Principal Team Editorial

It was with pleasant surprise earlier this week to receive the following email:

After hearing on the media this morning about new research regarding the increased stresses and strains on Principals and teachers and also after listening to my son who is in his final year at uni (secondary school teaching) and who’s also currently working as an integration aide, talk about the stressors for teachers, I would just like to sincerely thank you for doing such an amazing job at continuing to make Wantirna Secondary College a really good and respected school.  My son is thriving in year 9 and loves to go to school and I am very grateful.

There has been and is a lot of commentary in the media at the moment about the teaching profession, staff shortages and pressure on school leaders. Some of it is well informed and some of it utter garbage. I often read articles or listen to editorials from journalists and others, about the latest hypothesis that explains why there has been a decline in the number of available teachers. Everything from 'Schools have gone too woke' to 'Students don’t refer to teachers as Mr or Mrs anymore and therefore there is no respect and students are out of control!'.  These simplistic theories are a long way from an accurate explanation of the current challenges that we face in our sector.  The reality, not necessarily in our school but across our system, is that we have more teaching positions needing to be filled at the moment than available teachers, and that is a difficult challenge to overcome in the short term. 

In the medium to long term, we need to increase the amount of younger and older people choosing teaching as their preferred profession. We need to do a better job at communicating the benefits that come with being a teacher, such as the positive influence that you can have on countless young lives, the camaraderie you feel when working alongside your colleagues or the ability to spend more time with your own children when school holidays come around. The employment market is so competitive for available talent right now that we have to do more to make teaching stand out from other career possibilities. Governments can do more through further improvements to pay and conditions, so that teachers are not just compensated for the hours they work but rewarded for the influence they have. 

The answer is not just about addressing the supply of new teachers, it’s also about increasing the retention of current teachers. And this is where emails like the one that started this editorial come in. Research shows that more than 40 per cent of teachers leave the profession within five years with a feeling of being under appreciated far more influential than salary. With that in mind, if you get the chance, by email phone or in person, reach out to our teaching and non-teaching staff and let them know when you think they are doing a great job. If we can engender a culture where student and parents recognise and thank staff for their work, then  hopefully our staff will always feel valued and won't want to do anything else.

Where else can you spend part of your day playing basketball with young people and against colleagues, whilst on duty, and get paid for it! The Year 9s didn’t know what hit them when Ms Wallis was dropping long bombs from outside the key!!! My efforts were a little less taxing!  

Kevin Murphy

Principal