Debates Day 2 - Wednesday 1 May 1991
Parliamentary Record 3
Debates for 6th Assembly 1990 - 1994; ParliamentNT; Parliamentary Record; 6th Assembly 1990 - 1994
1991-05-01
Made available by the Legislative Assembly of the Northern Territory
English
Debates
Legislative Assembly of the Northern Territory
Darwin
application/pdf
Attribution International 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)
Legislative Assembly of the Northern Territory
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
https://hdl.handle.net/10070/279515
https://hdl.handle.net/10070/418775
DEBATES - Wednesday 1 May 1991 The aim was to ensure that talented teachers, who wanted to stay in the classroom and teach as opposed to leaving the classroom and going into administration, would be able to do so by taking a second promotional option. What has happened now? The master teachers have been loaded down with so much of the advisory and teacher support functions, which formerly were performed by other teachers, that there is a very real danger that the administrative workload that attaches to those functions will become such that it will affect their ability to teach. That totally negates the purpose of the master teachers program, which was to enable high-quality teachers to continue teaching in the classroom without their being deprived of the opportunity to gain 'promotion'. Thus, there is a major threat to the master teachers program less than a year after it was put in place. Let us take a closer look at the cuts to the advisory and support services. By way of example, I will look at the effects of the cuts in Alice Springs. The education officer positions in maths, English and computers are gone. This means that the service designed to provide up-to-date teaching aids, teaching methodology and assessment in the critical areas of English, maths and computers is gone. In relation to English and maths, this flies in the face of all other governments in Australia which are actively working to ensure improvements in those areas. It has severe implications for the implementation of the new English curriculum program that has been developed over several years and that is planned for implementation in 1992. The regional educational officers who were integral in training teachers in the implementation of that curriculum and in monitoring that implementation are gone. That is all to be centralised in Darwin. The belief that services can be provided from Darwin at the same cost and level of efficiency is total garbage. It could be perpetrated only by a minister who had decided to take up residence this side of the Berrimah line and shut his eyes to the rest of the Territory. Mr Stone interjecting. Hr EDE: You might have a property there, but I would not call it a home. You live here. Hr Stone: I live in both, from time to time. Mr Ortmann: Home is where the heart is. Hr EDE: I rent a flat here, but that does not mean that it is my home. Hr Stone: Where do you live? Hr Bailey: We are talking about closing schools and you are sitting there talking about how many houses you live in. Hr EDE: Mr Speaker, the computer education officer was not there simply to monitor the computer education courses. The position assisted teachers in the development of computer skills. The use of computers is now intensive. That is an initiative on which the opposition supported the government over a number of years and there have been some leaps forward in terms of computer education. The unfortunate fact with computer technology 1s that continuity of staff must be maintained and it should be ensured that they receive constant training to keep abreast of developments in the field. The removal of positions like those of the education officer (computers) is a savage blow to our development. If we are unable to keep 821