Archive (23 life histories found)
We went through the process of trying to recruit locally someone who would take over from me'
By the end of year 2 the PMUP project was making great progress. We had materials prepared and tested for the lower primary grades. Team spirit was at an all-time high. Then DFA got an external consultant to have a look at what we were doing. The…
Tags: leaving, management, Maths Project, Tanzania, teaching
'That was the end of my work in education. I have no regrets and am happy to have those years behind me.'
I left when I got supply work towards the middle of October as there is seldom anyone looking for supply teachers in September. I got some good positions and some schools kept booking me. I registered with several agencies who found work for me and I…
'It was a nasty situation to be in after that allegation had been made, and so after a few months, I decided to leave Belfast once more and this time head for England.'
My next job was a teaching post in BunScoil Bheann Mhadagain in Wyndham Street. This was another tough assignment and I left it after having been accused of hitting a child in my second year there. I had had enough of this Irish medium and to be…
'It became too much at one stage, and I had to negotiate terms and conditions as I could not keep going at such a pace.'
I started work at the end of August. It entailed training women to work in Irish medium play groups and help them to attain the NVQ levels two and three. I did not realise how much hard work would be entailed in this job. I had groups in Belfast in…
'It then became apparent that the salaries of the other two sisters were inadequate to support a third person-me! I decided to look for paid work.'
It then became apparent that the salaries of the other two sisters were inadequate to support a third person-me! I decided to look for paid work. The Franciscan mission work was not working out very well for me and I was very frustrated with wasting…
Tags: employment, teaching, training
'You need to bide your time when you come into a new place. Watch and wait for the first year and then you can begin to introduce changes.'
By that time I had been changed from Abbeyville, back to Mercy Primary School on the Crumlin Road in September 1979 where Sr.M.Emilian Moloney had taken up the post of principal after Sr.M.Bernadette Agnew retired. Sr M Emilian, Sr Frances Forde and…
'It was during my time in Whiteabbey that I decided to study part time for a B.Ed. degree.'
Immaculata School was very different from Sussex Place. Sr. Anthony Cairns was principal and she was a beautiful lady who was so caring towards me. We became great friends. There were weekly boarders in the school, girls whose homes were too far away…
'The people of the Markets were the salt of the earth and I got to know many of them very well through their children.'
At the beginning of September I was assigned to St Malachy's Convent Primary School, Sussex Place where Sr. Ann McKeever had just been appointed principal, to succeed Sr. M Vincent Donnelly who had been a legend there. I was given a Primary Seven…
'The Troubles were in full fling at this time and we learnt not to allow the children out to the toilet unaccompanied, as they would be off to loot, if they heard a bomb going off.'
My next job was in St Malachy's Boys' Primary school on the New Lodge Road where I had a Primary One class. This job was an answer to my mother's prayers. I got it because Fr Brendan McMullan who was a curate in St Patrick's at the time, could not…
'I remember the little shrines in the classrooms, where the children would bring flowers for Our Lady.'
The principal of the school was Sr. Marie Therese Laverty, and she ran a first class establishment where everything was in order and where the pastoral care of staff and pupils was paramount. The Sisters of Mercy believed in the philosophy of the…
Tags: Catholic, primary, Sisters of Mercy, teaching