Page 4981 - Week 12 - Tuesday, 26 October 2010
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our curriculum framework, every chance to learn, we are well placed to start rolling out the Australian curriculum next year.
As members would know, I am a strong supporter of the My School website, because it provides parents, students and teachers with the information they tell us they want. It helps make all of us involved in the education of young Canberrans more accountable.
There is a lot going on in ACT public schools, and there has been a lot of change. I acknowledge that some people have found this change hard. However, change has been worth it as students do outperform their counterparts in Australia, and we have seen for the first time in a decade enrolments in ACT public schools growing again. The successful reforms of 2006, and since, were hard, but they were necessary to achieve the strong education system that we have today. And whilst change will always be hard, it is a fact of life in education. We must constantly look at how we ensure we get the best outcome for our students with the limited resources that we have.
As I have outlined this morning, we have done a lot in education—investing in new facilities, more teachers and a new curriculum. This investment is paying dividends for students. But we need to keep improving our education system, and the best way to do this is to ensure we have the very best teachers in our classrooms.
Like all other jurisdictions around the country, we face challenges in attracting and keeping the best teachers. As we know from the weekend Canberra Times, the Australian Education Union are also concerned about this. They rightly point out that, after around four years, many teachers are likely to pack it in for other jobs. I do note their survey also revealed that as many as half of our teachers see themselves still teaching in a decade. Nevertheless, I share the union’s concerns, because teacher quality is the key to a great education.
ACT public schools are still a great career option for the very best teachers. For example, it takes less time for a new teacher to get to the top of the pay scale in the ACT than it does in New South Wales and Victoria. Face-to-face teaching hours in the ACT are the lowest in the country, apart from primary schools in Western Australia. The number of teaching days in the ACT is less than in New South Wales and Victoria and the third lowest in the country. Besides these employment conditions, ACT teachers also work in the best equipped classrooms in the country.
But the problem remains that teaching is still not a profession that appeals to the best and brightest university students. And why is this? Pay is low compared to other professions because from the day you start work your pay increases are determined by the length of your service, not the quality of your teaching, and because over the years the status of the teaching profession has been allowed to decline.
There is no incentive for a young, keen teacher to stick it out in the public school system. Their friends doing law, commerce or economics earn good salaries from day one and they have the potential to earn more if they work hard and deliver results. Just as importantly, they get recognised for their hard work and achievements—a major motivator for anyone in their work.
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