Problem teachers rarely on report

QUEENSLAND state schools are doing such a poor job of managing incompetent teachers that only 11 people out of 50,000 are being “performance-managed”.

The Queensland Audit Office has released a scathing report into annual teacher performance reviews, finding principals were not required to assess whether staff were doing a good job against any clear expectations.

There is no differentiation between what is expected of a graduate teacher and a senior lead teacher and goals nominated for teachers to achieve each year are not measured.

Also, there was no clear definition of “unsatisfactory performance” for a teacher or principal.

The 11 teachers who were being performance-managed as at December last year represented just 0.05 per cent of the state’s workforce.

The findings come ahead of plans to pay the best teachers more, but the question is how best to measure success.

“This low number may indicate that the process does not adequately identify and manage teachers who consistently underperform,” the report said.

“The Department of Education and Training has processes for managing development and managing unsatisfactory performance, but not for measuring a teacher’s actual performance,” it found. “This limits schools’ ability to objectively recognise teachers who perform well, and address those with performance issues.

“The annual performance process cannot provide specific and documented examples of poor performance to support the formal process to manage unsatisfactory performance.”

Education Minister Kate Jones acknowledged the “pretty low” rate of teachers being performance-managed, but said parents shouldn’t worry.

“We are committed to making these improvements to not only benefit teachers but schooling,” she said.