator Ruane said.
“They’re basically an exercise in elitism.
“Nobody is asking what is it that brings one school to the bottom and another to the top, what is the disparity between them?
“There are no suggestions, no debate on how we can level out the playing field, these tables don’t affect any positive change.”
Senator Ruane believes that the tables could be used as a tool for schools to learn from each other, with valuable information and practices available in many schools, which have, despite challenges, successfully made marked improvements in the number of young people progressing to third level.
She added: “If there is a public school, for example, that doesn’t have loads of money but managed to record an improvement in the number of students it sends to college, let’s hear how they did that.
“There should be a sharing of information but there is no learning, no exploring.
“Like if a school is at the bottom why not ask them why? Are they missing teachers? What’s the ratio in the class? What do they need to get to the top?”
She added: “I believe that the tables are not a fair reflection of schools and communities… they don’t take into account the resources the schools have or ask if there is any other positive outcomes they may have.”
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