Ele Ludemann: Union’s politics showing

What’s better, no teacher or a recently retired, though now deregistered one?

. . .Two Otago principals have welcomed the government’s short-term fix to a relief teacher shortage despite the teachers union’s concerns.

PPTA Te Wehengarua president Chris Abercrombie said the “ad hoc” response from Minister of Education Erica Stanford meant thousands of young people would not be taught by trained and qualified subject-specialist teachers. . .

The union’s anti-government politics are showing.

Surely a recently retired, albeit no longer registered, teacher would be better than no teacher?

But East Otago High School acting principal Keith Fleury said he would love to be able to use a teacher he knew as a reliever whose registration had recently lapsed.

This year there were instances where he only managed to avoid sending students home “by the skin of his teeth”.

He would far rather have a relief teacher who had recently had their registration lapse than send his students home, Mr Fleury said.

“It would be quite useful to use those people in classrooms. They’re still experienced teachers and the registration is just a technical thing really.

“We don’t feel it’s a risk if the person in front of the class has been a trained, qualified and experienced teacher in the past.

“We’re not talking about just members of the public here.”

Trained, qualified and experienced teachers aren’t going to lose the skills they’ve built up over decades because they’ve been retired long enough to let their registration lapse. Even if they’re not subject specialists, they’re better than no teacher at all.

Otago Boys’ High School rector Richard Hall said the teacher shortage had been a long-standing issue and the government had to be given credit for the changes it was trying to make.

“I think there has been too much talk and it’s time to get on with it and take some action.

“In the short term anything that fixes or alleviates the very real issues … is important.”

During winter, he was having to find relievers for relievers who were sick and the school’s systems were put under a lot of strain, Mr Hall said.

“We didn’t have to shorten any classes and we didn’t have to cut any programmes but it was tight.”

The rector recognises this as a short term fix, the union, blinded by politics, sees it as short-sighted.

PPTA Otago regional chairman Kussi Hurtado-Stuart said the loosening of regulations from the government was a “short-sighted solution”.

He was concerned the teachers with a limited authority to teach under the new regulations would not be held under the same code of ethics as other teachers.

Past teachers also had limited incentive to come back as relievers because they were still being underpaid, Mr Hurtado-Stuart said.

He felt the government was setting the education sector up to fail rather than fixing the teacher shortage issue. . .

Fixing the teacher shortage will take time and while schools, pupils and staff wait for the fix, encouraging recently retired teachers back is better than having to send pupils home.

Union representatives need to take off their political blinkers and recognise the need for this short term solution until the longer term one of more teachers is achieved.

Ele Ludemann is a North Otago farmer and journalist, who blogs HERE - where this article was sourced.