Australia’s teacher shortage crisis is deepening with no immediate solutions on offer from the Albanese Labor Government.
Shadow Minister for Education, Sarah Henderson, says Education Minister Jason Clare has failed to take urgent action to support schools desperately trying to fill thousands of teacher vacancies at the start of the school year.
“Jason Clare has been sitting on his hands while schools are desperately scrambling to fill teaching jobs. This is putting the education of many young Australians at risk,” Senator Henderson said.
“School principals, along with Australian parents and their children, deserve urgent answers – not next year, not next term, but right now.
In Victoria, the workforce crisis is particularly grim in Melbourne’s west and the outer suburbs as well as regional cities like Shepparton.
As the Victorian Department of Education’s jobs website* shows, in Melbourne’s west there are 87 teacher vacancies in Wyndham, 33 in Melton and 31 in Brimbank.
Manor Lakes P-12 College in Wyndham Vale is advertising for 12 teachers and Wyndham Central Secondary College has nine teacher vacancies.
There are 79 teacher vacancies in the Casey LGA with Narre Warren South P-12 College crying out for 19 teachers. Greater Shepparton Secondary College has 20 unfilled teaching positions.
“With teachers leaving the profession in droves in the first five years, Labor should be stripping funding from universities which deliver poor quality teaching courses that leave young teachers unprepared for the classroom,” Senator Henderson said.
“Labor has also failed to take any action over high levels of classroom disruption, another leading cause of teacher attrition.
“Apart from teacher scholarships which discriminate against non-government schools and a glossy ad campaign, Jason Clare has done next to nothing to get more teachers into classrooms,” Senator Henderson said.
“Jason Clare should immediately cut short post-graduate teaching courses to encourage more mid-career professionals to switch to teaching for which the Coalition has long advocated. In the face of Labor’s cost of living crisis, very few people can take two years out of the workforce to study a masters of teaching.”
*Source: https://www2.education.vic.gov.au/pal/careers-and-recruitment/overview