Recruiting Professionals to become teachers

[maccatak11]

OK i have another conundrum for you.

In order to entice professionals in other fields to become teachers, there has to be some pretty good incentives for them to leave their other job.

Besides getting paid to study, which is a good thing, you would reasanably expect to be offered a permanent job somewhere at the end of it all. After all, you wouldn't leave your secure job as an engineer only to be given consecutive contracts for a period of time right?

So lets say that of these people switching professionals will be given permenancy. We have also established that this program will not suit everyone, and you are probably going to get a mixed bag of people that actually swap professions (i.e. some good and some bad). This has the potential to add bad permanent teachers to the pool (and im not saying that these don't exist already).

There will need to be some kind of assessment process (as there is now with student teachers) to ensure that these new teachers are up to certain standards, otherwise we will be adding some permanent teachers (read: hard to get rid of) who aren't up to it.

Given that this assessment process is a must, are you then less likely to quit your job as an engineer, do all of this study when there are no guarantees about a job at the end (only if you met certain standards?).

I come back to my point of offering greater incentives for young people to get them to study undergraduate degrees in teaching in the first place (having said that, it then takes 4-5 years for these people to get into the system).


(and by the way the 18 month teaching course was a degree, now a masters in education, not a diploma )

[bennymacca]

OK i have another conundrum for you.

In order to entice professionals in other fields to become teachers, there has to be some pretty good incentives for them to leave their other job.

Besides getting paid to study, which is a good thing, you would reasanably expect to be offered a permanent job somewhere at the end of it all. After all, you wouldn't leave your secure job as an engineer only to be given consecutive contracts for a period of time right?

So lets say that of these people switching professionals will be given permenancy. We have also established that this program will not suit everyone, and you are probably going to get a mixed bag of people that actually swap professions (i.e. some good and some bad). This has the potential to add bad permanent teachers to the pool (and im not saying that these don't exist already).

There will need to be some kind of assessment process (as there is now with student teachers) to ensure that these new teachers are up to certain standards, otherwise we will be adding some permanent teachers (read: hard to get rid of) who aren't up to it.

Given that this assessment process is a must, are you then less likely to quit your job as an engineer, do all of this study when there are no guarantees about a job at the end (only if you met certain standards?).

I come back to my point of offering greater incentives for young people to get them to study undergraduate degrees in teaching in the first place (having said that, it then takes 4-5 years for these people to get into the system).


(and by the way the 18 month teaching course was a degree, now a masters in education, not a diploma )

the proportion of good to bad would be pretty high i reckon - as an engineer, i can earn more than most teachers, so it would only be because i wanted to teach that i would move.

secondly, there are many people that finish high school, and because of low demand for teachers, they decide to do teaching because they can actually get into it.

so i would say that the proportion of good teachers would be much much higher than for the general teaching undergratuate.


you are right though, offering incentives for new teachers is a good thing (but then your union would bitch if there were performance payments anyway)

[maccatak11]

The issue with performance payments is not whether they are good or bad, but who decides who a good teacher is or not. By the way, performance pay exists now (in the form of AST - Advanced Skills Teacher), which is a fair few hoops to jumo through including an assessment process. The union rightly complains when somebody comes up with the idea that teachers who get students the best marks should be paid more.

[gundog]

I'm just taking the devils advocate position on the following questions.

Where is the actual measurement that defines a good and bad teacher ? considering there are no actual exams for every level.

How can the system show that a student has reached the required standard ?.

I think a 3 or 4 year experianced private sector professional, would not be on the target list, i think they would be looking at the 15+ year professional. Then again a 100k+ a year professional wouldn't take a massive pay cut unless there was some guarantee's in the form of tenure and salary.

Would these guarantee's put the career teachers off side thus creating angst between them and then union disputation over their employment.

[Bacon]

I'm just taking the devils advocate position on the following questions.

Where is the actual measurement that defines a good and bad teacher ? considering there are no actual exams for every level.

How can the system show that a student has reached the required standard ?.

I think a 3 or 4 year experianced private sector professional, would not be on the target list, i think they would be looking at the 15+ year professional. Then again a 100k+ a year professional wouldn't take a massive pay cut unless there was some guarantee's in the form of tenure and salary.

Would these guarantee's put the career teachers off side thus creating angst between them and then union disputation over their employment.

With your excessive, incorrect use of the apostrophe in plurals, you won't be targetted either.

It would depend on what guarantees are given. But you don't choose teaching for the money.

[maccatak11]

you don't choose teaching for the money.

Winnar! Never a truer statement.

[trishan]

The biggest thing I noticed moving from another country's schooling system to the Australian schooling system is the lack of respect for teachers and discipline among kids.

Back in the Republic (of South Africa) teachers are respected almost as much as doctors, lawyers and other professionals (even though they don't earn as much). The kids accordingly are extremely well disciplined and rarely step out of line.

When I came to Aus, I was shocked at how kids would back chat and disrespect teachers. I think educational outcomes is based partly on culture. Culture's affect can be seen in Asian schools where again teachers get a lot of respect and students are extremely disciplined. It's no surprise that when a lot of Asian students move to Australia, having only English as a second language, they perform extremely well.

Any ideas why there is such a negative image and culture surrounding teaching in Aus?

[David]

That's true.
Very true.

And I think it stems back over the years, it's been a gradual thing.

Why? I'd need more time to think about it.

[bennymacca]

because, rightly or wrongly, the best and brightest have shunned teaching as a profession.

thats not casting dispersions on the teachers out there, but the fact is that the standards of entry are incredibly low, and teaching is seen by many people as a fallback degree, which is obviously silly. but thats the way it is.

[maccatak11]

because, rightly or wrongly, the best and brightest have shunned teaching as a profession.

thats not casting dispersions on the teachers out there, but the fact is that the standards of entry are incredibly low, and teaching is seen by many people as a fallback degree, which is obviously silly. but thats the way it is.

The standard of teaching degree entry has nothing to do with the way students respect or disrespect their teachers.