We don't know how many more teachers are needed in the ACT, but we're about to find out

More than we need pollies that only talk and dont act that fast

There are barriers that prevent candidates from entering the teaching profession. In Massachusetts, the licensure process requires passing 4 hours long, expensive exams. And if you fail, you get to pay the fee over and over until maybe you pass. Then you have to keep up your credentials by paying for additional courses and completing many hours of professional development. When you can make the same money driving a school bus or monitoring the hallway, it is harder to entice people to enter a position in which one can feel high stress, mental anguish and a feeling of being undervalued. The best thing the Department of Education could do right now to address the shortage is to declare a state of emergency and temporarily eliminate some of the hoops that have to be jumped through. Bottom line is, you have a college degree and a big heart?…….you’re hired!

I taught 30 years in the USA. I always thought it was interesting that research indicates that middle managers, to be most productive in business, normally supervise 7-9 workers. Supposedly these workers are trained and know how to do their job. On the other hand, teachers supervise 25-30 workers (students), teach them how to do their work and are expected to evaluate that work daily. In addition teachers are also expected to manage and evaluate part time paid classroom assistants, volunteers and at times mentor new teachers.

If you are going to micro manage school teacher there going too find it hard to find good school teachers you will get bottom feeder’s

The teacher problem shortage stems from cell phones, social media and parents wanting to be their child’s best friend. Teachers are tired of taking the blame and competing w cell phones that parents won’t let their kids go w/o.

I’ve recently thought of leaving… I’ve been a teacher for 23 years.

A shame, that legislators will not deal with Baumol’s Disease. Also the culture shift that has developed needs to be addressed as well. If you think it is bad there, it is much worse in the U.S.

Administrators should be hands on deck too when there is teacher shortage.

Here’s a thought…. The majority of teachers who have remained loyal and passionate, remaining in the profession, whom are now finally, cutting ties, are just the other 40% who held on for a bit longer! What is the plan for education, federally, when the industry breaks down to just 10%…? How many teachers are needed now??

Underpaid and bashed for all societies problems expected to discipline and sometimes feed and cloth tbeir charges being shot at possibly losing your life endless paperwork well guess what you reap what you sow

No sure why they need to investigate. Just ask any teachers – they will tell you what the problems are!

Just drop all mandates and let them go back to work. Not hard really, is it

Good luck! I left teaching after my first year 😉

How about you find out why we’re leaving? Try to keep the ones you have; the veterans that are tired of not being heard and dismissed.

Just treat them better and they won’t exit the profession so readily!

It might help if there was not so much red tape to cover for relief teachers each year to update their qualifications.

This is what happens to a nation’s education system when teacher bashing is a national sport second only to baseball. No one wants to be an underpaid whipping post for all that is wrong with our society. You reap what you sow.

Look after the teachers you still have better or you’ll lose a lot more. Making the important job of teaching harder, more stressful, stretching their roles well beyond reason and lack of appreciation for all they do can only lead to further teacher shortages. It’s not rocket science.

Train better uni grads…2 days per week in a school, just like a tradie.

There are plenty of teachers out there – or at least people with an education qualification. The issue is why are so many choosing not to enter or remain in the classroom. I know of people who are qualified but choose to do other things (which is their choice of course) but maybe we should be asking why this is happening. I honestly believe there are enough qualified teachers just not all of them choose to use their qualification – and this is something that should be examined closely

Claire Briggs strike while the iron is hot!

Let unvaccinated teachers to come back. Simple!

That’s understandable from a territory who says it is 100% renewables and uses coal fired power from another state to stay warm and keep the lights on.

Diane Tegova, Dianne Denton, Lisa Berg would love to know the numbers for NSW.

Bit late.

The issue lies within the demands and conditions. If you subsidise uni and or provide scholarships the problem will persist. Bite the head of the snake if you want the problem to be solved

Stop mandates and everyone can go back to work. No brainer

On one hand school management is pretty much a hazard to teachers for no particular reason. On the other, there are more and more broken and dysfunctional families sending broken and out of control kids to school… sometimes.

And it’s all a bemused “Why are the teachers leaving?“ position from the powers that be. They’re not merely leaving, they’re fleeing for their lives, livelihoods, and sanity.

So you failed to manage staff, recruit staff and retain staff? Perhaps they need to start by changing the management that created this situation? Exploitive staff practices, rampant in the teaching service, have contributed to an exodus from teaching. Change the managers, change the model or repeat your failures.

Good to see public schools are atleast better than when I attended in the 90’s. I have childhood memories of cops coming to our school and showing us what needles and bongs looked like because one kid stepped on a syringe and another grabbed a beer bong that was on the playground and drank the water in it….. also cars sometimes came onto the oval and did donuts and one time they chased a girl and some guys hand reached out and tried to grab her hair, maybe to pull her into car who knows but she dropped to her knees and they drove off. Thank you for getting fences Evatt Primary School so children dont have to experience that shit ever again

Improve pay and conditions, otherwise the shortages will worsen.

Lauren Morrison Could be over soon!

It’s simple. We need at least 30 percent more teaching staff and 70 percent more teaching assistants

We never even contemplate following an education system that works in other countries. Just keep on with the US and UK models and we see how well they are working,they’re not. Time for a new strategy!

The whole system is broken.
I suggest lessons in mandarin would be more appropriate. (Sarcasm for those of you that cannot spot the obvious) .
.
I would like to see a mandatory quotor system for equality in the work place .
Teachers freed from admin .
Disruptive children held to account .
ABC RN had an exellent programs on the issue in NSW the solution put forward was . Quote: get rid of the F wits in the educational department .

Are you guys doing parody now ??? How do they not know how many teachers they need ? Disgraceful

Should also add to the count how many teachers are contemplating retiring, quitting early due to burn out…

I went back and did two years post grad studies to become a male primary school teacher and give back. Gave up a six figure salary to do so. Lasted three years full time before walking away from the profession without an exit interview. The whole system needs flipping on its head. There’s no true innovation, lack of support for teachers, lack of recognition and like all nurturing and female dominant professions not equal pay recognition. People get paid more to mind to drive dirt out of the ground. The same old, same old rhetoric will bandy around for eons, meanwhile politicians will line their own pockets and say they’re there for the good of the community, which they’re not.
So many career politicians who have no real life experience, just idealistic and out of touch understandings of how the real world operates.
Men in suits will never change the world….just trying to look important.

Agree to look into numbers?? It’s their job to know!

No shortage if you let the unvaxxed teachers teach

Let’s hope it includes the need for early childhood teachers also

“There’s violence because of staff shortages”. No!

Under this Bar government the entire system is broken. We are potentially closing schools because of a shortage of teachers, our police force does not have the manpower to investigate Basic crimes asking us to log the issue online instead. We need a minimum of 80 police just to scrape of the bottom of police per capita across anywhere else in the country. Our nurses are working obscene hours just to keep the hospitals running but despite their efforts our wait times and health costs associated are the largest in the country. Every sector is under resourced and badly managed. When is enough, enough!

They sack teachers who wont get vaxxed, then are surprised when there’s a shortage of teachers. 0 common sense going on in Canberra.

ACT Government and TQI should look into allowing final year pre-service teachers to relief in these schools to ease staff shortages. If NSW and a few other states offer those style of jobs to pre-service with certain requirements, why can’t the ACT. It not only gives these pre-service teachers more experience that they need but ease some the issues. Yes fully aware some of these pre-service teachers would be exposed to the violence but that’s were the school should utilise their permanent staff with those classes.

Shouldn’t the education directorate already know that

Here’s an idea. There have been a few schools closed or restricted due to out of control discipline issues and poor support and resources for teachers. If you want to attract quality professionals, sort out the unsuitable , unsafe workplace issues like any other employer would be legally compelled to do. Then look at how poorly paid teachers are compared to other jobs they can walk into with a much less demanding and stressful workload, and you might be heading in the right direction.

I really miss my teaching days but it was so tiring

Try getting rid of the Principals

Sounds complex 🙄

Oh yea sure. Thanks useless ACT GOVT!!!

So once they identify how many teachers are needed then are they going to find out why so many leave teaching. Also it is unlikely they can fill the shortfall in the near future ad it takes at least 4 yrs to qualify then that gives us a huge number of inexperienced teachers coming in facing the discipline problems, lack of resourcing, too many hours of face to classes and being expected to plan and mark etc in their own time, low pay etc all the things driving teachers out now. They need to fix all the problems

All very well to say how many extra teachers have been recruited. If more teachers have left the system than have been recruited, the system is going backwards. Seems like there is a need for some expert workforce modelling to be completed in 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020…….. We used to do that in the olden days, but what did we know?

If rental prices weren’t so atrocious could help. Would move home in a heartbeat and teach!

Seems very short sighted not to look at ALL schools in the ACT, not just the public schools.

Justine Fuller, Granita Sherberg same in regional NSW

More than we’re going to be able to employ is my guess. Teacher workloads were enormous before COVID and totally ignored by the Department/Government and school management. COVID has brought this inequality to light and made the situation worse with fewer teachers available and many more ready to leave the profession. Given what is now public knowledge, there are likely to be fewer and fewer choosing teaching as a career path, with there being a 4-year degree between new teachers and the workforce. This will only compound the lack of teaching resources available from an already dwindling pool. Maybe it’s time to rethink HOW we educate in our schools based upon the resources we (don’t) have? A report will do nothing to relieve pressure and workloads when there are no resources available to hold up the current practice.