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Objective: To ensure initial teacher education supports teacher supply and delivers classroom ready graduates.
8. The Teacher Education Expert Panel, led by the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Sydney, Professor Mark Scott AO, is reviewing initial teacher education (ITE) and will recommend ways to boost graduation rates
- strengthening the link between performance and funding of ITE including looking at quality measures such as teaching performance assessments and how to increase the current average completion rate of 50 per cent in bachelor’s degrees
- strengthening ITE programs to deliver effective classroom ready teachers, with particular attention to teaching reading, literacy and numeracy, classroom management, cultural responsiveness, teaching students with diverse needs and working with families/carers
- improving the quality of professional experience placements in teaching with regard to best practice models used in education, medicine and other disciplines
- improving postgraduate ITE for mid‑career entrants including exploring paid internships and other employment‑based pathways.
The Australian Government will provide the Teacher Education Expert Panel with information gathered through the National Teacher Workforce Action Plan consultation process on strengthening ITE.
Timing and key next steps
The Panel and its Terms of Reference were announced by the Australian Government Education Minister on 22 September 2022.
It will consider the findings of the Quality Initial Teacher Education Review and consult with school and higher education sector stakeholders and other experts including through the Teacher Workforce Action Plan Working Group.
The Australian Government will present the findings of the Teacher Education Expert Panel to Education Ministers by June 2023
A key theme that arose from the public consultation process was the importance of:
- paid professional experience placements
- direct university and school partnerships to help train teachers
- Literacy and Numeracy Test for Initial Teacher Education
- internship training models and alternatives with greater proportion of training in school settings
- mandatory placements in the first year of study
- exit interviews for students who choose not to continue ITE.
This feedback will be passed on to the Teacher Education Expert Panel.
More information and the latest on this action: ‘Strong Beginnings’ report released by expert panel.
9. Recognise previous study, work experience and skills that may be transferable to teaching
A framework will be developed by the Australian Council of Deans of Education (ACDE) in consultation with Universities Australia, higher education providers and teacher registration authorities. This framework will include measures to ensure First Nations peoples, mid-career professionals and para‑professionals can have their skills, expertise and prior learning recognised through credit towards their qualification, whilst maintaining robust teacher qualification requirements.
Increasing learning opportunities for classroom support staff should also be facilitated, to help attract these professionals into teaching. The framework will have particular regard to areas of specialist skill need, including mathematics and Technological and Applied Studies (TAS), and consider existing initiatives to recognise the expertise of mid‑career professionals through the NSW Teacher Supply Strategy, including mid‑career pathways, School Learning Support Officer and TAS retraining, and the Queensland Turn to Teaching and Trade to Teach initiatives.
Timing and key next steps
The Australian Government will take a proposal to Australian Education Senior Officials Committee (AESOC) in early 2023. ACDE will be asked to provide its national framework to AESOC by late 2023 for application in 2024.
10. Co-design actions to attract and retain more First Nations teachers
The development of the strategy should be a collaboration between the Australian Government, First Nations peoples and other education stakeholders. It should also leverage key lessons from the successful ‘More Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Teachers Initiative’ which ran for five years from 2011, and existing state and territory initiatives such as the Pearl Duncan Teaching Scholarships and the Remote Area Teacher Education Program that operate in Queensland and look at pathways for Aboriginal Education Officers to leverage existing skills into teaching.
The Australian Government will work with First Nations education organisations to roll out its $14.1 million investment in the teaching of First Nations languages. This will give potential First Nations teachers exposure to the classroom and potentially provide a pathway for more First Nations teachers.
Timing and key next steps
The Australian Government to co-design a new national First Nations teachers’ strategy to apply from 2024, in close partnership with First Nations education organisations including:
- the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Education Advisory Group
- the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Education Council
- the Secretariat of National Aboriginal and Islander Child Care
- the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Principals Association
- the Coalition of the Peaks.
Read more about the First Nations Language Education program.
11. In recognition that the Literacy and Numeracy Test for Initial Teacher Education (LANTITE) should not be a barrier, all teaching students will undergo initial assessment of their personal literacy and numeracy skills in their first year
States and territories will work with the Australian Government and initial teacher education (ITE) providers around relevant supports and rules. From 2023, prospective students will be eligible to sit the LANTITE prior to commencing their studies. This will offer more certainty and fairness to prospective ITE students and require ITE providers to provide targeted assistance to those who need it, for example providing better feedback on areas where focus is needed.
This includes:
- increasing the number of permitted attempts at the LANTITE
- better feedback to LANTITE participants on areas they need to improve when they have failed to meet the standard (to help increase pass rates on a second or subsequent attempt).
This work will be trialled by Victoria and the Northern Territory working with higher education providers in their jurisdictions and report back to Education Ministers in 2023.
Timing and key next steps
Education Ministers to consider amendments to the Accreditation of Initial Teacher Education Programs in Australia: Standards and Procedures to specify where in a program a student should sit the LANTITE in 2023. This work will form part of the new nationally consistent guidelines for teacher training and accreditation.
More information and the latest on this action: LANTITE trial.