Teacher Quality
The Teacher Quality National Partnership is designed to improve and sustain the quality of the teacher and school leadership workforce.
The Northern Territory will receive up to $1.148 million to support the delivery of system-wide reforms targeting critical points in the teacher life-cycle to attract, train, place, develop and retain quality teachers in schools and classrooms. Reward funding is also available subject to the achievement of key reforms.
The Northern Territory's effort under the Low SES School Communities and Closing the Gap National Partnerships will complement the Teacher Quality reform effort.
Scope of reform
- World leading PD and support empowering principals to better manage schools to achieve improved student results and to lead performance improvement at the local level
- New pathways into teaching, Better pathways into teaching, Indigenous pathways into teaching
- New professional standards to underpin national reforms
- Nationally agreed process for accrediting/certifying Accomplished and Leading Teachers
- Joint engagement with higher education providers to improve teacher quality
- Establish quality placements for teacher education courses
- Establish School Centres for Excellence
- Improved mobility of the Australian teaching workforce
- Improved quality and availability of teacher workforce data
- Improved performance management and continuous improvement in schools.
Key Initiatives
- Programs to build capacity of aspiring leaders to build system capability to provide effective leadership in complex school communities and hard to fill schools. These will be developed in association with institutions such as the Australian Council for Educational Leaders to ensure the delivery of leading edge programs that develop capacity to engage with communities
- Pre-service practicum programs delivered in partnership with local and interstate tertiary providers will offer supported on-site internships in order to better prepare graduates to work in remote schools, and assist with retention of the remote workforce. In addition to provider-funded placements, the Northern Territory will self-select, orientate and fund 20 high-performing under-graduates per annum to participate.
- Scholarship program to attract high performing Northern Territory senior secondary students into teaching programs at Charles Darwin University.
- Commitments to adopting:
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- national pre-service teacher education course accreditation and registration standards are adopted and embedded across all sectors
- the national Accomplished and Leading Teacher certification process. The Northern Territory has committed to establishing 20 dedicated positions in selected remote schools to attract high performing teachers to hard to staff schools and enhance the in-school support for early-career teachers and those new to remote contexts (this initiative is funded through the Low Socio- Economic Status School Communities National Partnership).
- Two very remote Centres for Excellence will be established as hubs at which pre-service teachers as well as high potential teachers and leaders can experience on-site professional learning and the delivery of quality remote Indigenous education
- Continue to support the work of the relevant Teacher Quality Steering Committee sub-group and will ensure that available workforce data sets align with and contribute to the development of the nationally consistent approach.
- Pilot Industrial reforms that result in:
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- refined classification structure for principals that provide flexibility for differential remuneration for remote and hard to fill schools
- job descriptions that clearly articulate the roles and responsibilities specific to remote teachers, including community engagement
- tax related incentives for remote staff, including contracts that enable payment for additional hours worked and improved performance.