Anonymous #027

Submitter information

Name

Anonymous #027

Where are you located?

Victoria

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?

Teacher

Elevating the profession

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

Somewhat agree

Would you like to provide feedback about these actions?

PD needs to be funded properly - run Quality Teaching Rounds across the country and fund it properly. It’s the only PD that has research backed improvement on results and staff morale. And it’s Australian research.

Create a national benchmark for pay, give teachers the ability to negotiate their own pay on that benchmark and not rely on the unions to do it on their behalf. I don’t want them (unions) as they don’t represent me or my views any more but I have to cop the rubbish deals they produce.

Somehow the bias in the media needs to be addressed, but with the current monopoly in that market I don’t know how you could. Could you regulate truth, trust and balance in the media?

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 disagree

Would you like to provide feedback about these actions?

Short term:- Put in place a traineeship, people in courses can start on the job straight away. It will give the schools an ability to cover all classes with teachers (and trainees).

To retain teachers, student and parent behaviour needs to improve. Monash study recently released shows it is the most unsafe profession, even more than ambos and police (who are trained for the violence). The education departments have been getting more progressive and as such mental health based rather than education focussed. Lots of teachers doing mental health care plans for their lessons to try to be safe. Kids who in the past have been excluded from the learning are no longer and are a currently destroying the learning culture in most (public) classrooms. Teachers can’t fix those problems, so we need a funded program that can. Hands on Learning, etc. Have a budget for every school to support those students who need the support that quiet literally can’t be provided by a teacher not trained or given the time to do so. If those students are catered for the whole place becomes safer.

It would be good to have a national benchmark for pay, not a state by state negotiation every 3-5 years. Have an ability to get promoted and payed the same as principal wage without leaving teaching and starting administration roles.

Strengthening Initial Teacher Education (ITE)

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

Somewhat disagree

Would you like to provide feedback about these actions?

Throw out the literacy/numeracy test. Trust the tertiary institutions with the ability to pass and fail students on merit. Often those who stay in teaching aren’t the high achievers but instead those who’ve had to show some grit to be where they are.

Start traineeships across the country where teaching students are in the room with reduced loads as they start their courses. Use a day a week to do university work and a week of holidays each term. They don’t have to be high achievers for this to work, in fact if they are, generally they don’t have the grit to stay in the profession as teachers anyway.

Choose students that have grit over academic results. It’s a bloody tough profession with plenty of abusive relationships to negotiate and thick skinned people are the only ones that will stick around. Could there be interviews rather than just a score to get into tertiary courses.

Maximising the time to teach

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

Somewhat disagree

Would you like to provide feedback about these actions?

If their was an administrative assistant for every 4/5 teachers, it would go a long way to reducing workload and improving retention. Particularly the follow up involved with students misbehaving, student mental health, and behaviour support plans. A small number of students take up a disproportionate amount of time because the system of education we currently have doesn’t suit them. These are the same kids who end up in prison as adults. They destroy learning cultures in classrooms because as a school, their is no funding or dedicated programs for their needs. A fully funded program like Hands on Learning, would help.

There is a lot of meetings in schools with a skewed agenda away from learning in the classroom or an ability to cater for the wide range of skills in the room. Allow teachers to collaborate and reduce considerably the lecture style meetings we seem to get a lot. Get Quality Teaching Rounds going in all schools across the county instead of lecturing teachers at whole staff PD. Teachers of different experience levels have different PD needs and lectures do not cater for that.

Have national regulations on face to face time and cap it to a manageable level.

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?

Would you like to provide feedback about these actions?

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.

Strongly disagree

Would you like to provide feedback about these actions?

What is HALT, and why isn’t this advertised in Victoria.

At the moment we have a model based on years experience, unless you get a Leading Teacher role, where you can skip the levels. Learning specialists in Victoria are just leading teachers and hasn’t worked in the way it was set up. Pay capped below administrators means we lose educators to roles that in my opinion should not be done by teachers. Industry outside of education should be our principals. Most principals are unable to effectively run the business of schools, and the burnout is proof of that. Get company ceos in instead and retain our teachers as teachers.