With the dawn of the new curriculum at hand there is a lot of talk and speculation as to the direction of Technology and Design as a subject, so we thought we would take this opportunity to raise some important issues and documents that you and your department should be aware of.

Key Stage 3
September 2006 sees the beginning of the pilot for KS3 for 15 schools across NI. This is in preparation for the statutory curriculum obligations which will take effect from September 2007. This will have a significant impact for Technology at KS3. An overall snapshot of the curriculum is available at the following link big picture for KS3. In relation to Technology the KS3 schedule is now on one page which makes it easy to follow, click here to see more.

Key Stage 4
Starting in September 2006 new legislation will be introduced which will mean flexibility for all schools - The Entitlement Framework. Within this context, the full-time education and training provided for pupils needs to have sufficient breadth and flexibility to allow young people access to courses which are ap-propriate to their abilities and aptitudes. A school must offer a minimum of 24 courses of which one third must be applied or of a vocational nature, and one third general or academic.

This opens up opportunities in terms of the types of GCSE that schools will be able to offer. To have a look at the possibilities in terms of specifications click on www.openquals.com. Here you will find a list of accredited qualifications that a school may choose to offer at Key Stage 4. If you would like to read more on the Entitlement Framework click here for more info.

One school who are currently offering a diverse range of Technology and Design specifications are Portadown College. At GCSE level they offer two courses: one course has a systems and control based framework whilst the other has a graphic product element at it’s core.At GCE level they also offer two specifications which complement the courses running at GCSE. The head of department, David Neil is pleased to have led his department into one that caters for diversity within the subject. The pupils have also responded with this arrangement in voting with their feet to studying T&D at all levels in large numbers at Portadown College. This has also meant a widening in the nature of higher education courses that pupils are applying for ranging from electronic engineering to interior design. As a result of this the department feel that they are opening up many more opportunities for pupils in relation to career prospects. Please contact the staff at the Clounagh Centre for further details..