The conception,construction, and maintenance of the identity of Roman Catholic female religious teachers: a historical case study from Ireland

Over the last three decades, there has been a burgeoning of research on teacher identity. While the various bodies of work produced are very valuable, further lines of enquiry need to be pursued in order to take account of the complexities involved. This paper on the conception, construction, and maintenance of the identity of Roman Catholic female religious teachers in Ireland from the mid-1930s to the mid-1960s is offered as one contribution. Being restricted to a particular time and place, it is a response to those who have emphasized the need to investigate teacher identity in different national contexts. Secondly, by focusing on female teaching religious, it highlights the importance of studying different ‘types’ of teachers other than those identified by age group, school subject, or grade level taught. Thirdly, it represents a shift in research framing away from the more usually utilized concepts of ‘personal identity,’ ‘social identity,’ ‘professional identity,’ and ‘the self.’ Documentary evidence and oral testimony indicate that the professional life of the female teaching religious was viewed by them as being integral to their religious vocation. This particular notion of vocation embodied a spiritual belief in being called by God, to work for God. Thus, it meant that the female teaching religious approached teaching, quite literally, with religious zeal. It also meant that their commitment was, first and foremost, to their religious life and that teaching, while deemed to be very important, was always in accord with and, where necessary took second place, to that life.     

Higher education in a changing environment: Regional,national and trans‐national issues

The significance of competing conceptions of civic engagement is increasingly apparent as efforts are made to respond to the measurement imperative that characterises contemporary higher education. The importance of devising appropriate means of recognising and incentivising civic engagement is asserted in this paper and the potential offered by emerging measurement and mapping methodologies is considered. The empirical basis for the argument derives from a multi‐site case study of the process of embedding community‐based learning within Irish higher education. Analysis of interview data from four cases, drawn from the university and extra‐university sector, yielded, inter alia, a typology of orientations to civic engagement. Findings are discussed, including those relating to orientations, ambivalence, scepticism, and legitimisation strategies. The case is made that these themes and the factors which impact on sustainability are mirrored within the wider domain of civic engagement—hence the opportunity to learn from a civically engaged pedagogy.     

LibQUAL in Ireland: Performance Assessment and Service Improvement in Irish University Libraries

This article reviews the Irish university experience of LibQUAL, drawing from interviews with administrators and library directors in the seven Irish universities together with data from the Irish LibQUAL notebooks generated from 2009 to 2012. Of the seven Irish universities, three find it very useful, run it regularly and have integrated it into their planning activities. Two found LibQUAL to be very useful in an occasional sense and two found LibQUAL to be less useful for their needs. The results from all LibQUAL notebooks indicate common poor perceptions about library buildings among users. However Irish users' expectations of library buildings appear to be higher than elsewhere. The approaches to analysis, interpretation and response to the results varied from library to library. While most institutions reported implementing changes as part of their LibQUAL action plans, attitudes around whether LibQUAL was a catalyst for change in their libraries varied. The majority of those interviewed described themselves as somewhat satisfied, as opposed to very satisfied, with the tool. At a national level, LibQUAL has repositioned the importance of the physical library environment within strategic planning and has placed the customer firmly at the centre of Irish university library development.     

Externalities of openness in innovation

Discussion of open innovation has typically stressed the benefits to the individual enterprise from boundary-spanning linkages and improved internal knowledge sharing. In this paper we explore the potential for wider benefits from openness in innovation and argue that openness may itself generate positive externalities by enabling improved knowledge diffusion. The potential for these (positive) externalities suggests a divergence between the private and social returns to openness and the potential for a sub-optimal level of openness where this is determined purely by firms’ private returns. Our analysis is based on Irish plant-level panel data from manufacturing industry over the period 1994–2008. Based on instrumental variables regression models our results suggest that externalities of openness in innovation are significant and that they are positively associated with firms’ innovation performance. We find that these externality effects are unlikely to work through their effect on the spread of open innovation practices. Instead, they appear to positively influence innovation outputs by either increasing knowledge diffusion or strengthening competition. Our evidence on the significance of externalities from openness in innovation provides a rationale for public policy aimed at promoting open innovation practices among firms.     

The Amplification and De-Amplification of Amateurism and Professionalism in the Gaelic Athletic Association

In this paper we explain how and why a specific ethos of amateurism was portrayed and embodied by various groups comprising the Gaelic Athletic Association in Ireland throughout its history. Interestingly, the discourse pertaining to amateurism has at times been de-amplified, instead being superseded by the vilification of professionalism. Since the 1970s, both amateurism and professionalism have been imbued with new meanings and interpretations by different social groups comprising the organisation. In tandem with this, both the discourses of professionalism and amateurism have been increasingly amplified. We explain how the structure of competitive and cooperative interdependencies, the we-identifications, tensions and insecurities generated by these, between groups at different levels of integration – social class, national, inter-organisational and intra-organisational – underpin these social developments.     

Some attitudinal aspects of foreign language learning in northern Ireland: Focus on gender and religious affiliation

Abstract

This paper discusses some aspects of foreign language learning within the divided school system of Northern Ireland. It is argued that an improvement of foreign language learning must be seen in a socio‐cultural context whereby a change in attitudes to languages in general, including Irish, may lead not only to a balanced interest among girls and boys in the language classroom, but also to a more tolerant approach to the cultural differences among the Catholic and Protestant communities.     

The governmentality of reconciliation: adult education as a community relations technique in Northern Ireland

Despite a successfully negotiated peace agreement in Belfast in 1998, tensions between different community groups continue to exist in Northern Ireland. This situation creates a governmental need to find solutions to problems such as segregation, inter- and intra-group violence and other forms of sectarian antagonisms. On the one hand, this is attempted by disciplinary measures such as ‘peace walls’ and an increased presence of state powers such as police and armed forces. On the other hand, community relations discourses remain a common refrain in Northern Ireland with their focus on a ‘conduct of conduct’ approach. In this article, I seek to understand adult community education through community relations initiatives and designated anti-sectarian courses as a governmental technology in Northern Ireland designed to change technologies of the self. The article highlights the possibilities for a way forward inherent in this approach and links community relations to broader contexts of policy developments in Northern Ireland.     

A NEW LOOK AT INTELLIGENCE TESTING

The aim of the paper is to explore teachers’ methods of delivering an ethos of tolerance, respect and mutual understanding in one integrated secondary school in Northern Ireland. Drawing on interviews with 18 teachers in the school, it is argued that most teachers make ‘critical choices’ which both reflect and reinforce a ‘culture of avoidance’, whereby politically or religiously contentious issues are avoided rather than explored. Although teachers are well-intentioned in making these choices, it is shown that they have the potential to create the conditions that maintain or even harden psychological boundaries between Catholics and Protestants rather than dilute them.     

Organisational self-evaluation and teacher education for community relations in a transforming society?

During 2004, the School of Education at the University of Ulster embarked on an innovative three-year project designed to embed community relations objectives within initial teacher education. With the advent of more peaceful times in Northern Ireland, this was a precipitous time for initial teacher educators to review the preparation given to beginner teachers for teaching in an increasingly pluralist society emerging from conflict. The present paper reports on one very specific and time-limited element of the broader project. That is, development work designed to investigate the possibilities of using processes of self-review and evaluation as a lever for improvements in initial teacher education for community relations. Following a brief contextualisation, the background to, and the development of, a set of materials designed to support rigorous and systematic self-review of all aspects of provision in a university-based initial teacher education department is described. The Community Relations Index for Initial Teacher Education (Cr-ITE) was envisaged as being of use to initial teacher education establishments in order to help teacher educators take responsibility for rigorous learning from their practice, whilst placing inclusive values at the centre of organisational development. The final section includes further critical reflection on the role of organisational self-review in transforming teacher education for inclusion in a society emerging from longstanding communal conflict.     

Beyond the boundaries: resistances to school‐based youth work in Northern Ireland

In Northern Ireland, attention is currently focused on youth work in the context of wider changes associated with the integration of services for young people. Policy‐makers there have identified youth work as having potential to link formal and informal education. However, youth work has often been understood as predominantly out‐of‐school provision embodying different values and principles from that of schooling. Increasingly, and as ideas about education shift, schools have become an important setting for youth work, generating much debate amongst policy‐makers, youth workers and teachers. One important question is whether the school setting is an appropriate context for informal learning. This article draws on interviews completed with teachers and youth workers and explores their experiences of school‐based youth work in one part of Northern Ireland.