IN the wake of strikes by Sunraysia teachers, Member for Murray Helen Dalton has called on the NSW Government to guarantee it won’t slash incentive packages for rural teachers.
Staff at several schools across western NSW, including Coomealla High School and Gol Gol, Wentworth and Buronga public schools, have walked off the job over the past month, upset about proposed changes to NSW’s rural and remote incentives program, which they say will make it even harder to attract teachers to the area.
The staff are also fed up with ongoing teacher shortages.
Mrs Dalton, a former primary teacher, said what the department had proposed was a slap in the face to teachers and students at rural schools struggling to find staff.
“Rather than address these shortages, the NSW Government are actually looking at reducing the incentives to attract teachers to these schools,” she said.
“This will worsen the teacher shortage crisis and see rural students fall even further behind their Sydney peers.”
The bone of contention in the dispute is a move by the Department of Education to change the priority transfer points system, which draws staff to the bush by promising them the chance to transfer to a school of their choice after serving in a remote school for at least two years.
The scheme works off a points system, under which Sunraysia schools area are each six-point schools – out of a maximum allocation of eight – due to their distance from Sydney and other NSW population centres.
However, a review of the scheme singles out Sunraysia schools to have their points docked because of their proximity to Mildura.
A department-issued discussion paper on the issue states the transfer points system “assumes NSW is an island and uses proximity to Sydney as its basis”.
“This ignores proximity to hubs in other states … and therefore, for some schools is not a true indicator of rurality,” it continues.
“An update is needed to reflect current demographic and other variables of each area. In particular, better reflecting their geographical isolation … schools may be far from a NSW town but close to a Victorian or Queensland town (such as) Mildura.”
The paper also argues that the scheme, by its very nature, fails to encourage teachers to settle down in areas like Sunraysia.
“Transfer points are successful in attracting teachers for the same reasons they are unsuccessful in retaining them, by incentivising teachers to move to rural and remote areas by giving them an easy exit strategy,” it states.
However, Western NSW Teachers Federation organiser Brett Bertalli said the scheme was the only thing attracting staff to Far West schools.
“It creates bit of turnover, but it’s what brings people out here – it’s what works,” he said.
But, even with their full points allocation, some Sunraysia schools are already struggling to find staff, including Coomealla High, which started the year three teachers short.
Schools on the NSW side of the Murray River are also in the grip of a casual teacher drought, which means they struggle to relieve teachers who are ill or on leave.
“These schools are doing it really tough, with multiple teacher vacancies and students missing classes, due to a lack of teachers,” Mrs Dalton said.
“If the NSW Government reduce incentives, this situation will just get worse.
“The Education Minister needs to do the opposite – boost incentives at western NSW schools, and talk to them about why recruitment is so difficult.”
Mrs Dalton also criticised the government’s plan to “turn tradies into teachers” by churning would-be teachers through a crash course instead of completing a teaching degree.
“I don’t think fast-tracking qualifications to become a teacher is the right way to address the rural teacher shortage,” she said.
“I used to be a primary teacher. It’s a tough job. A short course won’t cut it.”
Mrs Dalton’s comments come as Sunraysia teachers’ industrial agreement expired at 5pm on Thursday, leaving them without a safety net to prevent class sizes ballooning out past the agreed 30 students and unable to provide surety to prospective staff regarding entitlements.
According to Mr Bertalli, school staff and the NSW Teachers Federation have been trying to get a new agreement signed off since the start of the year, but are yet to come to an agreement with the Department of Education.
The Wentworth Teachers Federation, which wrote to Education Minister Sarah Mitchell last month, has also not received a response.
