Vanna,

I agree with about the bullying of high-functioning autistic children, both from teachers and other students.
Many of these children are undiagnosed or diagnosed late - and unfortunately a label in this situation is necessary for the extra care and understanding needed.
My son is high-functioning autistic and our experience was a bit of both. Although he was undiagnosed at the time, he attended kindergarten and pre-school and had two fantastic teachers both of those years in the public system. His grade 1 teacher, however, was of the opposite mind and wasn't intending to give him an inch. He attended briefly before I pulled him out for homeschooling which, I'm pleased, to say has worked out wonderfully for us.
There is much grief endured by high-functioning autistic children and their families in attempting to conform to the education system - having said that, those who do make a success of it (children, parents and teachers), should be commended and their dedication recognised.

Vanna,

I repeat: the research evidence is that smaller classes improve student learning. If you go the other way and increase class sizes, many able teaches will leave the system, while those who stay will reduce their effort per child in order to retain their overall work-life balance. Thus, students will be worse off for two reasons.

Pelican,

The reason potential teachers require a lower university entrance score than potential lawyers is that university entrance works on supply and demand. The courses in more demand will have higher entrance scores than the courses in low demand. To increase the entrance scores for teacher training requires either a reduction in teacher training places (with the consequence that there would not be enough teachers) or the restoration of teacher pay and conditions to what they were decades ago in order to attract the sort of able people who went into teaching decades ago. Of course, the later mean society as a whole has to reject the teacher-bashing nonsense spouted by the Vannas of the world, who persistently refuse to deal in facts; e.g., the fact that smaller classes improve learning (Tennessee STAR study), the fact that teacher pay has fallen dramatically (by $35,019 in 36 years), the fact that Victorian secondary schools are worse staffed today then they were 30 years ago (10.9:1 in 1981, 11.9:1 on the most recent figures).

Chris C, Pelican et al:

<<I repeat: the research evidence is that smaller classes improve student learning.>>

Chris, I agree but the wisdom currently in vogue is the opposite. The Australian College of Educational Research seems to be accepted by governments as the font of wisdom, and when I last looked the conclusion the ACER has reached is that class-size is not a factor in the academic progress of students. They are pushing the "quality of the teacher/teaching" as the only key.

<<To increase the entrance scores for teacher training requires either a reduction in teacher training places (with the consequence that there would not be enough teachers) or the restoration of teacher pay and conditions to what they were decades ago in order to attract the sort of able people who went into teaching decades ago.>>

When Gough Whitlam's drive pushed up the teacher salaries considerably over a few years in the 1970s the status and enthusiasm of teachers soared. It might be nice if we could pursue education as a vocation only, rather than a source of material gain. But the reality is that it needs to be a mixture of both.

I started with my first class in 1970 on a salary of $3008 -- even allowing for the difference in monetary value over the 40 years, that was pretty poor in the socio-economic scale. If the pay had not improved greatly over the next few years I could never have continued in the game. But now the relative pay-rate has gone back to the poor status it used to be.

Chris C
The increase in standard entry levels would have to accompanied by an increase in salary to attract good candidates as I mentioned in my previous post. I agree it will only exacerbate the problem if the entry level was raised and the salaries remained low. Supply and demand is not the only measure of entry - we need more GPs but I would shudder to think the conditions of entry would be lowered to attract medical students.

crabsy is right IMO, the love of teaching (or any 'giving' profession) is paramount but the mix of salary/vocation has to be right.

Naturally quality of teachers is not the only issue. There is also issues of class size (really important), lack of teacher supports in the early intervention area and too much interference from the bureaucracy at times some odd 'new fangled' ideas that are more career aspirational in line with current trends, many not adding any real value.

Chris, Chris, Chris. On the one hand, you concede supply and demand means teachers are not in high demand, and on the other that we should pay them artificially high wages? Every profession thinks they're special, the reality is that teaching is no more or less important than most other professions, be it a carpenter, electrician or sewage worker, and shouldn't get an artificially high salary. The problem is not a lack of money, it's a poor allocation of that money, and an idiotic and obstructionist union full of hacks. The sooner the Education Union is crushed the better we'll all be.

When the UK introduced comprehensive education, the system became worse, and less equitable. I don't really know or care how some politically devised mechanic compares them to a diverse group of countries like the OECD, because to know they're sucking all I have to do is look at the before and after, personified by Northern Ireland. You see, NI stuck with the system the UK used to have when it was abolished on the mainland (though in name, they've supposedly abandoned some of it) and the result is that the second level schools in NI are actually beating UK students overall, an incredible turnabout, in a country which has a comparable system and students.

I don't care if teacher pay is lower than it used to be, that just means it was too high to begin with! And the amounts listed are way too high for a profession which has so little demand, and which so resists change and accountability.

By the by, since you accuse me of being inaccurate, can you tell me which part of what I said is inaccurate? Classics & Grammar have been killed off in schools, Principals don't get to select their own teachers, and teacher pay is very healthy. If you're going to throw stuff like that out there, it'd be nice if you could back it up.