Half of schools in need

Just over half of New Zealand primary schools say they do not have all the teachers they need.

A survey by the NZ Educational Institute (NZEI) has found that 30 per cent of primary school principals say there are no suitable applicants for the jobs they need to fill.

More than half (52 per cent) said they did not have all the teachers they need this term, and 28 per cent have had to increase class sizes because they can’t find enough teachers. The shortage is much worse for low decile schools: 62.5 per cent of principals in the poorest three deciles said they did not have all the teachers they needed this term, compared with 39 per cent in the richest three deciles.

The survey is based on responses from 700 (36 per cent) of the country’s 1945 primary and intermediate schools, and was organised as the institute campaigns for a 16 per cent pay rise for teachers over two years.

The teacher shortage has been a major justification for the pay claim, as starting salaries, now $49,588 a year, have slipped from 25 per cent above the national median wage in 2001 to 1 per cent below the median last year. Domestic students starting teacher training (excluding early childhood teaching) have dropped by a quarter from 3590 at the peak of the last economic cycle in 2008 to 2790 last year.

Indicative Ministry of Education numbers for this year are up by 280 but are still well below the same point in the last cycle, in a period when primary and intermediate school rolls have grown by 7.5 per cent. reo Ma¯ori, and has been trying to recruit two beginning teachers since March.

“I’ve had people applying from Canada, South Africa and Fiji, but no beginning teachers have applied,” she said.

Papatoetoe North School principal Peter Conroy said he had five teachers sick on Monday but could not get any relievers from Oasis.

“Knowing the problem we have getting relieving teachers, the first teacher rang me at 5.37am and I forwarded a request for a teacher to Oasis,” he said.

“All the other teachers rang