As you are hopefully aware, the Australian Education Union (AEU) has called on its members to take strike action on Tuesday 24 March. This follows a recent ballot of union members due to a lack of progress in negotiations for our new Enterprise Bargaining Agreement.

Below our School Council and our staff AEU sub-branch provide a little more context and detail behind this decision.

The school will communicate further detail on Monday 23 March around the impact the strike may have on school operations.

At this stage we do not know exactly how many of our staff will be participating. However, we anticipate that the strike will have a significant impact on school operations and it is likely that many classes will not be required to attend school on that day.

Despite this, the school will ensure supervision is available for the children of critical services workers.

A message from School Council

Dear SKiPPS families,

As you may have heard in recent media articles, Victorian public school teachers are planning industrial action in the form of a strike on Tuesday 24 March. We are writing as your School Council representatives to let you know that, while we understand this will cause inconvenience to many families, we endorse the actions of our staff.

We know that our teachers don’t take this action lightly, and they would much rather be working and providing high-quality education and wellbeing support for our children.

We have recently made a submission to the Victorian Parliamentary inquiry into public school funding, and are giving evidence to the inquiry in person in the coming weeks. We have also participated in media coverage around this issue and have held meetings with our state MPs and their opposition counterparts.

These activities have been a response to the fact that Victorian public schools are the lowest funded in Australia.

Rather than fully funding public schools to 100% of the national Schooling Resource Standard as promised, Victoria has delayed any additional funding until 2031. This means our children will miss out on more than $2.4 billion in much-needed resourcing.

The funding gap means that families are paying our school nurse’s wages. It means that children in need of mental health support must be triaged, because there is not enough funding to meet all of our counselling needs. It means that there is not enough funding to provide all the extra support for children who need intervention to achieve their literacy and numeracy potential. Without the enormous levels of fundraising (such as the Fete) that you so generously contribute to, and the voluntary contributions that so many of you provide, SKiPPS, like all public schools across the state, would struggle to deliver the level of resources and activities that we do.

There is also currently a huge shortage of teachers in Victoria. We are lucky to have so many highly-qualified teachers here at SKiPPS, but few public schools are as fortunate as we are. Sub-standard pay and excessive workloads both contribute to teacher attrition rates. Experienced teachers in NSW are 13%, or $15,359, better off per year than comparable Victorian teachers. Victorian school principals start on a salary 18% behind their NSW colleagues. At the same time, on average, school staff are working 12 hours per week unpaid overtime during each school term.

The Victorian government has been aware of these pressing funding issues for years. Our teachers’ enterprise agreement expired in July 2025, and they are still waiting for updates that will compensate them fairly. It is in these circumstances that our teachers consider there is no alternative but to take industrial action – something they have not done in more than a decade.

We thank you for your understanding of our support for this campaign.

SKiPPS School Council

If you would like to attend the rally with your children, ‘Vic Parents for Public Schools’ are arranging a families space on the day.

Why we wear red - a message from our school AEU sub-branch

You may have noticed that many of our staff members have been wearing red AEU t-shirts each Friday. We wanted to take this opportunity, on behalf of the staff and AEU sub-branch at our school, to explain why.

First and foremost, we are deeply committed to the idea of free, high quality public education. We have chosen to work in government schools because we believe public education is the key driver of social equality. It is where we can make the greatest difference and where we can work alongside families and children who rely on a strong, well resourced system.

Over recent years, the broader funding situation for Victorian government schools has become increasingly challenging. Public reporting from the Australian Education Union and Parents Victoria has highlighted that Victoria remains the lowest funded public school system in the country and that government schools are not yet funded to 100 percent of the Schooling Resource Standard, the benchmark agreed by governments as the minimum level required for students to achieve their best.

For schools like ours, these funding delays and decisions have very real impacts. Each year our budgets become tighter. Programs that once allowed us to provide small group and individual catch up intervention for students with barriers or gaps in their learning have been significantly reduced or, in some cases, disappeared altogether. This has a direct impact on our ability to support the students who need extra help the most.

We are aware that, as funding pressures increase, we are asking more of families through voluntary contributions and fundraising to help bridge these gaps. We know that this is difficult for many families, particularly in the current economic climate. At the same time, our staff continue to contribute hours of unpaid work each week and often use their own money to purchase resources for their classrooms in an effort to minimise the impact on students.

We wear red because we want to see fair funding for government schools. We want a funding agreement that brings our school, and all Victorian public schools, to 100 percent of the Schooling Resource Standard so that every child has access to the support and opportunities they deserve.

There is also a workforce dimension to this campaign. Under the last industrial agreement, teacher pay in Victoria fell behind that of teachers in other states. Pay increases that did not keep pace with inflation have meant that many educators have effectively taken a pay cut over the past four years. An experienced teacher in Victoria is paid more than $15,000 less than their NSW counterparts. At the same time, workloads have increased significantly, with research indicating that Victorian teachers perform thousands of dollars’ worth of unpaid overtime each year.

This situation affects our own households and families. It is also contributing to a statewide teacher shortage. Since the last agreement, thousands of teachers have left the profession. Fair pay and improved conditions are essential not only to value the expertise and commitment of current staff, but also to attract and retain high quality teachers for every classroom.

You may have read that union members will be taking part in a stop work action on Tuesday 24 March. Many teachers and education support staff at our school will participate. This will likely mean that normal classes won't run on that day and families may need to keep their children at home. We understand the impact that this has on children’s learning and on family routines. Nobody takes this step lightly.

However, many of us feel that the situation has reached a point where strong action is necessary in order to secure the funding and pay arrangements that our students and our profession deserve. We firmly believe that the long term benefits of achieving fair funding and sustainable conditions will outweigh the short term disruption.

There may be further stop work actions or other protected actions later in the year. Should this occur, we will continue to communicate clearly and respectfully with families so that you can plan accordingly.

We hope this message helps explain why we wear red each Friday. It is not about politics. It is about our shared belief in the value of public education and our desire to have the tools, resources and staffing required to help every child at our school thrive.

We thank you for your understanding and, we hope, your support as we stand up for the future of public education in Victoria.

St Kilda Park AEU sub-branch

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