Education

Elaine Byrne: Who profits from our ‘industrial’ education system? Not students or parents

Allowing publishers to largely dictate what goes into textbooks is short-changing young people and their parents

We are good at reading in Ireland, but not at examining or questioning what it is that we are reading. Picture: Getty

As the “back to school” preparations begin, Irish parents can take solace from the fact that Ireland performs well when compared to how other 15-year-olds in OECD countries are doing in maths, reading and science. The Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) shows Irish children consistently scoring significantly above the OECD average in these three key academic areas.

But there is more to it than that. Literacy is not just about the ability to read ...