Breda O'Brien and Ed Curran's Articles on Education Policies

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Recommended: Leadership traits, behaviour and attitudes

Introduction

There are many statements that have been made to attempt and define leadership. The most commonly accepted is that leadership is the action of providing guidance, direction, authority and management in a societal setting or in an organization. There are many aspects of leadership which include heading a group, having the authority over an organization, being in governance or administration, and being dominant, among others. This paper will analyze two newspaper articles from Irish newspapers in exploration of these aspects and requirements of leadership.

The articles

The first article reviewed was written by Breda O'Brien in the Irish times. It is about the minister for education not doing the right thing about change implementation. In the article, she poses the question on whether leaders should implement change at a time when there are no resources to carry out the proposed change. The education minister, Ruairí Quinn, in his proposed Junior Cycle reform is said not to have considered the preparedness of the change implementers to carry out the proposed changes. The proposal seeks to shift education from an exam-oriented system to one that uses a tool-kit to assess and help in the learning process. The teachers are faced with the problem of abruptly introducing a new approach to the teaching and learning process. These same teachers have suffered wage cuts, and many other demoralizing issues. The writer argues that the teachers, who will implement the change, are feeling undermined, demoralized and weary. She however quickly points out that the teachers are not opposed to the plan since they have seen the limitations of the current system.

The article points out flaws in the management of the plan. Training is ...

... middle of paper ...

...rying to fight such opposition. It is clear that the questions being asked about Gerry cannot go away but will increase.

Many are eager to see what step Gerry will take, if he will hang on to leadership and probably tear apart the party or destroy the unity achieved over years, or will he do the noble thing and leave office. This article does imply that leadership has to be visionary such that the leader is able to know when they are no longer useful to the organization and pass on leadership to new people who will lead the organization to better successes.

Works Cited

Breda O'Brien. (2013). The Minister for Education is not going the right way about implementing change. The Irish Times. http://www.irishtimes.com/news/education/breda-o-brien-7.2276464

Ed Curran. (2013) Is it time Gerry Adams stepped aside for good of Sinn Fein? Belfast Telegraph. United Kingdom.

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