Late Mairead was a pioneer of adult education in Offaly

Máiréad Wrynn passed away on July 18th and her funeral in her native parish of Fenagh in Co. Leitrim was marked by a huge attendance.

Máiréad came to Tullamore as a young teacher in 1970. Her first job with Co. Offaly VEC was in Tullamore Vocational school where she combined the roles of Career Guidance Counsellor and Irish teacher.

In the late 1970s the Government decided that the almost complete lack of adult education was a serious gap in the Irish educational system. Máiréad was one of the first group of county Adult Education Officers (AEO) and her appointment was with Offaly VEC. There were no clear guidance or rules on what an AEO should actually be doing and Máiréad was provided with just a small office, a desk, a telephone and a kettle, but very little financial or other resources.

She embarked on her role with incredible gusto, risk taking, energy and creativity. But as an impoverished lone provider she took the lack of an official brief as a bonus, an opportunity for new ideas and for pushing out boundaries. We often associate the term entrepreneurship with business but Máiréad took it as an instrument of social innovation. She and a small group of AEOs became educational Houdinis, in turn being beggars and browbeaters, devious and determined, persuaders and occasionally pessimists. But with optimism and passion they extracted any particle of the meagre crumbs that infrequently fell from the Department of Education table.

Máiréad criss-crossed Offaly with her flip chart, a gas heater and cylinder of gas to meet groups in cold halls to set up local adult education initiatives in personal development. A writing group was one of the many groups that emerged in those early years. She decided to contact Maeve Binchy and invite her to visit the group. When she asked Maeve what her fee was, Maeve said to pray she would pass her driving test which she had to do once again! Máiréad got a Mass said for her and Maeve passed her test. The writing group assembled on the appointed night in the Bridge House hotel. A brilliant night ensued. Laughter, insights and a few writing tips were shared.

She believed in life long education and was particularly focussed on the position of women in society. She felt adult education was a concept applicable to all including herself. With other newly appointed AEOs, they organised at their own expense, training in the skills required for their work. A group of likeminded AEOs recognising the challenges of the job, supported each other, exchanged ideas and shared good practice.

As a newly appointed AEO she was instrumental in developing the Adult Literacy, Community Education and night time education across the towns and villages of Offaly in the early 80s and into the 1990s. 

Adult literacy was a key priority for Máiréad. She set up the Offaly Adult Literacy scheme with the focus on meeting the expressed literacy needs of the adults who sought tuition. Voluntary tutors were cajoled into involvement and importantly provided with excellent training. Tuition materials were developed. The lives of so many who had been adversely impacted by overcrowded classrooms and sometimes difficult school environments were changed immeasurably by this innovative literacy scheme. The model she pioneered was later replicated in other counties. Her work resulted in Offaly being the first county in Ireland to engage in research on rural literacy provision. As a result of that, one of the first literacy organisers in Ireland was funded in Offaly and Marie Lantry who was a volunteer tutor and who had worked with Máiréad on developing materials for tutors, was appointed to that role. Subsequently literacy organisers were appointed in all counties.

She had an uncanny understanding of the importance of family learning and family programmes in supporting and nurturing the whole family, and was to the fore in putting family initiatives in place in disadvantaged areas of rural and urban Offaly. In particular she had a huge focus on improving the position of women in society.

She partnered with Lifestart, a parent education program founded in Derry. Máiréad set up the Lifestart Programme in Edenderry and the surrounding areas, some of which were in Kildare. Máiréad maintained contact with the Lifestart Foundation in Derry and at the time of her death had served as a very valued member of its board for twenty years.

The Community Training workshop in Tullamore, Youthreach centres in Edenderry, Clara and Birr, V.T.O.S. centres in Tullamore and Birr, B.T.E.I. in Edenderry and an adult B.Sc. programme funded by the EU with the University of London, were initiated by Máiréad.

Máiréad’s lively and open personality complemented her deep commitment over many years to values of fairness, equality, as well as feminism and community development. It was these values which inspired her adult education work and led to her lasting legacy of helping hundreds of adult students reach their full potential.

While Máiréad was from Leitrim, for which she always retained great affection, she was chosen as Offaly person of the year in 1993 in recognition of her community focused educational work in almost every town and village in Offaly.

Máiréad loved her work at local level but she recognised that decisions at national level were important. Thus, she worked with national organisations such as NALA, Aontas and the Adult Education Officers’ Association, having been on the executive committees of all three.

After Máiréad retired as AEO she threw her energy into many local organisations such as St Vincent de Paul. Her lifelong commitment to improving opportunities for those less advantaged remained her passion.

Máiréad’s love of Ireland, the Irish language and education also extended to nature, and especially the plants and flowers she cultivated in her own garden. The cacophony of colour there replicated the colour and diversity in her life. Retirement facilitated her love of nature and also brought her to Patthana Garden, Kiltegan, Co. Wicklow where she enhanced her gardening knowledge and cultivated many friendships over the years. There she lives on as she is interwoven into the landscape and in the hearts and memories of those she met there.

Máiréad was recently described as a woman before her time. Sadly, her time with us is no more.