Your accreditation may be affected by several key changes that started in November. We will unpack these policies over the coming months, however, you can click through to the full policy documents using the links below:
• Applying for Proficient Teacher Accreditation Procedure (K-12)
• Applying for Proficient Teacher Accreditation Procedure (early childhood interim arrangements)
• Maintaining Proficient Teacher Accreditation Procedure (K-12)
• Maintaining Proficient Teacher Accreditation Procedure (early childhood interim arrangements)
• Applying for HALT Accreditation Procedure (K-12 and early childhood)
There are also changes to the applying for a leave of absence process from your accreditation cycle – the most significant is that you cannot backdate a leave of absence. You will still be able to request an extension up to a maximum five-year period.
There will also be a new accreditation category called Non-practising Teacher, which will be of interest to members not working in a school or service but who wish to remain accredited and connected to the teaching profession.
What you need to know
Pre-2004 teachers
• Your accreditation cycle has been extended to 31 December 2023.
• Your eTAMS account might still show 31 December 2021 as your due date. Ignore this, despite what your employer is telling you.
• You should consider submitting your maintenance of accreditation if you know you will be undertaking a significant amount of PD in 2023 and would like to include this in your new five-year maintenance cycle.
• Once you submit your maintenance it will trigger a one-time reset of your maintenance anniversary due date.
General information
• As of 2023 NESA will become the Teacher Accreditation Authority (TAA) for all teachers.
• Your principal (or their delegate who is a Proficient teacher or above and is employed in the same school) is only required to attest that you have met the requirements of maintenance of Proficient Teacher accreditation. NESA makes the final accreditation decision.
• A report is only required if the principal decides that you have not met the maintenance requirements.
• If there are going to be issues with your maintenance of accreditation, the principal must inform you within 28 days of becoming aware of the problem.
A new process, not additional work
All employers must have internal procedures for implementing the accreditation process at their schools, however, the maintenance of accreditation process should not be used by individual schools or employers to create additional work for teachers.
An employer’s published internal procedures must include the professional activities that form the basis of the maintenance attestations. It is the union’s strong expectation that these should consist of the activities a teacher would normally undertake on a day-to-day basis.
Constructing an additional process for teachers to navigate for the specific purpose of maintaining their accreditation runs counter to the spirit of the policy and is antithetical to the obvious need to reduce teacher workload.
The union intends to monitor this space closely and will be keen to hear of any schools which are requiring unnecessarily onerous professional activities for accreditation.
Pat Devery
Professional Engagement Coordinator
Veronica Yewdall
Assistant Secretary