Me-tooism schooling reform

The entire argument regarding improved teaching standards is further complicated by the multiplicity of Australian Tertiary Admission Rank (ATAR) entry requirements for various teaching degrees including differing criteria between states regarding qualifications and teaching requirements. It is hardly surprising that most universities welcomed the federal government initiative. Higher education remains pressured to comply or their federal funding support could be jeopardised.

The competing - although positive - teaching improvement initiatives highlight the structural dysfunctional situation that continues between a government holding the purse strings of Commonwealth funding grants and state parliaments and education bureaucracies which are fundamentally responsible for continuing professional improvement for new teacher graduates as well as for long standing department teaching staff.

All governments maintain a vested interest to improve teacher and teaching quality in schools. It is equally clear both levels of government are constantly running their own agenda as they grapple with essentially a common issue but where each protagonist pursues its own legitimate, justifiable outcomes to improve teacher performance.

How each government’s teaching improvement plan can be appropriately assimilated remains an outstanding issue. Attempts to cobble together complementary spheres of improvement without mutual negotiation between both tiers of government appears doomed to failure.

Any possible failure would provide yet another reason to continue the blame game for ineffective policy administration between the commonwealth and the states which remains a fundamental sticking point involving Gonski reforms.

Would it be possible that – maybe for the first time – the affiliated criteria of both governments could be shared to find a consensus outcome that would improve the teaching profession – including the contentious matter of increasing teacher salaries to attract higher standard candidates – so all students across all school sectors could benefit from a higher level of teacher quality?