Albo’s Teaching Make Over
The Albanese Government is trying to take on the issues of teacher workload and community regard for the profession and has earmarked millions of dollars to do it. Whether the initiative will succeed remains to be seen but its structure has encouraged experts.
New ways to reduce teacher workloads and a multi-million dollar PR campaign are included in the draft plan to address teacher shortages and teachers have been given a seat at the table in framing the plan. Education Minister Jason Clare said $25 million would be spent trialling ways to reduce teacher workloads and to maximise the time teachers spent actually teaching.
The draft national plan follows months of roundtable discussions and is being released for stakeholder feedback before the final policy is agreed on in December.
It is a response to escalating education workforce shortages, with 4,000 fewer teachers than required predicted by 2025.
“The newly launched plan is certainly encouraging and signals a critical shift in the way the Federal Government is talking about the teaching profession. The focus points of the plan align with what the research tells us: teacher workload, administrative burdens, and the status of the profession are all vitally important concerns that need to be addressed.
“I also feel encouraged that the approach is listening to the people who matter most – teachers. Authentically responding to the concerns and priorities of teachers by ensuring that they get a seat around the table in an ongoing way, will increase the likelihood of these measures making a meaningful and positive difference to the sector,” says Dr Saul Karnovsky from Curtin University.
Recent research by Monash University (Heffernan et al, 2022) showed that 60% of teachers across Australia are considering leaving the profession. Unreasonable workloads, mostly focused on burdensome administration, are eroding the health and wellbeing of our teachers.
“Many teachers are feeling increasingly frustrated and disillusioned by the ways schooling has been reshaped to focus on standardised testing, compliance and performance of learning measured in terms of data. Teachers feel like they have very little professional autonomy, with Education departments and principals driving accountability demands that simply can’t be met. Teachers work increasing hours outside of school, with many working 50 hours or more each week over the year. All of this has led to worrying level of demoralisation, emotional burnout and attrition."
Teachers have left the profession because they are unable to secure long term or permanent teaching positions. Like many industries there has been an increase in the casualisation of the profession, with numerous schools adopting a short-term contract system to employ classroom teachers, especially when employing graduate teachers. This leads to uncertainty about future employment and limits the options for these professionals to make long term financial commitments.
The federal government can put pressure on local school authorities to limit the casual contract system and provide pathways for more attractive long-term appointments. Retaining and supporting teachers who are currently in classrooms is the most critical element of this current plan.
“My colleague (Dr Brad Gobby) and I have conducted recent research into teachers’ online discussions about their wellbeing. These teachers feel school leaders use “toxic positivity” and corporate wellbeing programs to sideline or ignore the problems, like the ones outlined here. To change this attitude school leaders need to create time and space for their teachers to come together and work out collective solutions to their shared workplace stress.
“As this announcement has stated, now is the time to “test and try new things” – which includes ditching the Tuesday yoga classes in favour of collective, authentic, meaningful, and local responses to these issues,” Dr Karnovsky says.
Image by Dids