Geelong is experiencing significant teaching shortages, union says

Teaching job vacancy rates in the Geelong region are twice as high as in the city, union data shows.

Meredith Peace (red jacket) said staff shortages in Geelong schools continued to be a significant problem despite the Allan government having invested in several strategies to address the problem. Picture Stuart McEvoy/The Australian.

Geelong and the Surf Coast are experiencing significant teaching shortages, with 79 vacant positions across the region, according to data from the Australian Education Union (AEU).

AEU Victorian Branch President Meredith Peace said staff shortages in schools continued to be a significant problem despite the Allan government having invested in several strategies to address it.

“Clearly more needs to be done to attract and retain teachers, principals and support staff in public schools,” she said.

“Every child has a right to have a permanent, qualified teacher in their classroom, and right now that is not the case in every school due to shortages.”

Ms Peace said as the major growth corridor Greater Geelong’s population was projected to continue to grow over the next two decades, it was clear that more investment was needed to ensure local schools are adequately staffed.

She said a lack of teaching staff was impacting both students and staff.

“Public schools have waited more than a decade for full funding, so it is not surprising to see workforce shortages, unsustainable workloads, and salaries that don’t reflect the value of the work of school staff,” she said.

Since 2019, more than $1.6bn was invested by the Victorian Government into school workforce initiatives, including financial support for student teachers to undertake their placements in regional, rural and specialist schools, financial incentives for hard-to-fill positions, and 8000 free teaching degrees.

According to the latest Supply and Demand report, demand for Secondary registered teachers is forecast to grow 16.4 per cent from 2022 to 2028, and supply is forecast to grow 8.1 per cent.

The report cited more than 5000 registered teachers regionally who are choosing not to work in schools.

While the online jobs board lists all available current vacancies in schools rather than job vacancies in the system, in the Geelong region 60 teaching vacancies were advertised as of this month.

A Department of Education spokeswoman said the vacancies reflected the time of year, as schools were now starting to advertise teaching roles for the 2025 year, with many to fill roles of teachers retiring or moving on.

She said these current job advertisements in Greater Geelong were consistent with recent years.

“Our teaching workforce grew by 2.3 per cent in 2023 – the largest increase of any state or territory – and Victoria now has about 8,000 more registered teachers than we did in 2020,” she said.

Originally published as Geelong is experiencing significant teaching shortages, union says