Increasing the ranking required for admission to teaching degrees and improving the overall quality of those degrees have been flagged in a discussion paper on raising the quality of teachers released by the Victorian government.
According to the paper launched by the education minister, James Merlino, the Australian Tertiary Admission Rank required for final round entry into undergraduate teaching degrees ranged from 30 to 86 across the state.
“Recent findings reveal that the number of initial teacher education entrants with an Atar less than 50 has more than doubled over the past four years,” the paper found.
“High achievers report that low Atar cut-offs are a deterrent to pursuing a career in teaching, and parents report perceiving low entry requirements as denoting a low-status career choice. Retention rates show that students with a lower Atar are less likely to complete a teacher education course.”
Neither Merlino nor the discussion paper stated what the cut-off might be – stakeholders have been invited to give feedback. Changes to teacher training requirements would be announced by the end of the year, Merlino said, to allow course providers to plan and prepare in 2017 before implementation in 2018.
“South Korea selects the top 5% of academic achievers, Finland the top 10%, and Singapore and Hong Kong the top 30%,” the paper found.
“Evidence shows that policy decisions to lift entry standards have been successful in signalling high expectations of students and courses, encouraging higher achieving entrants, and elevating the status of the profession.”
The reforms will also require that course providers assess more rigorously for a potential candidate’s motivation to teach, interpersonal and communication skills, willingness to learn, resilience, self-efficacy, conscientiousness and organisational and planning skills.
The New South Wales government introduced a raft of changes for aspiring teachers in January last year. Entrants need to have achieved 80% or higher in at least three of their Atar secondary school subjects, with one of those results required to be in English. In September, the state’s education minister, Adrian Piccoli, said low standards had made teaching as a career choice “a joke”.
Teaching students in NSW must also pass a numeracy and literacy assessment before being approved for their final-year practicum placement in schools, and the government is working with universities to improve the content and practical components of teacher training.
Data from the University Admission Centre published by the ABC found 6,278 undergraduate teaching offers were made in NSW in 2012 compared to just 4,306 offers in the 2016 intake.
The president of the NSW Secondary Principals’ Council, Chris Presland, said those figures may be an indication the more stringent admission standards were working, but it was too early to tell for certain.
“And it would be a concern if teachers were dropping off in the areas where there is a shortage, such as maths and science teachers,” he said.
The council supported the more stringent criteria, he said, but added that to truly improve teacher quality, greater support for teachers in their first and second years in a classroom through mentoring and ongoing professional development was needed. Six-month internships had also been piloted by some universities in addition to practical assessments in the final year of teacher training, he said.
“It is also important to remember that academic scores are not the only indicator of potential to be a good teacher,” Presland said. “But we must make sure they have got the academic capapcity to do the job.”
