Page 3154 - Week 07 - Thursday, 1 July 2010
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The minister, if he wants to fundamentally change the way we reward teachers, as he said later in estimates, needs to be open with teachers in the lead-up to the enterprise bargaining round, so that we end up with the best teachers and they are paid accordingly. If he maintains that restructure of the teaching system is critical and he sees the budget—through school based management, the teacher quality institute and national standard—providing this opportunity, he needs to move quickly and engage all parties in the process.
School-based management has been allocated $600,000 over two years and involves trials in two schools, with the plan that other schools will move into this model in the future. Before school-based management is adopted, it will be important to understand the implications of the change and the impact on existing teacher workloads. We will need to see how it will produce the savings the minister predicted in estimates, and we feel that, if savings are made, it will be in the longer term rather than the short term, as hoped. Apart from, hopefully, gaining some advantage from reforms associated with the introduction of school-based management, the workload on teachers will not decrease. In fact, with the work involved in getting the national curriculum in place, the introduction of the online virtual learning environment, new legislation, with the implementation of earn or learn, and changes to things such as the suspensions regime and establishing new schools, in some cases teachers will be stretched considerably more in the coming 12 months.
In relation to this, I note that efficiency savings will result in a staffing reduction of some 35 staff from central office. We have been assured by Dr Watterson, the chief executive, that this will occur through natural attrition and that none of these reductions will impact on schools. With the current workloads, and with new initiatives on the agenda, teachers hope this is the case, but we will be following this issue to ensure there is proper consultation with the staff and the union about the cutbacks and the impact on teachers and students.
In relation to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students; in estimates we asked questions concerning transitioning programs and extending the Gugan Gulwan program to years 11 and 12. Dr Collis, from the department, did confirm that there were a number of transition programs that look at the transition of young people right through to graduation. It was pleasing to hear that one program includes scholarships for students to move on to a teaching career. Dr Collis did indicate that the transitions were a keen focus of the department’s work and that the department is in the process of undertaking consultation around a strategic plan for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander education. We note also Dr Collis’s comments that it is clear that transitions, particularly primary school to high school and high school to college, are areas we need to continue to attend to and continue to address. The ACT Greens will be monitoring this, to ensure resources and appropriate funding are provided within the budget allocation for this area.
In response to our question in estimates on extending the Gugan Gulwan program to years 11 and 12, Dr Collis indicated that conversations were taking place in regard to this and that the department was keen to move forward with the program. Again, we are keen for this expanded program to be implemented sooner rather than later and call on departmental officials to keep progressing this matter.
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