AMY SIMMONS reports on Prof Alloway’s insights in the state of teaching as a profession.
EDUCATION is increasingly being recognised as the lifeblood of democracy – an indisposable body part essential for the survival and growth of society.
That’s what Professor Nola Alloway, of James Cook University, believes but she suggests the teaching profession is paler than ever and in desperate need of a blood transfusion.
At the Queensland Parents and Friends Associations biennial conference in Townsville recently, the JCU head of school and dean of education spoke grimly about the future of teaching, if its perception as “unattractive” continues.
In “Suffer Little Children … Who Will Respond to the Call? – Teaching in the New Millennium”, Prof Alloway began by reinforcing the importance of education – “the greatest social leveller” – and the joint role parents and teachers play.
“Parents lay the foundations upon which teachers, as professional communicators, build,” she said.
“In an ideal situation, parents and friends work in concert in allowing, and encouraging, children to come to them, to learn, to discover, to be and to become.”
Prof Alloway also said education was important in its ability to steer a nation towards economic and social success.
But she felt while international research and current government policy supported these endeavours, the teaching profession did not.
Prof Alloway highlighted a plummet in university enrolments and interest in the field of education.
Queensland Tertiary Admissions Centre first-preference data showed an average of 6.6 per cent decline between 2005 and 2007 in all areas of study, and a 30.8 per cent drop in teaching.
“The decline in interest in teaching alone accounts for 62 per cent of the overall decline in interest in the state of studying at all at university,” she said.
She then expressed worrying trends among teachers who have just started their careers.
About a third of primary and secondary teachers interviewed in a nationwide study felt their “pre-service courses had been not at all helpful in preparing them in working effectively with parents or guardians”.
They felt the same about teaching students from indigenous backgrounds.
Prof Alloway also revealed there was “considerable uncertainty” among teachers about staying in the profession.
“The planned exodus, if it were to happen, would wreak havoc on the system where, already, in many instances, schools across Australia are struggling,” she said.
So why is education, the lifeblood of a nation, in the dire circumstances Prof Alloway describes?
The situation became clearer to Prof Alloway in a series of interviews she conducted with students, parents and teachers about the desirability of teaching as a career.
“It was the negativity of the views that dominated the interviews that was most concerning,” she told the conference.
“Students, parents and staff expressed a strong consensus that teaching salaries were too low, promotional pathways too few, the status of teaching was depressed and university entry levels to teaching programs were declining inappropriately.
“They also expressed varying concerns about the conditions of working in schools that centred on the difficulties of managing student behaviour, teaching as a repetitive and uninspiring set of work practices and the inadequate resourcing of schools.”
One interviewee from Queensland said teaching would be their 50th career choice.
“I’d be an Eskimo before I became a teacher,” she said.
While many who Prof Alloway interviewed said pay was their biggest deterrent, a parent from New South Wales also spoke about the stress of teaching.
“You hear people saying they get ‘x’ amount of holidays every term and every Christmas, but I said, ‘God! You wouldn’t be a teacher for quids at times, they put up with so much’,” he said.
Prof Alloway warned that these issues needed to be resolved or the biblical words “suffer little children”, and the title of her lecture, could take on new meaning.
“There can be no doubt that we need to recruit very special people to educate our very special children,” she said.
“We need dedicated people, people driven by an ethic of care.”
Prof Alloway said parents and friends in education communities were vital in creating change.
“I call you to arms to do what you can to recruit wisely, to support your teachers and to promote and advance teaching as a profession,” she said.
“Education systems and their teachers can be fortified, energised and enabled through the communities that support them.”
