School teacher training goes back to classroom fundamentals

Tens of thousands of irrelevant and outdated professional development courses for teachers will be scrapped from today as part of a complete overhaul.

Professional training for school teachers in NSW will be completely overhauled, with pointless courses thrown out in favour of those that concentrate on essentials.

All 42,000 professional development courses have been cancelled effective immediately and all 750 course providers will be asked to reapply by the end of the year under new, stricter criteria, with a greater focus on day-to-day teaching.

Teachers must do 100 hours of professional development courses approved by the NSW Education Standards Authority every five years in order to maintain their accreditation.

But a review of the current training system found just 23 per cent of secondary teachers took courses in literacy and numeracy in 2018 and 2019 — at an average of just 30 minutes each.

About two-thirds of secondary teachers did not sit courses about the latest teaching methods and changes to the curriculum in 2018 and 2019.

Education Minister Sarah Mitchell. Picture: John Grainger

From next year there will be 50 hours of mandatory courses dealing with mental health and wellbeing, the curriculum, ­disability and Aboriginal ­education.

As The Sunday Telegraph revealed last week, the overhaul will mean every teacher in NSW will be trained to better understand students’ mental health and stop vulnerable kids falling through the cracks.

“Teachers should know that the courses they are taking are the best available, helping them to enhance their classroom practice to benefit our students’ education,” Education Minister Sarah Mitchell said.

“We are starting with a clean slate so that NESA can guarantee the quality and value of the courses they ­accredit.

“This change will ensure that everything on offer is of a standard that will benefit them and their students in areas where we know additional support is needed.”

Teachers will still have choice about how to spend the remaining 50 hours but any optional professional development will now have to align with specific categories stemming from the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers such as classroom and behaviour management, engaging with parents and the school community, gifted education, and information and communication technology.

The NSW Education Standards Authority will scrutinise every course rather than just approving providers and trusting them to come up with appropriate courses.

Greater oversight is expected to stamp out such courses such as Sous Vide Hands On At The Sunbeam Test Kitchen and Backpacking On The World Wide Web.

Course providers will also need to seek renewal every two years to stop the accumulation of outdated courses.

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