‘You don’t really live’: Long-distance commuting teachers priced out of Dublin

Rachel Shanahan has mastered the art of hopping out of bed just after 6am and getting on the road within 15 minutes.

“My clothes are laid out, my lunch is packed,” says the 28-year-old second-level teacher of French and Irish. “I’ll have showered the night before, my hair is done in a plait, so I’m ready to go.”

The rush is down to the fact Shanahan commutes from Mullingar, Co Westmeath, to Neilstown in west Dublin. The journey takes about one hour and 40 minutes on toll-free roads in morning traffic.

If she leaves it a few minutes longer, she risks being late for school, which opens at 8.20am.

“Once I hit heavy traffic, I start worrying,” she says. “I’m looking at the time wondering, ‘Do I need to call the deputy to say I’ll be late?’ It’s like a sick feeling in my stomach. You don’t want to leave the students or the school down.”

Shanahan, who lives with her parents, is like many teachers who cannot afford to live in the Greater Dublin Area.

Teachers’ unions say soaring rents and huge deposits required for homes are pricing members out of the capital and surrounding areas.

Schools in the Dublin area and beyond, meanwhile, are finding it difficult to attract qualified teaching staff due to the lack affordable accommodation as well as commuting costs.

This, in turn, is forcing schools to hire unqualified staff to plug gaps in many cases or, in the case of second-level schools, drop subjects.

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