Secondary teaching degrees to become free under $229.8m plan

Secondary teaching degrees will become free under a $229.8m plan to help crippling staff shortages currently plaguing the state school system.

Premier Daniel Andrews on Tuesday unveiled a $229.8m package to grow the school workforce. Picture: iStock

Victoria’s Catholic education body has called on the Andrews government to expand its free teaching courses, arguing it will unfairly favour the state system and won’t fix the teacher shortage crisis.

Secondary teaching degrees will become free under a $229m plan to scale back crippling staff shortages plaguing the education system.

Students wanting to take up a career as a high school teacher will get $18,000 for a four-year undergraduate program or $9000 for postgraduate study, if they commit to working at state schools for at least two years.

But Catholic Education Commission of Victoria executive director Jim Miles said the scholarships should be extended to Catholic schools.

“This shouldn’t be done in ways that favour one sector over others. That doesn’t solve the problem of teacher shortages, it just shifts it between schools,” he said.

“This new scholarship program, which is only available to graduates who teach in government schools, will make this recruitment much harder.”

The announcement comes after the education union intensified its war with the Andrews government on the weekend by taking their fight to the steps of parliament to sound the alarm on an “unprecedented” teacher vacancy rate of 2500.

Premier Daniel Andrews said the union’s campaign did not prompt the free courses.

“No one needed to protest at parliament. No one needed to put ads in the paper,” he said.

AEU Victorian Branch deputy president Justin Mullaly said the free courses was a positive first step, but warned there’s “a lot more to be done as the Premier is fond of saying”.

“There’s no doubt that teachers are frustrated by the fact that we’ve been asking the government to take action for longer than 12 months,” he said.

Mr Mullaly said the free courses was a positive first step but warned there’s “a lot more to be done as the Premier is fond of saying”.

Berwick Lodge Primary School principal Henry Grossek said the “long overdue” initiative didn’t go “anywhere near far enough” given the primary sector is facing similar problems.

“It’s quite ridiculous that they’ve cherry picked the secondary sector when the whole profession is hurting through teacher shortages. It’s very disappointing,” he said.

“You could plausibly argue this will drain people from the primary sector.”

Independent Education Union general secretary David Brear welcomed the “important measure” as a way to help students navigate the rising costs of studying while also addressing teacher shortfalls.

“Much more is needed though – what we need to see next is a plan for retaining the thousands of teachers leaving the classroom each year as a result of the extraordinary pressures and workload burdens of the job,” he said.

Professor Mary Ryan, the Dean of Education and Arts at Australian Catholic University, the largest provider of graduate teachers, said the scheme should be widened.

“We know the teacher shortage is not isolated to one part of the country or one sector. It would be ideal to have measures like this one … implemented across all jurisdictions to help boost the pipeline of teachers into our schools,” she said.

Independent Schools Victoria chief executive Michelle Green said measures to increase the supply of teachers “will ultimately benefit all school sectors”.

Opposition leader John Pesutto said attracting new teachers won’t solve the problem if teachers can’t be retained.

“Daniel Andrews wants a pat on the back for a Band-Aid solution to a crisis his government created,” he said.

The scholarships will be available to all students who enrol in secondary school teaching degrees in 2024 and 2025.

It’s anticipated the program will result in 4000 graduates.