Accreditation

We received the latest Pravda today. It's full of the usual useless propaganda aka rubbish. One article starts with:

"Schools working towards building a Performance and Development Culture and achieving the highly prized accreditation would do well…" blah blah blah.

Accreditation reared its ugly head last year and we were a long way off it. Nobody told us why we would want to be accredited. Do we get more money, more staff, better conditions, less paperwork (not that I do any!) or what?? Why would any school want to go to the trouble?

Accreditation is 'highly prized'??? By whom??

Pravda dishes up the usual slop.

So there is enough money…

In the letters to The Age (18/2/08) there is a sentence that sums up a previous post, and shows the hypocrisy of Bronwyn Pike et al.

The letter reads:

"Trade holidays for pay, teachers told" (The Age, 15/12). So there is enough money"

Lewis McCavour, Swan Hill

Sums it all up.

Trading holidays for pay

I had heard that this was on the cards a while ago. The story is here:

 

http://www.theage.com.au/text/articles/2008/02/14/1202760494720.html

 

VICTORIAN teachers will be asked to trade some of their holiday time and pupil-free training days in return for higher wages.
As thousands of striking teachers shut down schools across the state yesterday, Education Minister Bronwyn Pike said the Government was prepared to pay teachers more, provided they agreed to measures designed to lift performance and make the profession more productive.
Some proposals on the table include changes to pupil-free training days and annual leave. Victorian teachers have 11 weeks of holidays a year, 15 days of sick or carers leave and four pupil-free training days, which are used by teachers for planning or professional development.
As part of the wage negotiations, the Government is reviewing the time teachers have away from the classroom, and may shift pupil-free days — most of which are in school terms — to the start of school, before students resume class.
"We'd like teachers to come back to school before the students so they can talk together in teams, plan in teams, and improve the quality of their programs," Ms Pike said. "A lot of teachers already do that but we'd like that to be standard across the board, and then we're prepared to talk about how teachers can get extra money for that increased attendance at school."

 

A couple of things, how will making teachers come back in the holidays save money? Teachers are on a salary, no matter how many days they work. It won't make any difference to the budget. Where are the so-called productivity "trade-offs"?

 

I'd be quite happy to get rid of a couple of the pupil-free days. As I've said before, the whole school PD days are a waste of time. We usually get so-called experts in to tell us how it could be done. There is going to be a shortage of experts if they are all going to work in the same couple of days before school starts. They will also have nothing to do for the rest of the year. How will they survive?

 

Teams - how I hate that word. It's an import from the business world and should have been left there. 'talk together in teams, plan in teams, and improve the quality of their programs' - that's not going to happen. You can't shove a team together under duress and expect it to do some productive work, which is what is going to happen.

But Bronwyn Pike is all hot air and is more interested in looking good.

Bureaucratic Stupidity

I have very little time or respect for the ministerial bureaucratic sycophants. They are overpaid and are just there to save the minister from making a jackass of themselves. They make no productive contribution to our economy and the money they're paid could be put to better use.

 

This time it is Matt Nurse who makes an idiot of himself:

Matt Nurse, spokesman for Education Minister Bronwyn Pike, said the Government wanted to lift standards in schools and find better career pathways for teachers.
But giving teachers a 10% wage rise and better working conditions would cost taxpayers $8 billion, he said.
"If we agreed to this claim we would have no money left for new classrooms, new technology or libraries for our students," Mr Nurse said.
"We will continue to discuss a new enterprise bargaining agreement with teachers once they return to the table and many things are up for discussion."

 http://www.theage.com.au/text/articles/2008/02/11/1202578694347.html

 

The next day Stuart Brearley pointed out that Matt should have gone to school and done some maths.

 

Number-crunching

I NOTE that Matt Nurse from the Education Department states that giving teachers a 10% pay rise would cost $8 billion (The Age, 12/2).
That figure presupposes that the wage bill for Victorian teachers must be $80 billion. Given that the average teacher wage is $55,000, we must therefore have 14,545,455 teachers in Victoria.
This figure is almost 3.5 times our entire population. It must be untrue.
It would cost $121 million to give teachers a 10% pay rise, to bring them almost level with NSW. This is 66 times less than the figure quoted. Just where does the Education Department get its numbers from?
Stuart Brearley, Box Hill North

 

I'll admit all of the $8 billion is going to wages but it would have to be most of it. And Stuart has ignored the extra costs such as superannuation. However, it does show what ministers and their toadies will say if they are desperate. I hope that one of the "many things (that) are up for discussion" is the reduction in the number of wasteful bureaucrats.

 

Education Times

We received the latest version Pravda (aka Education Times). This is the 16th year of the tripe. It is just a propaganda piece. Everything is rosey, there are never any problems and there is never any criticism of the minister or her policies.

 

I was at a school that was asked to contribute to the 'this is what we do' page. It was supposed to be about how we used AFL in our classroom. Every one of the contributions was rubbish, we did none of it. It was all how we 'could' have used the AFL. Ironically, the only person who did use the AFL was me, in computers - and there was no way I was going to waste my time to write for Pravda.

 

Normally, I go straight to the appointments to see if there is somebody I know and it's then straight into the recycling bin. I took a bit more time as I knew there'd be something useful for this blog.

 

Newspaper photographers regularly set up stupid shots, trying to make the material seem more interesting. There is a picture of a girl soldering a circuit board. Apart from trying to solder the wrong side of the board, the caption says they are testing robots they designed in class. Sorry, but I can't believe that there is any way that she designed that circuit board.

 

I really couldn't be bothered reading the rest of the tripe.

Teen performance decreases

Both papers today had a summary of the Andrew Leigh and Chris Ryan paper:

 

 http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/teen-performance-on-three-rs-in-decline/2008/02/10/1202578601344.html

 

I couldn't find the online version of the Herald Sun article.

 

The original research article is here:

 

 http://econrsss.anu.edu.au/~aleigh/

 

I bet the reporters who wrote the articles didn't read all 47 pages of the report and just rehashed the summary. Overall, I am not convinced that the report proves anything. Students today certainly don't have the basic arithmetic skills that their grand parents had. The use of calculators have killed that - who does long division any more? I am dubious that the tests are testing the same thing and even the authors admit that there is a lot more that students today learn compared to their grand parents. The ability to adapt to new technology is one such area.

 

Education is different. Compare any subject now with what was done in the '60s. A student from today would struggle back then and vice versa.

 

As for class sizes, I find the ideal size is about 20. Too much smaller and you don't get the interaction that teachers like today and too much bigger you don't get to see the kids individually as much as you like. There is no way we could go back to the class size in the 30s we had when I first started. Besides the school rooms are not big enough.

Tough schools to get 'better' teachers

Saturday's The Age had an article that gives some clues as to what the government may want in the current wage negotiations.

 

http://www.theage.com.au/text/articles/2008/02/08/1202234169441.html 

 

Top teachers, including graduates, would get a bonus to teach in underperforming schools. Good luck to them. It'll be interesting to see if it works. My guess is that it won't. One, the government won't be willing to pay enough. Secondly, tossing the graduates into that environment is more likely to put them off teaching for good unless they get an amazing amount of support, which the government is unlikely to provide. Teachers tend to like to teach in areas similar to those they grow up in. How many teachers originally from the western suburbs are there in the education system?

 

Incidentally, if the staff succeed and pull up a school so that it is no longer underperforming, will that mean that their salary will then go down? If they don't, how does this accord with schools that already are performing to the correct 'standards'? That would be unfair on those teachers and schools already doing a good job.

 

One good thing in the article seems to be that the government wants a reduction in the number of pupil-free days. I've said before all-school pupil-free days are a waste of resources. Using a scatter-gun approach to professional development never works. They might want to also look a t the number of days some staff take off for PD. It is ridiculous the number of days taken off. I hear that there is a new process for applying for departmental PD that has a ridiculous number of hoops to jump through. That ought to slow things down a little. I'll have to investigate this.

'Parasites' deserve a place at the table

A Charles Spicer wrote a letter in The Sunday Age having a go at the teachers' union. It's reproduced below.

 

Although it does a lot of good, the Australian Education Union also does a lot of harm. I'm old enough to remember strikes they have called on ideological grounds, which have had nothing to do with teaching. I can sympathise with Charles. Because of the AEU, in recent years we have had to put up with the VIT (Victorian Institute of Leeches) and, as Charles pointed out, the appalling agreement in 2004. Like him, I voted against it, one of two in my school I believe. It was that agreement that put us so far behind. I know Charles is not the only teacher who was disenchanted with the AEU and gave them the flick.

 

I think one of the problems is that the union is run by non-teachers. When was Mary Bluett last in the classroom?

 

'Parasites' deserve a place at the table

Juliette Hughes, The Ethicist ("Should you go on strike if your union asks you?" 3/2), refers to non-union members of the teaching fraternity as "merely parasitical".

I doubt that the Australian Education Union represents half of all serving teachers in Victoria, and yet they hold all the power at the negotiating table during discussions with the government.

During the 2004 Schools Agreement talks, I contacted the government as I wanted to contribute to the discussion. I was told I had to speak to the union. I then contacted the union and they hung up on me when I told them I was not a member.

As this door closed I turned to my usual course of action and wrote letters to the minister.

Unfortunately, under the Bracks/Brumby Government, I only received the standard auto reply of "we'll get back to you", which they never do.

When it came time to vote on the agreement, I voted against it but was in the minority. I had no choice but to accept the umpire's decision, however flawed, in order to continue doing what I love.

Having been a member of a union, I believe the AEU has continually let its members down and therefore I choose not to join.

I do, however, continue to lobby the government and have been described by senior bureaucrats as an "activist", although none of these people have shown me the courtesy of actually speaking to me and finding out whether I am rational or otherwise.

It is my hope that all teachers, and not simply unionists, will be able to have more of a say in their working conditions in the future.

That way "parasites" such as myself can finally play a role in changing education in Victoria for the better.

CHARLES SPICER, Glen Waverley

Nurses in Schools

The teachers' union made The Sunday Age in a couple of articles. The first is for a nurse for every school.

 

http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/union-seeks-allergy-nurse-for-every-school/2008/02/09/1202234230280.html

 

In a nutshell, that isn't going to happen. I was in a small school and it had a nurse three days a week. I'm in a larger school with five times the kids and it doesn't get a nurse. Some brilliant decision making is going on here.

 

All teachers are supposed to have been trained on using EPipens. We had a staff meeting mostly devoted to it. What a waste of time. We didn't get to try or even touch the EPipen. The presenter told us what to do and that was it. Our school hadn't even decided where to put the EPipens. If I had a case I wouldn't have a clue what to do except call for the assistant principal, which might be the best thing anyway.

 

When the government says all teachers will be trained in something you can rest assured that it will be poor (and cheap) and probably useless training.

Merit Pay

The education section of The Age brought up the idea of merit pay again. The article quotes Dr Andrew Leigh from the ANU. The link is here:

 

http://www.theage.com.au/news/education-news/push-for-trial-of-merit-pay/2008/02/01/1201801039692.html 

 

The Age article linked back to Andrew Leigh's web site but I couldn't find his original comments. Despite his comments, I have do not know of any place where merit pay has worked. The small example from Denver Colorado quoted shows the problem and has very little to do with merit.

 

It offers an extra 3% if the teacher goes to a hard-to-staff school. What has this to do with merit? And I would want a lot more than 3% to take on some of the schools in Victoria.

On the merit side it offers 3% if test scores exceed expectations. Does this mean all subjects are now tested? It will side effect of making teachers teach to the test. Does it mean every student has to exceed expectations? There will be a rush to teach 'good' classes. What about the 'unteachable' student. There are only a few but some students have no interest in doing anything with school. And despite the rhetoric by politicians a school is not going to be able to do anything with them.

 

They offer an extra 9% for extra degrees etc. Extra qualifications should be rewarded but it doesn't necessarily make a better teacher. Extra 2% for professional development (PD) - given the amount of rubbish PD we get shoved down our throats we deserve the extra for having to put up with it.

Criminal Teachers

The Herald Sun started the week with some front page teacher bashing:

 

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,23154163-661,00.html 

 

Mind you, more column centimetres were spent on plugging their Monopoly game than on their so-called exposé on criminal teachers so things aren't too bad.

 

I'm not sure if the little paper expects teachers to be paragons of virtue or not, or whether it was just a bit of a beat up. Christian Bennett, writing in the letters to the editor the next day made the interesting comment: "Imagine the outcry if a school demanded full disclosure of its parents' past deeds. It would soon become a very small school."

 

Yes, teachers do have an influence on kids lives but parental attitudes are a far bigger influence. As a principal once said, we're trying to instill behaviour patterns in some students in the few hours we see them that parents have no ability to teach them.

Stop holding back top students

The new grand pooh bah of education, Professor Barry McGaw, says we are holding back our top students by concentrating on the weaker ones.

 

http://www.theage.com.au/news/education-news/stop-holding-back-top-students-curriculum-chief/2008/01/31/1201714153287.html

 

That will certainly put the cat amongst the curriculum pigeons. Unfortunately, with the way school are under-resourced and are set up it is difficult to cater for all abilities. Streaming has been tried and found wanting. No, I don't have an answer but I bet Prof. McGaw doesn't have one either.

 

He is quoted as saying, "Any plans to develop a nationally consistent curriculum could fail without additional resources for schools." I think he used the wrong word. It should be 'will' not 'could'. If it is like every other initiative, such as VELS, we'll get plenty of web sites to look through, as if we have nothing else or better to do but spend hours trawling through the Internet. Occasionally, we get bored to death by departmental apparatchiks doing their best to earn their bonuses. Somebody needs to teach bureaucrats how to produce a PowerPoint presentation. The coal face is not the place to be.

 

In the science area, schools have been gradually getting further behind in the technological area. Last year, for the first time in about 40 years as far as I can remember, money was actually allocated to schools to buy resources to help bring schools up-to-date. It wasn't enough and let's hope it's not another 40 years before it is done again.

Education Spending

So, Victorian students get less money spent on them, according the Productivity Commission. The article is in The Age here:

 

http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/pressure-builds-on-education-spending/2008/01/30/1201369229697.html

 

We're the lowest funded in the country, $1000 less than NSW and $2000 less than WA.

 

Bronwyn Pike gave the predictable line, which of course cannot be proven: "our education system is one of the most efficient". Bronwyn is confusing frugality with efficiency. Not spending money does not make you efficient. But she doesn't care that our students work in appalling conditions. I know that she wouldn't work in the conditions she expects us to work in. But she doesn't care, she's comfortable.

Preppies Beginning School

Have you ever noticed that all the media outlets do the same boring thing every year on the first day of school? It seems to be a competition amongst the primary schools to have the most twins and triplets featured in the newspapers or on the TV news.

New National Çurriculum

Once again we will have to put up with a new curriculum. The Herald Sun has the article here:

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,23134813-2862,00.html

 

and in The Age here:

http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/national-plan-to-tackle-education/2008/01/30/1201369229670.html

 

As a practicing teacher, you just get tired of it. We've just had the VELS curriculum shoved down our throats and now the federal government is having its go at it. (VELS is a farce but I'll write about that later.)

 

Rudd promises it will drive up retention rates, improve student performance, blah, blah, blah. How it will do this is never explained. If it is like every other initiative it will die through lack of resources. They produce plenty of paper work and then expect teachers to put it into practice, all on top of all the work they are still expected to do.

 

I notice that there don't appear to be any teachers on this new National Curriculum Board. That's really gone to help it work! The Age notes that unions will not be on the Board. Predictably, they're complaining about that but they're pretty useless anyway, at least in Victoria.

 

About the only advantage I can see is for the kids who are transferring between the states and territories.

 

The best way to fix all the problems is to get rid of all the states and territories with all their inefficiencies and duplicate bureaucracies. But that isn't going to happen as the state MPs have their own interests to look after.

 

With a bit of luck I will have retired before the waste begins.

Teacher Should Strike

Catherine Deveny, who I assume is a staff reporter, wrote a very nice piece titled 'Teachers should strike for more pay. Our kids are worth it'. The article in The Age is here:

http://www.theage.com.au/news/opinion/teachers-should-strike-for-more-pay/2008/01/29/1201369130959.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1 

 

I am not in favour of striking, I think that there are better ways of doing it. Staff should stop doing all the extra work, all the PPW (pointless paper work), ignoring all the department surveys or filling them in incorrectly, not paying the VIT (Victorian Institute of Teaching) black mail etc. Of course, it won't happen.

 

Speaking of the VIT, they are the biggest leeches in teaching fraternity, the blood-suckers of bureaucracy. They do nothing useful for teachers. I know of no teacher that is happy with them. Some of their useless ideas are pathetic. They want CRTs (relief teachers) to participate in professional development. They are usually retired teachers and schools are desperate to get them to fill in when needed. There aren't wandering herds of CRTs just desperate to become employed, it's the other way around. If they aren't available then the work load on teachers goes up, which has happened with some small country schools without a pool of CRTs.

 

Teachers used to be registered by the education department. The VIT came about as the government decided to put the costs onto teachers. Unfortunately, the useless teachers' union agreed. This means that the union won't do anything about the VIT. Another reason why teaching now sucks. It was Mary Delahuntly who started the VIT and, boy, was she a useless flash in the pan.

 

They've increased the work load of first year out teachers with all the paper work - the VIT calls it support. What it means is they are busy collecting work off other teachers and passing it off as their own. I'm proud to say I have supported this! Why should they have to suffer? They also expect other staff to increase their work load above what they normally do just to fill in VIT's useless paper work. That's the type of work that should be black banned until we are properly rewarded.

 

Thanks for the support Catherine, but the government (and especially Bronwyn Pike) just doesn't care.

The Teaching Answer

A Leigh Williams in the letters to The Age neatly put something that I hadn't realised. The letter is below. The temporary link is

http://www.theage.com.au/letters/index.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1

 

From a personal point of view (and being an 'older' teacher), I will not take on a job if there is insufficient time given to perform the task properly. Schools tend to not give money and, even if they do, it is usually a pittance after you take out tax.

 

The comments about training days (pupil-free days) are also most apt. They are always a waste of time and money. I have never been to one that has been worth the time and money. The number I have had to suffer would be over 100. Occasionally, a segment out of the day would be interesting and useful but as I look around at the $1000s spent all I can see is waste.

 

What is it with principals and leadership teams that they believe that they have to inflict their rubbish on the staff. I can only believe that it must be in their performance plans and they are doing it for a bonus. It must be easier not to run them so why not make most people happy. A couple of years ago, one staff member said she liked pupil-free days. They allowed her to catch up socially with other members of staff that she doesn't normally get time to speak to.

 

Leigh William's writes:
PHILIP Riley (Opinion, 28/1), in highlighting the attrition rate of new teachers, mentions fundamental points such as wage rates and training.

However, he fails to get to the heart of the matter. As in any job, the first few years are a mixture of challenge and reward.

New teachers are bombarded with training days, coerced into leadership roles and treated little better than the students they are paid to teach. Older, more experienced teachers handball responsibilities onto new teachers, mainly because they are not supported with the time or pay, they have a revolving door of seminars and school leaderships that treat teachers like children.

Those in education who provide the framework for training, curriculum, timetables and pay refuse to understand the basic needs of new teachers.

Teachers are voting with their feet. They move to other, less stressful, better paid jobs.

Put simply, older teachers are saying that the profession has got harder, while new teachers are … well, not teaching any more.

Keeping our Teachers

A university lecturer from Monash University, Philip Riley, has penned his thoughts on how to keep teachers teaching. His article is here:

http://www.theage.com.au/news/opinion/keeping-our-teachers/2008/01/27/1201368941242.html

He makes some good points. Nearly half the teachers who start teaching do not last longer five years. A quarter last only one year. All this means a lot of money and effort are wasted.

 

His solution seems to be better training and professional development. I seem to remember that the practicum (practice teaching) was the best part of Dip Ed. It will be interesting to see how Melbourne Uni's two year teaching course goes. I gather it has a strong emphasis on the practicum. Unfortunately for Melb Uni's students they do not get any more money when they start teaching (except, possibly, if they can obtain a position in an obliging private school) and they will have a higher HECS debt.

 

Increasing teacher training costs money and short-sighted governments don't like spending money, unless they can get a few quick votes.

Editorial Letter by Chris Curtis

Chris Curtis had another letter publish in The Age today. It can be found here:

http://www.theage.com.au/news/letters/a-fight-for-the-bay-and-a-battle-for-hastings/2008/01/27/1201368939652.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap3

I have put a copy of his edited letter at the end of this post.

 

He criticises both the union and the government over their incompetence. I tend to agree with him. The union and the government are both useless. I am proud to say that I was one of two people in our school (out of about 80) who didn't vote for the current agreement. I could see what was going to happen. It is interesting that within two days of us getting 2.25% pay rise, the politicians gave themselves a 4% pay rise. We have to increase our work load to get more money so why don't they? They are hypocrites. They claim they have an independent tribunal to give them pay rises. What rubbish! The members of the tribunal know they won't remain in their quango junket if they don't give the necessary pay rises. We should tie our wages to politicians wages (and allowances).

 

Chris didn't answer the original writers questions as to why an experienced teacher has trouble getting a job. Another writer did. In a word, money. Graduate teachers are cheap so schools are encouraged to employ them. Experience is irrelevant. Once again, the learning of students is put last. As graduate teachers find out, you learn the most in the first few years as you find out what does and doesn't work.

 

I did my Dip Ed with a Chris Curtis at Rusden college many moons ago. The same Chris Curtis?

 

Chris wrote:
AMANDA Campbell is the latest in a long list of teachers complaining abut their working lives. What none of them has mentioned is that the decline in pay, staffing and working conditions is exactly what they themselves actually agreed to.

Victorian teachers foolishly endorsed the 2004 enterprise bargaining agreement, and were forced to accept higher teaching loads, longer periods, inadequate time allowances and the abolition of their management advisory committee, while secondary schools overall remained almost 2000 teachers short of their previous staffing levels.

The Government expects teachers to cave in because that is what they did in 2001 and 2004. If teachers think they deserve the pay and conditions that a much poorer state could afford more than 25 years ago, they will have to stop being wimps, stop voting for deals that make their working lives worse and start walking out of their schools en masse.

Finding Sufficient Teachers

The Age published a major article reporting a survey showing the difficulty that schools (particularly regional schools) have in recruiting teachers. It is here:

http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/state-schools-struggling-to-find-teachers/2008/01/27/1201368944842.html

 

Unfortunately, it was a survey produced by the teachers' union, the AEU (Australia Education Union). This means that the government can ignore it claiming the union is just pushing their own barrel. Of course, the government doesn't do any surveys so that it can say that there is no problem. This means it doesn't have to do something.

 

40% of secondary teachers (and I am one of them this year) teach subjects outside their expertise. Doesn't help the kids, but Bronwyn Pike (the minister) doesn't care.

 

28% of schools (and we are one) have unfilled positions. We had to reduce the range of subjects offered, which a third of schools do. Does Bronwyn Pike care? You have got to be joking.

 

The minsterial syncophant quoted contradicts themselves by saying that there is no teacher shortage but some subjects were 'harder to staff'. If you can't staff a subject doesn't that meant hat there aren't enough staff?

Boxing in Schools

In the Herald Sun, Les Twentyman is advocating that we introduce boxing into schools. The aim is to reduce some of the anti-social behaviour and giving boys in particular an outlet for their energy. The article is here:

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,23117473-2862,00.html

 

Les is a social welfare worker, well-known in Victoria. Personally, I have no objection to boxing in schools. However, before going all out I would like to see the evidence that it works. I seem to recall boxers are good at getting into to trouble just as much as other people, e.g. Mike Tyson! This is a job for super crunchers (statisticians).

 

Bronwyn Pike (the education minister) might give a tentative go ahead (by turning a blind eye to it) but you can be sure that after the first letter to the paper complaining about a blood nose it will be instantly banned.

Our Name

Do you know who we actually work for? Whenever we get a new government or minister they change the name of who we work for. They seem to think that we will be impressed by the fact that they are doing something. Actually, we just see it as a shocking waste of time and effort for the egos of politicians.

 

Incidentally, we work for what we know as DECEASED, which is more a comment on them than anything else. Officially it is the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development, DEECD. Only the environment/forestry/conservation has more name changes. No, I don't know what their name is.