Putting Manners on the Marketers.
September 3, 2009 by Joe Fogarty
As the new school year 2009-2010 begins, Irish schools are faced with the withdrawal of grants, proposals to decrease the main capitation grant and the realisation that the much-hyped €252 million investment in computers and technology has evaporated into thin air. While commercial schemes proliferated during the years of economic boom in this county, they are likely to endure much longer than our short-lived Tiger era and may seek to exploit the funding shortage in schools.
In an article in the Sunday Business Post, the Campaign for Commercial-Free Education lays down its unapologetically straighforward position – we’re for commercial free education for all Irish children, no if’s, but’s or ambiguity. We believe in a commercial-free space for children to grow, develop and learn to critically assess the world around them without the intrusion of ads, marketing or commercial interest. We seek to defend, in our own small way, the core democratic and child-centred mission of public schools – to deliver messages and experiences solely for the benefit of children and with no other agenda, hidden or apparent.
Read the Article by Catherine O’Mahony in Sunday Business Post, August 30th 2009
