Anonymous #008

Submitter information

Name

Anonymous #008

Where are you located?

Queensland

What type of area do you live in?

Regional or rural

Are you an education professional?
(e.g. teacher, school leader, learning support assistant, teacher’s aide)

Yes

Which sector do you work in?

Secondary

What is your occupation?

School leader

Elevating the profession

The actions proposed recognise the value teachers bring to students, communities and the economy.

Would you like to provide feedback about these actions?

Improving teacher supply

The actions proposed will be effective in increasing the number of students entering ITE, number of students completing ITE and the number of teachers staying in and/or returning to the profession.

Somewhat agree

Would you like to provide feedback about these actions?

The time delay is problematic. What do we do now? We have a shortage of approx 15% at our school and there are no teachers to take up these jobs. How do we deliver curriculum to students now?

The overseas program has previously been a failure and will continue. There is a shortage of teachers overseas so they are not there is sufficient numbers to address shortages. Also, in my teaching career I have witnessed first hand over 30 years, state governments recruiting from South Africa, England, Europe, Middle East , South Pacific, Asia etc. The only teachers of any quality who could relate to Australian students and form positive relationships were Canadians. All the rest had teacher training and authorative attitudes that were old fashioned, approaches that were transmissive in nature and did not work in our classrooms.

We have had them all at our school and none were successful despite extensive support. How do you think it will be any different this time? Our students deserve quality practitioners who can engage students, work alongside of them to get the best out of them and understand our systems. The ones that the Qld government are trying to force onto us are poor. It would be better to have no teacher than a poor one who can do more harm than good.

Strengthening Initial Teacher Education (ITE)

The actions proposed will ensure initial teacher education supports teacher supply and quality.

Somewhat agree

Would you like to provide feedback about these actions?

The old system required teachers to have a degree and a 1 year Diploma. Now we require them to have Master's degrees instead of Diplomas. Much of what teacher's really need and learn is in the first few years of their teaching. It would be better to give them some training, a reduced workload in a school with time to continue to study etc. Current school staffing models give new teacher an extra spare compared to other staff - no where enough time. For a school to have a large proportion of new teachers, there is no allowance in the staffing formula to take account of this - if your school is entitled to 30 teachers, 30 teachers is all you get no matter what level of experience they are. Again this disadvantage rural and remote schools who can usually only attract beginning teachers.

Maximising the time to teach

The actions proposed will improve retention and free up teachers to focus on teaching and collaboration.

Strongly disagree

Would you like to provide feedback about these actions?

You do not understand the teaching role now. Everyone is using the excuse that somehow teachers are doing a whole lot of administration. Not true - there is an increase in administration because the system requires it (governments, departments etc). The system is requiring teachers to have data, to use data, collect data, to report data to justify decisions and actions.

The expectation of teaching is now much more complex - what takes teacher's majority of time is planning for their students in a classroom (need to differentiate, cater for 25 individuals, follow up with high needs students, understand and support out of care students, create ICPs for individual students, deliver wellbeing lessons, teach students about social media issues etc). In a high school setting you may have 150 students to cater for. You get 210 mins to plan for 150 students. Impossible.

I agree reduce this fixation with data and justifying. But you wont because you want the data. You are paying a teacher to teach, to make decisions, yet you dont trust them. Let them do this instead of having to make all their decisions about data to please you.

I see that you and state governments are talking about creating banks of resources to support teachers. Again you miss the point. We had that system in Qld just recently called C2C - abject failure. They tried to create resources that were suitable for students in Brisbane and also in remote communities. (Having students in remote communities learning about bus timetables is one of many ridiculous examples.) It takes longer to contextualise and modify these resources for your students than if I had to find and create them myself.

The job is just more complex now -students are more complex and require more support than ever. Communities and families expect us to treat each student in the class as an individual. Not possible. Teachers need more non contact time to do the planning, moderation etc. In Qld teachers should get 420 mins of preparation time not 210 mins. Will never happen because the mind set is about reducing teacher workload on unproductive tasks - that thinking is wrong..

Better understanding future teacher workforce needs

How effective are the proposed actions in better understanding future teacher workforce needs, including the number of teachers required?

Slightly effective

Would you like to provide feedback about these actions?

Again this fixation on using non teaching staff to somehow reduce teacher workloads misses the point. The issue is planning for complex students in classrooms and then enacting that curriculum. These people are support people, they are not trained to do this work. I hear people who don't work in schools saying that these people can do playground duties to relieve teachers. That is true to a point. You still need teachers otherwise students misbehave. These people do not have the authority that teachers do in a school. We have maxed out all our support staff in our school to do these duties (they are also entitled to lunch breaks etc) - it effectively gave each teacher an extra 20 mins/week. Pointless.

Certainly having more teacher-aides in schools to work in classrooms with teachers would be a good thing. Can I tell you in Qld - the teacher-aide rules and regulations handicap schools trying to employ actual extra bodies to work in classrooms since they have to be given opportunity to work outside of school class times. the important thing is not teacher-aide hours allocated to schools but teacher-aide bodies, There is a difference.

Better career pathways to support and retain teachers in the profession

The proposed actions will improve career pathways, including through streamlining the process for Highly Accomplished and Lead Teacher (HALT) accreditation, and providing better professional support for teachers to retain them in the profession.

Somewhat disagree

Would you like to provide feedback about these actions?

These are great initiatives and can certainly be an asset to school. The problem is that they need to be on reduced classes so that they can support other teachers etc. Again there is no allocation in school staffing models that allow this. We require every teacher to be on a full load of classes just to cover our timetable.

You can do all of the things in your plan and I don't believe in 10 years it will be any better. You havent got to the heart of the issues because you haven't spoken to people in schools. The panel of education participants you selected for your round table that gave input to this plan do not represent my school or schools around us. They were Principals, many from private schools and city schools.

Come and talk to us on the ground, see what each school needs and work with those schools to get them what they need. A school in a remote part of Qld is different from a school in inner Brisbane. Many of the strategies listed in the plan does not take this into account. At my school i want strategie and resources to attract staff to my school (incentives, higher pay scales, ......). Why would they come to a rural school when they can live in the city? This has been the issue at my school for 30 years and there is nothing in the plan that will change that.

If you want to help us - give me extra teachers above the staffing formula so that I can free up staff to have more planning and preparation time to cater for complex students and allow me more $$ to have incentives to attract staff from the city to my school. Again it will never happen and state schools will continue to be the poor cousins of the private schools.