Fix for teacher shortage

AUSTRALIA’S “unprecedented” inability to attract and keep enough teachers will be tackled by all levels of government and school officials tasked with boosting numbers without reducing “quality” education for students.

Offering guaranteed jobs at the end of degrees, more ongoing training, using skilled migrants, increased pay and better managing workloads are among the strategies a roundtable chaired by federal Education Minister Jason Clare will consider this week.

Ahead of the meeting of state and territory education ministers, school principals, universities and other experts on Friday, the federal government has released a discussion paper outlining ways to fix Australia’s dire teacher shortage.

Growing student numbers and an ageing workforce has contributed to what the Department of Education estimated will be a shortfall of about 4100 secondary teachers in Australia between 2021 and 2025.

The roundtable will discuss ways to raise the “status” of teaching as a profession to “improve the attractiveness” of the profession.

“In surveys of the general public, teaching usually has a moderate level of social status, below doctors, nurses and engineers,” the discussion paper said.

Boosting senior teacher salaries and also improving conditions and workloads will also be discussed at the roundtable.

Australian teachers spend about 4.1 hours on administrative tasks a week, compared to the average of only 2.7 hours among other OECD countries.

A top teacher’s salary in Australia is only 40 per cent higher than the starting wage, which is significantly below the OECD average of 80 per cent.

Streamlining the process to allow “suitably qualified” skilled migrants to work as teachers is also on the table.

Mr Clare said there weren’t many jobs more important than being a teacher, and Australia did not have enough of them.

“We have a teacher shortage right across the country,” he said.

“Fewer young people are enrolling to become teachers and more and more teachers are thinking of leaving.”

Mr Clare said it was an issue the nation needed to fix.

Universities Australia chief executive Catriona Jackson said the teacher shortages were “especially pronounced” in regional communities, reducing opportunities for kids to study core subjects like mathematics.