A Fair Go for VET in Schools Trainers

A Fair Go for VET in Schools Trainers

Started
19 September 2021
Signatures: 391Next goal: 500
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Why this petition matters

 A Fair Go for VET School Trainers!

Please sign this petition to tell Jason Clare MP, Dan Andrews MP and Natalie  Hutchins MP and that Victorian Vocational and Technologies 'trainers' deserve undergraduate opportunities to gain a professional teaching qualification with access the same pay, status and opportunities as other teachers in secondary schools.

Victoria no longer has an Initial Teacher Education (ITE) course for industry experienced tradespeople and tech-based industry professionals to become qualified and registered VET teachers. This situation is an insult to experienced professionals who want to become qualified VET teachers in schools. Without industry experienced professionals to teach VET in schools, the quality of education on offer suffers. This situation holds potentially serious consequences for students' futures. If you think that school students deserve to be taught by qualified teachers, then please sign this petition!

Tell the government that it needs to give VET and Technologies professionals A FAIR GO by treating them with some dignity and enough respect to offer them an undergraduate pathway to become qualified school teachers.

There is currently a serious shortage of qualified VET and Technologies teachers in Victorian secondary schools, but late last year, the only undergraduate course in Australia purposefully designed to recruit and ‘up-skill’ industry experienced tradespeople and technology experts to become qualified Vocational Education and Training (VET) and Technologies school teachers was closed. This means that THERE IS NO LONGER A SUPPLY OF APPROPRIATELY SKILLED AND QUALIFIED VET & TECHNOLOGIES TEACHERS to teach in schools, nor a practical way for VET professionals to gain a professional teaching qualification.

This has come at a time when the Victorian government is rolling out two new vocational pathways into its refreshed VCE that, we are being promised, will deliver “high-quality vocational and applied learning" (Merlino, 2021).

Without a purpose-built teacher course to offer Initial Teacher Education (ITE) to existing VET and Technologies trainers in schools, those expected to teach VET in Schools to senior secondary students in the new VCE program are not only likely to be working as unqualified teachers, but will also be expected to go without the same rights, pay, conditions, and opportunities as regular teachers.

School staff and students deserve high-quality education!

Right now, State and Commonwealth governments are in the process of deciding how to address the VET school teacher-shortage issue, and one thing they are seriously considering is creating a tier of second-class teachers―that is, secondary school teachers who will be teaching VCE, but remain deprived of the same rights, pay, qualifications, status or opportunities as regular school teachers. 

Although the OECD (2021), AITSL (2018) and Gonski (2018) all acknowledge the importance of having appropriately qualified VET teachers to help prepare the next generation of Australians, the nation now finds itself in a situation where the existing pool of qualified VET and Technologies teachers is depleting and secondary schools increasingly desperate to find suitable teachers. Without access to appropriately qualified teachers, it is now not uncommon for otherwise well-intentioned principals to place ‘out-of-field’ teachers in front of Technology and VET classes, or use trade or technically-qualified (but not teacher-qualified) trainers to teach on a special (but temporary) authority called Permission to teach (PTT).  Both of these ‘solutions’ are unsuitable for high-quality vocational and applied learning, and in many cases, even creating safety risks.

Please sign this petition to tell Education Ministers that Victoria needs is a solution that includes an undergraduate course for VET and Technologies school trainers to achieve professional teaching qualifications with the same pay, status and opportunities as other Victorian secondary school teachers. Thank You!

Please forward this petition on to those you know who are or might be affected by this issue. We need your help to let governments know that it is time to give VET and Technologies teachers a fair go!

For more information, go the Campaign for VET and Technologies Education (CVTE) visit: https://www.campaign-vet-tech-education.com/

Or join the FB group.

Glossary:

VET Trainer: person who holds a Certificate IV TAE Workplace Training qualificaiton

VET Teacher: Person with an Initial Teacher Education (ITE) qualification at either Bachelor (AQF 7), Graduate Diploma (AQF 8) or of Masters level degree (AQF 9) and teacher registration with state regulatory authority.

 

 

 

 

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Signatures: 391Next goal: 500
Support now