Oops… When I recently listed Ministers for Education, I realised afterwards that I had left one out. I had simply forgotten that Jan O’Sullivan had held the role at all. (It’s worse because she was the Minister that opened my school building! 😳)

O’Sullivan’s term was short and cautious. Her one clear, attributable achievement was the repeal of Rule 68, a long-overdue symbolic correction to an outdated and discriminatory rule. Beyond that, her time in office was marked more by continuity than reform. Long-running issues around patronage, special education, and workload remained largely unchanged. This is not a criticism. Some ministers change systems. Others simply mind them. O’Sullivan largely did the latter.

Although, to her credit, when I nominated her for the ice bucket challenge, she dutifully took it on!