The AITSL is just a rebadging of Teaching Australia. The government had the chance to replace what was a Howard Government corporation with one shareholder, the Minister for Education, with a body that properly represented the profession, but it just changed the name and the people on the governing board.

What is required is a Council of Australasian Teacher Registration Authorities, a bottom-up rather than a top-down organisation. consisting of representatives from the state and territory registration authorities, the Commonwealth Government and the New Zealand Government; e.g., the NSWIT Council would appoint from its members a government primary teacher and an education department representative, the VIT Council would appoint from its members a government secondary teacher and a Catholic Education Office representative, the WACOT Board would appoint from its members an independent school teacher and a teacher educator, and so on. The majority of members would be teachers (including a principal). I suggest 20 in total: two from each state, one from each territory, two from the Commonwealth Government and four from New Zealand, to comprise three government secondary teachers, three government primary teachers, two Catholic school teachers, one independent school teacher, one pre-school teacher, one special school teacher, one school principal (government in one term, non-government in the next), three government education department representatives, one CEO employer, two teacher educators, one representative from the NZ Minister and one representative from the Commonwealth Minister. (I include NZ because closer integration of our two societies makes sense, along the lines of the Food Safety Authority.)

CoATRA would ensure mutual recognition of state and territory and NZ registration, co-ordinate the professional standards across the countries and check overseas qualifications, such a check to automatically lead to registration with the relevant state, territory or NZ authority.

The election of Labor was a chance to remake federalism, to tie Australia and New Zealand together more closely and to start hearing the people who have been excluded by the previous government. The thinking behind Teaching Australia was that of the bully - exclude the states and exclude the teachers. AITSL still excludes classroom teachers.

I hate testing as a means to "judge" anything however, when it comes to learning more about the disparities between regions, between schools I cant see another way to help change the current framework which is merely a "smelly cheese fight" each year for funding with small else changed.

I am all for a 'universal approach' however until we see one it is a conceptual dream. I agree 'teachers need to get over themselves to think once they have done their training that's it' for their own broad skills learning. Open Beautiful Minds. It is not the teachers I target as much as the educational framework hence my support for Ms Gillards tests which I believe will open the doors to ethnic and authentic needs where the 'one stop' shop fails the diversity of student needs especially in regions. [Think learning resource accountability for Cape York... Rossville, Laura, Wujal Wujal, Cooktown, Coen for example]. We need an inclusive framework that is unhappy with a 'revolving' door here.

Another bias I have is all the over emphasis on "professional' this... and 'professional' that. Give me a break. In this changing dynamic world "Common sense is a Super Power'... it is the thing we are missing when it comes to the stagnating cultures in human services, the departments of health and education. The blind rigid following the same. Sheep follow sheep while real crows fly.

As a ethnic learner I want these tests. I want the results and then I want to get back to the broader methods possible as I think your article suggests for the innovative - critical minded creative thinkers who are needed and whom we need to inspire before we can say "knowledge nation".

Thank You for the article I used it to bounce given educational "change" has so many conflicting dimensions.

http://www.miacat.com/

Is there another reason for the teachers' opposition to the the literacy testing?
If or when a school or individuals have been found wanting then the teachers might have to actually begin teaching encoding and decoding skills whereas hitherto all that has been taking place is yakking coloring in and cutting and pasting. I have first hand knowledge how inadequate teachers are in these skills themselves. Quite a few cannot spell and write grammatically themselves and would be unable to do any remedial work to help those found to be wanting.

How were these unfortunate children ever allowed to deteriorate in such a pronounced manner? It didnt happen in merely a year or two!

socratease

I have an intellectually disabled child that is mainstream integrated at a small country school that has a high socio-economic problem. All I can say about the teachers and staff is they are fantastic. It took some fighting to get things in place to help her, there was some resistance at first till the school realised I was serious and would back them up and help at home to reinforce the learning. Since this i have managed to have a good relationship with her teachers and the school, I have sat on committees for a major renovation as well as P&C. The most notable problem I have always found is the atmosphere of fear that schools operate under. They are frightened to upset the state government, the department heads and especially the teachers federation. This union is the most counter productive union there is. They don't help there clients and have teachers in a position where parents don't trust them to be doing the right thing. The renovation needs to start at the top, If the new health model works out in the longer term then I would be in favour of transferring it to education. Regional control funded by a single source with a national curriculum. The current situation sees schools, teachers, students and parents treated like political toys of the state government and the teachers federation. Please don't forget, despite our complaints we actually have one of the best education systems in the world and don't let a headline driven media fool you otherwise.

Miacat,

Spot-on ! I looked up all the schools that I ever went to, primary and secondary, and all of them were under-performing (at least in 2009) - but of course that was all fifty years ago: they all probably had higher literacy and numeracy standards than the norm school nowadays, and the unions can proudly claim some responsibility for this, especially the stuffing-up of the education, and therefore life-opportunities, for working class and/or ethnic children. Oh well, once you've made it yourself, pull up the ladder: the working class can kiss .....

Surely testing - in-school or otherwise - is vital to know where to pump in extra funds and to re-direct specialist teachers, and whose backsides to kick, hack principals and their cronies: a bit of carrot and stick.

Joe Lane
Adelaide