Vocation to teach
Matthew Quinn’s letter (21 January) should set alarm bells going, because unless the issues he raises are addressed, prospects for our Catholic schools look uncertain. Our schools have always been reliant on headteachers and staff with a profound sense of calling to the education of the children.

All schools are struggling to recruit staff as young teachers are put off by the data-driven soullessness of school culture in our times. And let us not doubt that the same soullessness is a real danger for Catholic schools. Just as the Anglican communion found it not only necessary but revivifying to review their school system in 2001, so too ought we to review and renew ours as we seek to generate hope and commitment for the future.

The 1977 review of Catholic education led by Bishop David Konstant focused on adult religious education and made recommendations including “that plans be made for the establishment of an Ecumenical Christian College for the preparation of adult religious education teachers, of headteachers and potential headteachers, of chaplains for schools, universities and poly­technics, of catechists and others”.