The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in teacher educators dealing with multiple problems caused by the disruption to the professional preparation of pre-service teachers. This led to modified arrangements for teaching, learning and assessment on an emergency basis. For teacher educators, the challenges and disruptions caused by school and HEI closures…

Background: Placements are a core component of learning within speech and language therapy (SLT) undergraduate and postgraduate university programmes. They facilitate the development of students' professional and clinical competencies and socialization into the profession. It is indicated that an optimal environment for placement learning often…

Pre-service teachers (PSTs) are often placed in a vulnerable position during their school placement. Recognising the presence of power dynamics between PSTs, university-based tutors, and cooperating teachers as well as exploring how PSTs navigate these power relations is the focus of this paper. Data from interviews with final-year PSTs were…

Recent structural and conceptual changes to initial teacher education (ITE) in Ireland have impacted on the professional roles of many teacher educators. This study explores the perspectives and identity of seven placement tutors on the Professional Master of Education (PME) course in Maynooth University in relation to their role, past and…

Internationally the relocation of people with intellectual disability from institutions has brought significant gains to their quality of life. This study contrasted three groups of persons in Ireland who moved either to personalized arrangements (n = 29) or to community group homes (n = 31) with those who remained in congregated settings awaiting…

Teaching education is Ireland is currently undergoing significant structural and conceptual changes. School placement is at the centre of these reforms. This article reports the findings of an all-Ireland study which investigates student teachers' experiences of teaching geography during their school placements. Based on data collected from…

The aim of this paper is to analyse Irish school placement cooperating teachers' supervisory experiences when involved in various structures of communities and explore factors which enabled or challenged them in cultivating relationships with school placement stakeholders where there is no formal system of supervision established in schools in the…

In 1992, Ireland committed to the right of children to participate in decision-making that impacts on their lives. The extent to which this right is upheld for young people in the care of the State who live in residential childcare centres is unknown. A small qualitative case study was carried out in four such centres in the West of Ireland in…

The important role of the teacher in developing morally sensitive individuals is widely acknowledged. This paper examines the integration of context-specific moral development interventions within a four-year undergraduate teacher education programme in Ireland. The intervention strategy employed a case-based pedagogical approach where…

The status of school placement in the Republic of Ireland has recently been elevated in importance within a reconceptualisation of initial teacher education (ITE). This paper shares the findings from one case study of a school--university partnership enacted in this regard. The partnership involved a researcher-in-residence at the school…

Tikunoff, Ward & Lazar (1980) argue that parity or "equality of status" (p.12) is one of the most important ingredients of successful collaboration. During the placement of students on teaching practice (TP), therefore, it can be argued that school and university personnel should be equal partners if the collaboration is to be…