Rod Sawford (Port Adelaide, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The implementation of the very achievable 12 recommendations in the report of the Standing Committee on Education and Vocational Training on teacher education entitled Top of the class will provide a very sound underpinning to future education policy in this country in not only teacher education but education generally. Debates in this country on education are all too often non-productive. Claims and counterclaims are made and repeated ad nauseam. Few of the claims can be substantiated, for they ignore valid evidential research and data. The committee has responded very strongly to this glaring omission. Three of the recommendations, 1, 2 and 9, deal with the need to establish a far better research base.

Firstly, it is recommended that a longitudinal study be established to examine the effectiveness of teacher education in Australia and the first five years of a teacher’s career when it is all so obvious a serious attrition rate occurs. Secondly, it is recommended that the Australian government establish a specific educational research fund to be distributed on a similar model to that of the National Health and Medical Research Council. Thirdly, the committee recommends that the Australian government support Teaching Australia’s proposal to conduct a feasibility study into the establishment of a national clearing house for education research.

One of the great problems in the education debate in this country is that everyone thinks that they know what is going on because they went to school or university or some bit of further education. Nothing could be further from the truth. Very few people indeed know what is going on in education, and very few in this place. That in itself is a tragedy. Education debates in this House are all too often embarrassing and just plain wrong.

Recommendation 1 says: ‘Stop guessing, find out what is going on.’ Recommendation 2 says: ‘Take education seriously.’ Recommendation 9 says: ‘Stop grinding teachers into the ground with the latest fad, whim, fashion or politically correct statement.’ Recommendation 3 says to the Australian government: ‘Continue to support the work of Teaching Australia to develop a national system of accreditation.’ There is no doubt that the establishment of a national system of accreditation will take some time and cooperation of state and territory registration authorities. The government should ensure that sufficient resources are committed to allow time for agreement to be reached.

Education is becoming internationalised. It is imperative that Australia begins to take a national approach to education. A national system of accreditation is a sound way to begin that process. Thirty years ago Australia was regarded as an enlightened educational beacon internationally. That is no longer necessarily the case. From that time, we have dropped the ball on technical and vocational education—we still have not picked it up; undervalued primary education, particularly in numeracy and literacy—we have not picked that up either; diminished physical education, giving rise to obesity in children—we have not picked that up either; allowed mathematics and science to fall under the radar—we have not picked that up either; and, as over 25 reports on teacher education have indicated, sent many mixed messages on that topic as well.

It is time to begin to return Australia to a more prominent position in the world of education. Recommendation 4 concerns entry into teacher education. As prominent researchers Skilbeck and Connell have said, selection for teaching should draw upon the rich cultural diversity of Australian society. They are absolutely correct. The teaching force needs to reflect the diversity of the Australian population. It does not, however, do this. Entry into teacher education is increasingly mature, metropolitan, middle class and female. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with any of those attributes. However, they are far too narrow.

There are too few students from lower socioeconomic, Indigenous, non-English-speaking, rural and remote backgrounds, as well as a dearth of males in primary education. Indigenous representation of 0.7 per cent is well below the four per cent of Indigenous enrolments in our schools. Non-English-speaking representation is at 13 per cent, well below the 23 per cent of students enrolled in this category. Statistics suggest that representation from low socioeconomic areas is not a problem. That is not true. The way of measuring the representation—the socioeconomic status—is flawed and seriously so. Mature age representation is increasing. Sixty per cent of enrolments in teacher education at Flinders University in my state are mature age. Thirty per cent of the enrolments in the University of Tasmania are aged over 25 years. Percentages in Queensland are 50 per cent and higher.

Students from rural and remote areas are disadvantaged because of living and relocation costs and the need to get a job. This leads to a significant dropout from courses of people who would probably become great teachers. It appears the real issue with rural and remote students is not necessarily attracting them to teacher education but supporting them to ensure the retention and successful completion of their studies. Some states like South Australia and Queensland do provide significant funds for this to occur but it is not extensive and, overall, the national response is uneven.

Selection processes for entry into teacher education is very much a contested debate. Should it be based solely on academic performance or draw upon a wider range of criteria? Academic achievement is not sufficient, but this is how most teacher education entrants are selected. However, aptitude is also crucial. The quality of students when they graduate is more important than their academic achievement when they enter the course. It is at graduation that no compromise should be made.

During courses some students display attitudes that suggest they are totally unsuited to teaching. However, there is some reluctance to transfer them to other courses. The assumption that high academic scores reflect high literacy and numeracy is not always correct. Only four of the 31 universities require year 12 mathematics; eight require year 11. The other 19 universities have no requirements in mathematics. That is not acceptable in a modern world.

Recommendation 5 deals with the supply of teachers and meeting teacher shortages. There is an obvious mismatch between government, employing authorities and universities in meeting the needs of the teacher labour market. The obvious lack of collaboration between these bodies is not acceptable. This is one area where data is available. There is no excuse for not using it, although it should be acknowledged that the process for identifying workforce priorities is not specific enough.

Recommendation 6 refers to practicum and partnerships in teacher education. Beginner teachers rate their practicum as the most useful part of teacher courses. However, there is no single model in Australia. There is no consensus on how much there is and when it commences, nor on structure, assessment or evaluation. There are suggestions that the amount of practicum has reduced in recent years. There is a shortage of placements. There is no obligation on employing authorities or schools to offer places. There is a lack of incentive to be involved: small payment, no time off and no professional development. This is a very serious problem in our secondary schools. Major reforms are needed in practicum. There is insufficient attention given to matching students with appropriate teachers. Too often teachers have little contact with universities and are unclear of expectations. Universities list a lack of funding as the major hindrance to a practicum. There is a lack of shared responsibility between employers, universities and schools.

The Australian government should take the lead in promoting, strengthening and evaluating partnerships. Employing authorities need to assume a greater responsibility for the preparation of future teachers. Practicum supervisors should be eligible as advanced teachers for higher status and remuneration. Universities need to give greater priority to properly supporting students in practicum.

Time is going to limit my recommendations, so I will quickly refer to recommendations 7 and 8. I support the committee’s recommendation on the introduction of the Scottish model of induction as the model that should be followed in Australia. Ongoing professional development for teachers should be a condition for the renewal of registration. As an aside, interestingly, the Scottish model of education is the one that we are most closely aligned with in Australia.

Recommendations 10, 11 and 12 refer to the funding of teacher education. The Commonwealth contribution for teacher education at $7,251, which is lower than that for languages and performing arts at $9,037, is simply not justifiable; in fact the amount ought to be closer to that of nursing, at $9,692.

Funding increases for practicum and the greater transparency of acquitting Commonwealth government funds are also highly recommended. As I have said previously, this is a very sensible and professional report which has made achievable recommendations and demands, and it deserves a positive response from the minister and the government. I thank the chair, the member for Cowper, and members of the committee. I thank the secretariat, who have done a great job—in particular, Janet Holmes, who has put together a very lucid and professional report, needs to be specifically congratulated. I commend the report to the Main Committee, and I commend it to the government and to the opposition.

Stuart Henry (Hasluck, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In speaking in support of the report Top of the class: report on the inquiry into teacher education I would like to firstly acknowledge the City of Gosnells, in my electorate of Hasluck, which hosted a day’s hearing on 25 October. They provided a great deal of assistance and support to the Standing Committee on Education and Vocational Training in setting up the hearing room for that day, which was greatly appreciated. I would also like to acknowledge the work of the chair, the member for Cowper, and fellow committee members. This was a very interesting, enlightening and educational opportunity to hear all of the evidence and to discuss the issues with members of the committee during the course of the hearings. I would also like to commend the work of the secretariat in organising, administering and providing support to the committee and in the detail of the report.

Top of the class is a comprehensive review of some of the problems faced by trainee teachers. The report will give us a better understanding of the opportunities currently available and the changes that need to occur to provide even more support and, most importantly, to improve teacher performance in the classroom. As was said at the tabling of the report, there is not a crisis in teacher education, but there is an opportunity to improve performance in teacher education. Importantly, the report seeks to bring about solutions to support teachers, as they are the most important factor influencing student achievement, influencing our children as they go through the school process.

The committee recommends the Australian government’s continued support of Teaching Australia in its development of a national system of accreditation. This is not a new idea. I understand it has been on the agenda of the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs for years, but unfortunately it has not happened. A common set of national, professional standards for teaching needs to be developed for use by all jurisdictions—for the registration of teachers and for the accreditation of courses. Key stakeholders need to be involved in the development of these standards. A national system of accreditation will not only strengthen the quality of teacher training but also provide the public with the assurance that graduating teachers are trained to a nationally accepted standard. Doctors, accountants, engineers and even plumbers operate within a national standard. National standards are set not just to ensure entry standards performance expectation but also to ensure accountability and continuing registration to practise.

Another aspect of the report, which is significant and must be addressed, is that of practicum. Practicum is a very important aspect of teacher training. The committee heard evidence of shortages of practicum placements, a weak link between practicum and theoretical components, the differing quality of supervisors, inadequate funding, along with additional problems faced by those undertaking practicum in rural and remote areas, all of which need to be addressed. These problems have been outlined time and time again for many years and they appear to escape an effective solution. Whilst there are a number of initiatives in place that are designed to improve practicum and whilst there are many teachers who are outstanding supervisors, it is still unacceptable that the quality of practicum is so varied across the country.

In Western Australia a teacher is required to have only 45 days of supervised practice teaching. Having the opportunity to experience a classroom, honing the skills required to not only manage the classroom but also plan for each term’s classes whilst at the same time keeping the students not only focused but engaged requires as much practical experience as possible during training. I believe this practical experience must commence early in training, not at the end, because it gives a student teacher the opportunity to discover early if their preferred profession is really what they wish to do. Many young trainee teachers spend three years at uni and find themselves in front of a classroom only to discover that they do not have the skills, the knowledge or the competency to control students in the classroom environment. These people tend to drop out, leading to the attrition rate that we seem to experience amongst qualified teachers.

Having the opportunity early on to discover the class environment can then lead to remedial steps being taken. It is important that these sessions are properly supported and supervised. Recent graduates rated practicum highly, but much of the evidence before the committee showed that it is an area of major concern. Practicum sets out to achieve integration of the theory with professional practice across teacher education, content, knowledge and professional knowledge. It is important that it is implemented in such a way that there is a partnership with the teacher educational institutions, the schools and the relevant professional bodies.

I might just underline that partnership aspect and its importance in ensuring a proper, practical process of teaching student teachers in the classroom about classroom management—managing students and the issues that students have. Its aim is to assist progressive development of newly acquired skills for the trainee teacher, providing valuable classroom experience in a variety of circumstances whilst working with the students. This provides a trainee teacher with the opportunity for evaluation and can then assist them in their response to their classroom experience. Practicum is also vital in providing feedback to the training institutions to ensure that their course best serves their trainee teachers.

Evidence before the committee showed that a number of course providers are working hard to improve the professional experience, and the committee commends these efforts. However, where the system was not as good can largely be attributed to a current division of responsibilities for delivering teacher education and the lack of recognition of shared responsibilities between the major parties. Teacher education facilities, the schools involved in the partnerships and the supervisors all play an integral role in providing the best practicum experience for the trainee teacher. It is not a difficult role but it is imperative that it occurs, as everyone, including the students, will benefit from an increase in responsibility.

I strongly support the recommendations of the committee to rectify these problems. Ensuring that high-quality practicum is carried out and assessed by high-quality supervisors will ensure that course providers better meet the expectations of the trainees. In all professions, the governing bodies ensure that apprentices, doctors and lawyers serve an extended period under supervision. This supervised on-the-job training is vital. It should be no less important an opportunity for those who are charged with the education of our children.

With an attrition rate of some 60 per cent of teachers and an ageing population, it is extremely urgent that we address the problems that are leading to this exodus from the profession. The Howard government recognised the trend in the shortage of teachers and capped the HECS fees for tertiary teaching courses in 2005. Unfortunately, the state government in Western Australia took a lot longer to act. In Western Australia at the start of this school year there was a shortage in the public schools of more than 250 teachers. That impacted on a number of classrooms, with children attending school for the first time without teachers.

It is not as though there are not teachers with qualifications. In fact, I had a young constituent approach me last year who spent four years at university gaining a qualification in physical education and the best that the state education department could do was place him as a relief music teacher—not within his area of discipline. We need to make sure that these allocations and the development of skills and disciplines are applied in the best possible interest of the teachers but also the students.

Relief teachers in Western Australia are being allowed into the classroom with just three years training, rather than four, under part of a desperate plan by the government to tackle the shortage. This situation has not occurred overnight. They have been warned for several years that this was the trend. The response of the Labor minister for education, Mark McGowan, was to send a party of three officers from the Department of Education and Training to attend a range of immigration expos in universities in places such as Birmingham, London, Edinburgh and Belfast on a recruitment drive to overcome this issue.

He also intends to recruit teaching students from England, Scotland and Ireland who are only due to complete their studies in June of 2007. That is on top of 16 UK and overseas teachers employed at the beginning of the school year who now find themselves in classrooms in the far north of Western Australia. Imagine being plucked from those areas in the Northern Hemisphere and being placed in the north of Western Australia. The difference in climate itself would be a significant challenge to teaching. What support will these new teachers have? Apart from the differences in the classroom, how are they to deal with other aspects such as government employee housing conditions and a department that is completely foreign to them, not to mention the cultural differences and homesickness?

As legislators it is imperative that we ensure that teachers enter the classroom with the best possible training and the best approach to the job at the same time as not only keeping intact what was once a desire but also ensuring that their passion for teaching remains strong. As William Butler Yeats once wrote:

Education is not the filling of a pail but the lighting of a fire.

We must ensure that the classroom experience is closely aligned to the perceptions gained during training. I commend the report to the chamber.

Stephen Smith (Perth, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Education and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I welcome the publication of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Education and Vocational Training report on the inquiry into teacher education. I note that it is a unanimous report. I note the committee’s chair, the member for Cowper, has referred the recommendations to the government, just as the deputy chair, the member for Port Adelaide, has referred them to me as Labor’s spokesman on education. I will, as the government no doubt will, give the detailed recommendations consideration and respond in due course.

This is a very valuable report because it underlines the importance of teaching as a profession and it underlines the importance of quality teaching. Historically as a nation we have undervalued, underregarded and underremunerated teachers. We have undervalued teaching as a profession and that is now emerging as a historical attitude which is to our cost. If we do not repair that attitude, it will be to our considerable economic and social disadvantage in the future. I do not think we can underline too much the importance of teaching and the importance of quality teaching.

All of the research and evidence I have looked at recently leads me to the conclusion that one of the most important factors, if not the most important factor, in determining a quality educational outcome for a student is the quality of the teacher in the classroom. As a consequence, public policy cannot turn a blind eye to how we assess quality teaching in the classroom. But before you can move to determine how public policy might judge the quality of teaching in the classroom, you actually have to have a supply of teachers—you have to have a supply of quality teachers and retain them in a noble profession.

Let us look at a quick snapshot of the state of our teaching profession and the supply of teachers in Australian society at the moment. The statistics are readily available from the department, and some feature in the report. Between 2001 and 2003, one in five domestic students in teacher education courses dropped out during their course. Fewer than 60 per cent of teacher graduates from initial teacher education courses were actually working full time in education in the year after they completed their course. Education authorities report anecdotally that up to 25 per cent of commencing teachers leave their current teaching position, and possibly the profession, within their first five years of teaching. Some 70 per cent of teacher education students in 2005 said they intended to work as a teacher for no more than five years. In 2002, of the over 365,000 Australians with teaching qualifications, over 115,000 were working outside education.

As well, we have significant difficulty with the ageing of our teaching workforce. In 2001, six per cent of teachers were under 25; 22 per cent were between 25 and 34; 28 per cent were between 35 and 44; and 43 per cent were over 45. And there are suggestions now that maybe about 50 per cent of our teachers are 50 or over. It was as early as 2003 that the ministerial council of state, Commonwealth and territory education ministers concluded shortages of 20,000 to 30,000 teachers could occur later this decade.

When it comes to specialised teacher qualifications, we see appalling statistics in physics, chemistry and maths—the key, core disciplines of science and maths. Over 40 per cent of senior school physics teachers lack a physics major, 25 per cent of senior physics teachers have not studied the subject beyond first year at university, 25 per cent of senior chemistry teachers do not have a major in chemistry, 25 per cent of science teachers do not have a science qualification, around 25 per cent of maths teachers do not have a major in maths and nearly 10 per cent of maths teachers have not studied any maths at university at all. We have an emerging crisis in the number of teachers, in the specialised attributes of those teachers and in retaining teachers within the profession. That leads to a crisis in the quality of teaching within Australia.

What does the committee unanimously recommend we do about that? I think there are some significant strands underlying the importance of the committee’s report. What can we do to attract young Australians to teaching? What can we do to attract young Australians to stay within that profession? What can we do to attract young Australians to specialise in key core discipline areas? Some of the suggestions that the committee have made are to me eminently sensible, including that teachers in their early years should be subjected to some form of mentoring program conducted by more experienced teachers. This is a very sensible idea. The committee suggested that teachers in their early years, particularly their first year, should be the subject of rigorous induction procedures and that a standard year’s teaching load should be reduced to enable that induction to occur. The committee said we should require ongoing professional development as a matter of course and that it should be recognised. The committee said that, through the work of Teaching Australia, we should move to national accreditation of teacher qualifications. This, to me, is a sensible course to pursue. Just as it is sensible to pursue national curricula in other areas, it is sensible to pursue a system of national accreditation when it comes to teachers.

The committee also referred to the entrance requirements and the current public policy attitude to university students studying education. I think that the government sent a very important message a couple of years ago, in 2003-04, when it reduced the HECS up-front contribution for those students who wished to study teaching. Whether or not people take a sceptical view about whether HECS is or is not a deterrent to students studying—and I take the view that a high HECS contribution can be a deterrent to young students from working families—if you reduce the HECS contribution in key areas you send a public policy message that the nation believes that studying and teaching in these areas is important. The committee sensibly recommends that there should be a long-term evaluation of that.

The committee also makes the point that the cluster funding arrangements for the Commonwealth contribution per university student studying an education or teaching course ought to be the subject of a very serious review. We do know that the government’s current cluster funding arrangements are historical and we also know that very many of them bear no relationship whatsoever to the real cost of providing quality courses to students in particular course areas. That particularly applies in education in the practical on-the-job and classroom training that is essential for and required of graduating teachers. This is a very important report. It underlines the importance of quality teaching in the classroom.

I said earlier that it is a difficult thing for public policy to judge the quality of a teacher in the classroom, but I think we have to go down that road. I do not subscribe to the current minister for education’s simplistic view that you can somehow judge the quality of a teacher in the classroom simply by looking at results in standardised tests. That is simplistic and narrow. But there are a whole range of things we can do to ensure quality teaching in the classroom, including the committee’s recommendations on mentoring, induction, ongoing professional development, accreditation in specialised areas and a national system of accreditation. This report is important because it goes to a fundamental area of importance to our social and economic future. Without quality teaching we will not see quality students emerge. That will be to our economic and social cost. I commend the committee’s report to the House.

Michael Ferguson (Bass, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the report of the House Standing Committee on Education and Vocational Training inquiry into teacher education, Top of the class, which has today been tabled in the House of Representatives. I have found it a very fulfilling and satisfying experience to be a member of this committee and, in particular, to be involved in this inquiry. We on the committee have worked in a fashion which I think the parliament and the people of Australia can be very proud of. I have observed very good working relationships between the committee chair, the member for Cowper, and the deputy chair, the member for Port Adelaide, and among the members of the committee. The subject matter of the inquiry was not easy, but we approached it in a spirit of genuinely wanting to see improved outcomes for people who study at university to become teachers.

The inquiry was a very interesting experience. We approached it with trepidation because it is just the latest in a very long list of antecedent inquiries over my lifetime. I would like to think that this will be the last such inquiry. It would be nice to think that, with all of the work that has been produced over the last few decades in this area, we are actually in a position today to take a holistic approach to those, to take the good from all of them and to actually implement them. I know that one of the great frustrations for people in this sector around Australia has been the fact that many reports and inquiries on this subject in the past have been ignored. While I think there will be more inquiries in the future, I hope that this report is taken note of and adopted by the government, and I see no reason why the opposition would not be minded to do the same.

In that spirit, I offer a little anecdote from back in the days when I was a schoolteacher. In my last year of teaching, one of my more memorable students, a young lady by the name of Rebecca, quite indignantly complained to me that a person who wanted to study to be a veterinarian had to study for some six years and they only have to look after animals, yet a person who wanted to train to look after children—that is, to become a teacher—had to train for only four years. She was quite indignant about this situation, the implication of course being that it should have been the other way around because children are more important than animals. The comparison is not a fair one, and after all she was only joking, but it does highlight that there is a very important link between the quality of a teacher’s preparation as an undergraduate and their quality as a teacher in the classroom.

The report today is, I think, the result of a committee inquiry which approached this subject by really looking to again speak with and hear from universities, parents, teachers, schools and other peak bodies. Today I strongly believe that we have an opportunity to look at these reforms, stare them in the eye and actually take this opportunity—and I heard one of the previous speakers describing this as an opportunity.

There are 12 far-reaching reform measures which are being recommended, including the need for a truly national system of accrediting university courses; making practicum more effective and building genuine partnerships which can actually empower practicum to be a very useful experience for student teachers; the need for a reliable research base to inform this policy area in teacher education into the future; at last, sanction for a genuine induction for graduate entrants to the profession; career-long learning and development; and, of course, the funding issues which come with any reform initiative.

I know that our report does explicitly state that the committee has been very impressed by the dedication and professionalism of both the profession itself and those who are preparing future teachers. In attempting, though, to fulfil our mandate of honestly looking this sector in the eye and being able to assess the quality of teacher education in Australia, we certainly did find that the quality varies widely between providers and depending on exactly what institution and what stream a student is in. This makes sense given that faculties as entities within universities operate in an academic environment which allows for freedom to be innovative, creative and clever, and maybe even do some risk-taking about the approaches that they adopt in preparing teachers. But equally it has to be said that universities and faculties are free as well to be very dull, uninnovative, uninspiring and traditional—if you like, resting on the methods of the past because, after all, that is what you are familiar with.

At a political level over the last few years there certainly have been concerns expressed by different parties or different people about the quality of our future teachers. That does point, as always, to the quality of the experience that they are being exposed to at university. This needs to be tested. As was indicated earlier today, the committee, in accepting that there might be some evidence for this, was not in a position to make a broad-brush judgement because, unfortunately, as strange as it may sound, the research base is simply not there on a basis that you could rely upon with any certainty.

In that regard, I think we will find that there will be people, particularly in the media, who will be perhaps disappointed that the document is not more political, and that it does not give a hard time to academics for being too left, quasi-psychological, uninspiring or unimaginative, or not producing teachers capable of teaching in a classroom and managing that very difficult environment. But, equally, there is no bill of clean health here either. We have a lot of work to do in this country in establishing a research base which we can rely upon when those people who replace us in this parliament are again confronted with issues to do with teacher education. I hope that the Australian government at this opportunity takes up our recommendation of establishing that very important longitudinal study along with, of course, the educational research fund—call it what you will—to put education in this country in an informed position. Unfortunately, that is not where we are at today.

Teacher training in Australia is certainly not in crisis. It is with a good deal of heart that I say that. But we certainly can do better. I do believe that our community is ready for further education reform and that we need to see that beginning in our universities. On the evidence that is available here, it cannot generally be said that teacher training produces graduates without the necessary suite of knowledge, skills and strategies to teach effectively, but it is happening in some quarters and we will need to be courageous enough to meet our obligations and to challenge it.

The country is also confronted by the fact that we do not have at this time a set of professional standards for either teacher registration or teacher education that is nationally consistent. That is a very important initiative. I think it is one of the centrepiece recommendations from the committee’s report. I think that will need to be handled in a very delicate fashion with our state and territory colleagues, because we will all have to own this if it is to be successful in the future.

Adopting this recommendation has a risk in that if it is not handled carefully and with a genuine spirit of goodwill with state and territory colleagues we run the risk of bringing those professional standards in a nationally consistent way down to a lowest common denominator. We must be very careful that that not be allowed to take place and that we in fact strive to lift standards, which can only result in better learning outcomes for our kids. I think Rebecca would be impressed with our report. I think she would see that we are actually attempting to harness the information we have to hand in a way that reforms education, makes it stronger and makes it better for people in her situation in the future who are challenged with questions of the difference between four and six. I thank the House.

Sharon Bird (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of the report of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Education and Vocational Training entitled Top of the class: report on the inquiry into teacher education. I commence my comments by extending, as other speakers have, my thanks to the chair, the member for Cowper, and the deputy chair, the member for Port Adelaide. It has been quite rightly identified that this inquiry, given the highly political nature of education as an issue of debate in the community, could have become quite divisive. Thanks to their leadership and the partnership approach taken in this committee we managed to work our way through some fairly difficult and challenging issues to come up with what were solid and practical responses in a way that, as the chair made clear in his comments, focused on what would be a good outcome rather than on what was an ideologically correct position. I think at the end of the day that is why the committee feels so comfortable with the unanimous support that stands behind this report.

Before I get to the recommendations I would like to take the opportunity to personally acknowledge the work of the committee secretariat. I suspect that the process that we went through was not the standard process for many committee hearings. I do not think there was a single person on the committee who was not absolutely engaged and interested in debating out both the content of the report and the recommendations. It was a very vigorous engagement of minds, which my colleague the deputy chair has often talked about, not only between the members of the committee but with the secretariat. It puts a lot of pressure on the secretariat personnel to have to do that, with fairly vigorous members of parliament putting their views. It was handled extraordinarily professionally and resulted in a first-class report being produced. To all members of the secretariat, past and present, who lived through that process with us I extend my thanks for their professionalism.

I would like to address some of the context in which this report now enters the educational debate in this country. Many speakers have made the point that it was certainly not in evidence received by the committee that there is a crisis in teacher education. Indeed, I think it would be fair to read from that statement that we do not believe there is a crisis in teaching. What we do believe is that there are looming serious challenges and significant pockets of shortfall that need to be addressed and that one way of addressing that is through the manner in which we educate and train our teachers and provide them with support in ongoing professional development.

What are those challenges and those glaring gaps at this point in time? One challenge is that we have brought down a report on how to produce a quality teacher in a time period where the issue is going to be how you get a warm body in your classroom. That is a real challenge. Already we are seeing significant shortages, and the shadow minister for education, the member for Perth, talked about some of those in his contribution. There are significant shortages in certain aspects of teaching, in particular in maths and sciences, in languages other than English of course and, increasingly, in some of the technical subjects being taught in schools. When we combine that with the fact that the teaching workforce is ageing, we are looking in the near future at a significant demand for teachers in the classroom. So the pressure will be on to simply push people through in numbers in order to address that shortage. I think there is no more critical time for a report such as this one about quality; to be saying to governments and all the partners involved in teacher education—the universities, the employing authorities and, indeed, the young training teachers themselves—that this is exactly the point in time when you need to make sure that you are maximising the quality outcomes, because the pressure for quantity is going to be significant.

I think that, with regard to this report and its recommendations, there is a real urgency about making sure that these very practical measures are put in place to ensure that we do not end up in that bind where schools are simply faced with the fact that any teacher in the classroom is better than none and so that some of the things that the shadow minister talked about, such as people teaching maths with no maths qualifications, do not continue to occur. That is the overall workforce plan and the context in which we bring down the report.

We also bring it down with the recognition that, for many young people, the teaching profession has undoubtedly become less and less attractive, particularly secondary teaching. We know that societies have become more complex and communities deal with multiple challenges in terms of drug and alcohol issues, crime rate issues and neglect issues that are confronting classrooms around our country. We know that to some extent some of the very good developments we have had through encouraging our children not to unquestioningly obey authority, with all of the problems that had in the past, have also meant that it is much more difficult to assert authority. For many teachers that is a real challenge, particularly, as I said, in the secondary system.

I talk to a lot of young people. I have a son doing teacher training at university. There is nobody more critical of that than those who have just come out of school. They know what horrors they were, so it is very difficult to encourage them to feel positive about becoming a high school teacher. It is interesting to listen to their conversations. Part of the reason that I think we get an overapplication for primary school teaching and an underapplication for the high school teaching is that they have this view—they know how horrible they were at 14 but they were not too bad at seven or eight so, if they would like to teach, perhaps the primary school option is the better one. That is a real challenge.

Some of the programs that we are recommending in this report will, I hope, start to address that. What happens is that you get a big supply of kids applying to do primary teaching and not so many applying to do secondary. The universities say, ‘We can fill up classes full of primary school teachers and get the funding for that, so we will do it regardless of whether there are actually jobs for them at the other end of that process.’ Some of the really serious recommendations in this report about workforce planning and tying the funding of university courses to that planning are very important, because if you make courses available in the areas you are more likely to have kids look at it and say, ‘I actually really liked science at school, so maybe being a science teacher would not be a bad option.’

The other really good thing that has happened is that we have seen a movement towards mature age entry in particular into secondary training because of options like the one- and two-year diplomas in education. Many of them are even going into the full degree courses. That is a good outcome too. The recommendations in here actually provide for opportunities to not close down and become prescriptive about the entry level. I think the committee very wisely, under a lot of pressure to talk about entry-level criteria—should we test, should we enforce interviews, should we have psychological testing of people on their appropriateness to the profession?—listened through all of that and worked our way through. I think that, quite rightly, the committee at the end of the day said that the real test is what comes out the other end. You can spend your whole life arguing about what criteria and characteristics you can or should measure at the intake level.

There needs to be a good course providing plenty of practical experience from the earliest stages that allows people to self-deselect, if you like, if they recognise early on that they are not suitable for the classroom; a good course that measures the standards that young people reach at the end; an ongoing induction program that supports that through provisional to full registration; and then an ongoing professional development program that says, ‘If you want to get registration and reregistration and promotional-level standardisation then you will do ongoing professional development.’ I think that this report is a sound basis for all the things that we need to do to ensure that quality can be sustained under the immense demand for more and more teachers that is going to face us in the next 10 to 20 years. I commend the report.

Debate (on motion by Ms Hall) adjourned.