Constructing an interesting career

Last year, 1,494 teachers across the country were timetabled for subjects such as construction studies, materials technology (wood) and technical graphics. Only 121 of those were women and only four of these were teaching in Clare.

Marie Lynch, a materials technology (wood), technical graphics and construction studies teacher at Scariff Community College, is one of those four.
Marie has been teaching in Scariff for the last two years and puts her interest in the subject down to her simple liking for engineering and woodwork. She adds however, that her own teacher in the Coláiste Muire in Ennis had an influence in her going into teaching these subjects.
“When I got the CAO forms in school I had teaching and engineering on the list, so I liked engineering. I was doing honours maths, physics and those sorts of subjects. My father would also be very practical like that, always doing bits and pieces.
“Teaching was always one of those things that appealed to me, I think I always wanted to be a woodwork teacher or a carpenter or an engineer and then the two just tied into together with the teaching.
“I’m from Clarecastle and went to the Coláiste Muire secondary school, where I had Niamh Ní Mhuirí as my teacher for Junior Cert technology and Leaving Cert construction studies. For Leaving Cert, there were just 14 girls in my class and three of us went on to do woodwork teaching in college.
“There were just five girls doing woodwork teaching when we went to college and three of us were from the one secondary school. I do think that having a female teacher for the subject did help us make that decision. I never believed it was an issue because you were a girl and because we saw her doing it, it was never the case that we thought we can’t do this,” Marie explained.
She added that although female teachers in this field would be few and far between, that it doesn’t seem to have an impact on the pupils in terms of taking them seriously.
Marie feels the way practical subjects can be blocked against each other often leads to less girls taking up the subject and believes it is a subject that does appeal to many girls.
“The main problem with these types of practical subjects is that they are often blocked against other practical subjects such as home economics or art. I’d find a lot of the boys would opt to do woodwork and technical graphics and because of them taking those options, they would also take metalwork. The girls nearly always will go for art, home economics or music. I would encourage more girls to give it a try.
“It does come down to parents sometimes, what subject a student might pick and a lot of older parents wouldn’t know what technical graphics is. As far as learning is concerned, it stands on its own, in the way that you can be good at maths or art, but technical graphics is a different type of learning.
“You can learn it but if I see a kid on day one I can nearly tell if they will be good at it from that. It’s not building drawing. It’s like if you have a 3D shape but you are trying to draw it in 2D. For instance, if you have a cardboard box design you draw out how it is developed flat out so that then the machines can come along and print it.
“There is an element of computers coming into the subject too at the moment. This year’s Leaving Certificate programme is a sat nav and the pupils will draw the sat nav on the computer in 3D and they can bring in their own changes from the design. It is a brilliant subject; it has gone very much into the area of design.
“I was at a construction studies conference recently and they were saying that with the way things have gone, Ireland seems to be ahead in computer design. I think that’s definitely the way these pupils should be going.
“Even for their own lives, the subject is very useful. Pupils should be able to plan from start to finish how to construct a house and then the technical graphics ties in with the drawings.
“While they are not qualified to sign off on the drawings, they should be able to read their architect’s drawings and do their own initial design to be presented to an architect,” she added.
Marie explained that materials technology (wood) has 25% of the marks going for a written exam, 25% going for a project and 50% theory, which, she says, makes it a very academic practical subject.
She added that boys are generally better at the skills side of things but that the girls excel with the reports and written aspects of the subject.
Not only does the subject provide pupils with great skills, they also work on projects that can add to their homes. First year pupils start off by making things such as a tool rack, or a tea pot stand, while Leaving Certificate pupils can create anything from coffee tables, sugán chairs, model houses, bridges, toy chests, even poker tables, which makes it very fulfilling experience.