Photo by Annika Gordon
The good news –
One week to go, and if you live in South Canterbury New Zealand like I do, Monday is a public holiday – the term break is almost close enough to reach out and touch.
The potentially stressful news –
We need to hire some teachers and it seems many of you need to as well.
It is hard to understand how teacher supply can be such a roller coaster of a situation for successive Governments. All the factors for a bit of pre-emptive planning are right there – number of school age children (including immigrants), staffing formulas, number of teachers leaving, number of people enrolling in/graduating from training organisations. Surely a smart group of people with an Excel sheet or two could nail this down? . . . yet here we are again, with an imbalance between demand and supply.
Or maybe the ‘system’ did know what was coming, just that no one close to our political leaders could convince them that unless the job was made more attractive, people wouldn’t choose it.
But waaaay down the chain of command where I operate, parents tend to notice very quickly if their child either doesn’t have a consistent teacher, or has one that is not great. The distance between reality and pain is very short indeed.
We are now being asked for ‘innovative local solutions’ which effectively boils down to how best to recruit overseas trained teachers. (Although I heard it suggested in media this week, that we can also entice retired teachers back into the classroom, and that potentially, we can get approval for untrained/semi-trained people to lead classes.)
The obvious problem with these solutions is that none of them support a high quality, pedagogically sound, or culturally responsive education system. In fact, they are the opposite.
So, like many of you, I’m going to cross every appendage I possess, hold my breath and hope that the people we are looking for can be found. I can already feel the hurt the probable compromises I’m going to make will cause me.
And because I know this is a stressful state to be in, I’m going to double down on my own proven strategies for sustainability – moving, eating ok, having some fun. You might want to prioritise something similar.
Dave
PS: I wrote this post just before the APPA/NZPF Trans-Tasman Conference. I bet I heard some gold plated, inspiring thinking there which will give a positive kick towards the Term break. I’m looking forward to it greatly!!