Dear Minister

Teaching profession rejects government mandated student reports

The Federation's General Secretary wrote to the Minister for Education and Training, Carmel Tebbutt, on 2 June advising her that the teaching profession rejects the federal and state governments' mandated student reports. The letter is reproduced here.

The Hon. Carmel Tebbutt, MP

Minister for Education and Training

Dear Ms Tebbutt

Re: Teaching profession rejects government-mandated student reports

I write to advise that to date over 11,000 teachers across NSW have voted to reject the federal and state governments' mandatory reporting requirements. This is a massive rejection by the profession.

As you are aware, Federation has advised its members to continue to use their own reporting systems and not comply with the DET memoranda of 9 February 2006. That advice remains.

As you are also aware from the discussions between the Senior Officers of the Federation and yourself and our letter of 15 March 2006, the Federation and the Department have not resolved the dispute about student reports. When the Department discontinued its action in the NSW Industrial Relations Commission, there were seven items of dispute between the parties. The Deputy Director-General, Mr Trevor Fletcher, advised principals by memorandum dated 1 March 2006 the following:

"As a result of the hearing, the Department will meet with the Teachers Federation later this week to discuss their concerns which include:

• Implementation timeline

• Use of the A-E scale

• Application of the A-E grading to Years 1 and 2

• Application of the A-E grading to all KLAs in primary school

• The use of the phrase 'parents are encouraged' to seek information on the distribution of A-E grades on the front of the reports

• Clarification of how reporting will apply to ESL (new arrivals, phase 2 etc) students and students with intellectual learning difficulties

• Use of information on distribution of A-E grades by schools for promotion and other purposes."

All the Federation's concerns remain outstanding. The Department has sought to confine its discussions with the Federation to the "clarification of how reporting will apply to ESL (new arrivals, phase 1 etc) students and students with intellectual disabilities". These issues are of critical importance but, as is apparent from Mr Fletcher's memorandum, the dispute is much wider. Hence, the confined discussions with Mr Randall are not suitable and will not solve the dispute.

Federation wishes to engage in genuine, good faith negotiations with officials from either your office, the Department, or both, who are able to discuss the full gamut of issues. Teachers have told you in their thousands what they wish to negotiate.

In addition, the Federation is aware of serious logistical difficulties with the production of "work samples" by the Board of Studies. It has been reported to the Federation that the Board believes the task to be both impractical and impossible.

I note also that the Deputy Director-General has advised principals that A-E should not be awarded on the basis of achievement of stage outcomes but rather on teachers' shared assessment of how well the student has achieved skills, knowledge and understanding intended by the teachers when they planned the teaching and learning program. If this is the case, I note that the Minister's mantra that an A in Bourke should mean the same as an A in Burwood will be rendered null and void.

Please contact Maree O'Halloran, President, about this matter.

Yours sincerely

John Irving

General Secretary

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Last Modified: 03 Jun 2006