NT Education Department redeploys corporate staff, teacher vacancies unfilled at orientation

The Education Department is redeploying about 80 corporate staff to schools in an effort to plug ongoing teacher shortages.

Education admin and corporate staff will be redeployed to plug teacher shortages as vacancies remain high ahead of the new school year.

About 134 school vacancies riddle Territory schools despite Education Minister Mark Monaghan’s confidence the department could fill 143 positions less than two weeks ago.

Education Department chief executive Karen Weston said about 80 corporate staff held their teacher registration and would be redeployed to schools to plug any gaps.

Ms Weston said about 30 had been offered contracts to create a “relief pool”.

“We will make sure there’s a teacher in every classroom in front of the students,” she said.

More than 230 educators attended the 2024 NT teachers orientation at the Darwin Convention Centre. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

Australian Education Union NT branch secretary Michelle Ayres said she understood the majority of the corporate redeployments would come from the department’s Student Wellbeing and Support, Student Engagement, and Teaching and Learning Services teams.

Ms Ayres said these divisions were critical considering the NT’s “attendance crisis”.

“Those are where the majority of the qualified teachers work,” she said.

“This has been a regular practice since Covid — it is not a great solution as it’s another ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul’ situation.

“Those staff have jobs they are responsible for and those are left hanging when they are redeployed.”

Australian Education Union NT president Michelle Ayres.

Ms Ayres said she had spoken to corporate staff who claimed to be working until midnight to help teachers devise learning and behavioural support plans after they’d finished teaching classes for the day.

“It is important to have teachers in front of students and the government absolutely must invest in them, but they need to be careful to continue to provide support, especially at the beginning of the year.”

Mark Monaghan at the 2024 NT teachers orientation, Darwin. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

It comes after Mr Monaghan welcomed more than 230 educators to the Territory during their annual orientation at the Darwin Convention Centre.

He said 50 of the 210 teachers were from the Territory – 145 had travelled from interstate and 15 were from overseas.

Mr Monaghan said 22 new principals were joining the NT’s education workforce.

“A large number of them will be heading out to remote schools – 70 per cent of our schools are remote or very remote,” Mr Monaghan said.

He said he was not concerned by the number of positions still open in the NT despite only nine being filled in the past 11 days.

“I look at the nature of teaching, everything happens around recruitment in January for every sector,” he said.

“It’s a normal part of the process and … our principals are responsible for recruitment of their own schools, we support that as a system and we will support the filling of their vacancies should they need it.”

Education Minister Mark Monaghan and Robinson River School principal James Powdrell. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

New Zealand national James Powdrell will head to the Big Rivers region to head up Robinson River School as its new principal.

Mr Powdrell said he and his wife had moved to the Territory a year ago, where they both took on roles at Lajamanu School and “absolutely fell in love with it”.

“Being able to be in such a strong partnership with the families was incredible, and I was in the role of assistant principal at the time,” he said.

“Seeing the impact that you can make and leading change among the community with students, teachers, and families really encouraged me to want to step up and be more involved in that leadership space.”

Originally published as NT Education Department redeploys corporate staff, teacher vacancies unfilled at orientation