$400k Teach for Australia plan yet to recruit a single staff member

A scheme to lure and train ‘career changers’ to teaching has not recruited a single person in 15 months — while staff shortages are forcing teachers to supervise up to seven classes at a time.

A $400,000 plan to address the critical teacher shortage by luring and training “career changers” into the profession is still being designed, with not one new staff member yet recruited.

The delays come as schools continue to juggle classes to cover absent staff, with one teacher at Canobolas Rural Technology High School forced to supervise 94 students from seven different classes last week, while at Armidale Secondary College, one teacher looked after 78 students after shortages forced classes to merge.

Then-treasurer Dominic Perrottet and Education Minister Sarah Mitchell announced the “new pathway into teaching” initiative in ­November 2020, declaring the joint government and non-profit Teach for Australia program would attract the “best and brightest” professionals into making a career switch to bolster the teaching workforce.

However, an internal ministerial briefing paper obtained by Labor reveals the program is only to have its “final design” completed this month, and attempts have been made by the government to reduce its funding.

The state government has also curiously since established its own similar “mid-career” change program for professionals to be ­retrained as teachers, with 50 already taking part.

Dominic Perrottet and Sarah Mitchell announced the $400,000 initiative to lure ‘career changers’ into teaching in ­November 2020. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Gaye Gerard

The September 2021 document — marked “sensitive” — reveals an agreement with Teach for Australia was not even reached until October 7, 2021, with the “final design” of the program not expected until April 2022 — 17 months after the announcement.

It has also been revealed that on July 22 last year, the government had attempted to renege on its announcement, requesting Teach for Australia’s support in “reducing the grant amount to $200,000”.

Opposition education spokeswoman Prue Car questioned the delay on the original program.

“Not a single extra teacher is in NSW schools under this program, while the ongoing teacher shortages mean students are missing out,” she said.

The NSW Teachers Federation president Angelo Gavrielatos has long blamed workloads and uncompetitive salaries for the shortages. He said the government had known for years of the looming crisis, with children now paying the price for its inaction.

Mr Gavrielatos pointed to the slow progress of a separate STEM teacher supply program, Recruitment beyond NSW, which had also not yet delivered a single new staff member in schools since it was announced last October.

“The government has known for many years about the worsening shortages and their causes, which are unsustainable workloads and uncompetitive salaries,” he said.

Ms Mitchell accused the Opposition and teachers union of not wanting to “join us in the 21st Century”.

“The $125 million Teacher Supply Strategy was not designed to be a quick fix,” she said.

“It’s a long-term, 10-year strategy to address real challenges in our system — a system the union doesn’t want to fix.”

A Department of Education spokesman said supply strategy was on track to deliver 3700 teachers in subjects and locations of need.

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