On 19 June, the IEU shared an article from the Sydney Morning Herald on our Facebook page entitled “Performance pay, revamped school hours: Premier flags education reforms”. We asked what you thought, and you had plenty to say. Here’s a selection
What you said
Former IEUA Federal Secretary Chris Watt: Two questions: Where is the successful implementation and outcome evidence of this anywhere in the world? Where is the evidence of any consultation with any stakeholders – teachers, support staff, parents, universities, employers – as distinct from education ‘experts’ (commentators)?
So, a teacher in a selective school gets better academic results, gets a pay rise. A teacher working really hard in a disadvantaged school, teaching kids with learning disabilities, raises them up but results don’t look good on paper, gets nothing. How is that equitable?
This will be interesting – teachers are leaving in droves already – this is only going to make it worse and harder to keep staff.
Excellent, let’s go performance pay – not. Who will decide who is doing well- jobs and pay for friends. How about we fix the current problems, not enough staff, poor training levels, too much paperwork and don’t even get started on wages. This is just smoke and mirrors, folks.
Can’t believe how disconnected from reality this government is. Let’s try performance pay for politicians.
They’re not going to do anything except make us jump through more hoops.
Will it be based on final scores, longitudinal results or improvement? Who’s overseeing this? NESA? How will we staff lower-performing schools (the ones with low socio-economic status and other contributing factors)?
We’re short on teachers so we denigrate the profession. That will help!
I AM performing. I’ve been performing well for a long time. My students and my school know it. So, where’s my performance back pay?
Let’s do performance pay when politicians pay for budget blowouts out of their combined retirement funds.
How about politician performance pay?
Out of touch and has no idea. Good luck with that, Premier. A great initiative to get rid of the remaining teachers.
Watch the shortage get worse if this gets over the line.
Performance pay … hmmm, judging that is easy: the smart teachers teach the smart kids and get better pay. Oops, did I hear a rumour that it is more challenging to teach kids with complex needs? And some say high school content is more difficult than kindy, so pay high school teachers more. Oh, oops, who are those rebels saying kindy is the foundation of the whole enterprise and to put your best teachers there? And, of course, early education is ‘just child minding’ so they deserve the least. Oh, oops, that’s not true either? Research shows it is most important. Why let facts get in the way? Maybe someone ought to ask teachers what they reckon. Performance pay would be a nightmare.
Who will determine performance and how will it be done? Will it be like the corporate world where you set goals, score yourself, score your manager and team, then an overall aggregate. Will this then determine your bonus? Who in turn will fund the performance pay?
Performance pay wedges teachers against teachers.
How about we start paying politicians according to performance? They can trial the scheme.
I’m so disgusted by the wilful ignorance displayed by those in charge. A full-time teacher is expected to do the work of three people. Let’s do the maths. In Finland a teacher does 15 hours face-to-face teaching a week with the rest of the time to do prep, marking, admin and the rest. We can be face to face for 22 hours! So, when does one have time to do the rest? It’s shocking.
Sounds like a nice big stick to beat teachers with to me!