Today Monday the 13th 2010, the VCE results came out. The students that I was teaching for the year 2010 weren't my sons, daughters, cousins or nephews. The weekend went by like I was waiting for a year because I just wanted Monday to come quickly so I know what enter score my students got. Monday came and I rushed to the school then I was surprise that we were not allowed to get the results before Tuesday. I was wondering, who doesn't trust us, the government or the school? My friend is a doctor and he says he has the right to access any information about any of the patients immediately. Are teachers really so scum people that they haven't the right to access their students results. If the answer is "YES", so why on earth they are trusted us to hold their future between our hands. If the answer is "NO, they are not scum", so the teachers will feel bad and they will start changing their attitudes from "Yes we care for our students" to "Hey we don't care for those students coz they are not related to us". Can you get the idea, you people who are not teaching why the level in our Australian Education System is going down and down and down. Come on Government, start your investigation and you will realize if I am making this up or not.

"Can you get the idea, you people who are not teaching why the level in our Australian Education System is going down and down and down."

I'm afraid some people reading your post could conclude that they have quite a clear idea of why educational levels might be falling.

Considering the vast array of problems that most educators are currently grappling with - inequitable funding for example, lack of progress on class sizes, narrowing of the curriculum, to name but a few - having to wait an extra day for test results hardly seems to be a priority issue.

Bronwyn says:

"I'm afraid some people reading your post
could conclude that they have quite a clear
idea of why educational levels might be falling."

Bronwyn can be very diplomatic. She is also good at understatement.

It is good to see that after eleven months to the day Bronwyn has returned to her keyboard on OLO.

Watch and learn, rumrum4.

Well put Bronwyn and I'll also add a welcome.

I spent Thursady last week at my children's schools - both of them. I was there because the teachers at both schools had allowed ny children to rack up over 30 days of absences each without once raising the alarm with me. Most of the absences occurred on a Thursday or Friday and nearly all were authorised by their mother. The teachers seemed to think that meant they were off the hook, but Education Qld doesn't: it says that teachers should be very concerned at just 20 days of absence.

Perhaps if teachers were more concerned about their students and less about covering thier bums there's be more respect? As it stands, I was reasonably satisfied with the response of one of the principals, who offered to ring their mother, but the other is the subject of a Departmental complaint for negligence. The same principal took the trouble, only a few days before the end of school, to ring me to tell me thet she was very cross because my 12 year old sone had failed to attend a couple of minor detentions for the heinous crime of giving a teacher "the finger" behind her back, only to be caught out by another teacher from through the window.

Personally, I think this illustrates very nicely the sort of person she is - prepared to hold a 12 year old boy to a higher standard than herself.

Did I mention the "Girls can Do Anything" and the "Girls: Building the Future" stickers plastered everywhere? Not a single boy was handed a prize at the Year 7 graduation ceremony, except a couple who got "effort" awards.

The biggest problem with teaching is simple - the men have been largely driven from the profession. At my son's school there is one deputy head who is male and two male teachers in a school of 800 children. At the graduation the only teacher cheered by their class was one of those men.

If teachers want respect they can earn it - it's not a right.

Ah, Antiseptic, didn't realise you were a banana bender.

Your school experience is not the only one, here in Qld.

Putting aside individual classroom teachers, a varied bunch from 'very good' to 'should be shot', the management of our schools here in Qld is VERY poor, at the school level, and right up through district, regional and Mary Street offices.

Our schools are run by incompetent careerists, selected from a monoculture of gormless nitwits, devoid of any inmagination, skills, or any sign of basic intelligence.

Our childrens school also feels able to send home 'days off' on the report without ever once thinking to say anything at all to parents.

However, the 'days off' are not 'actual' at all. If a child gets to school late, and misses the checking off moment, they are 'absent' for the day.

But at each lesson a classroom register is kept, consuming teacher time to no purpose.

The two sources of 'present' 'absent' are never to meet, so although the child can be 'absent' from school all day, they can also be 'present' in every class that day.

I have long since ceased to cooperate with the school, since they make no effort to review their processes.

They also suspend students for not coming to school!

What Dills they are.

Then there is the open-door policy to all the Baptists and Pentacostal's who invade our schools spraeding 'hope' where the teachers leave only despair, presumably.

There is absolutely no 'education revolution' going on in Qld, apart from taking our schools back to the stone age.

I can only speak from my own experience with teachers. And I have to agree with what Bronwyn posted. Teachers are expected to reach unattainable goals with inadequate tools. The miracle is that at times they accomplish this impossible task. Schools, however, cannot survive on miracles. Every teacher deserves effective tools and skills. Many teaching problems hopefully will be solved in the next few decades. There will be new learning environments and new means of instruction. One function, however, will always remain with the teacher: to create the emotional climate for learning. No technology, sophisticated as it may be, can do this job. Having to wait an extra day for exam results may be frustrating - but a teacher has to learn to deal with all sorts of situations. Children present problems which don't disappear, even when the teacher believes in democracy, love, respect, acceptance, individual differences and personal uniqueness.
These concepts though great, are too abstract and too large. They're like a thousand-dollar bill - good currency, but useless in meeting mundane needs such as buying a cup of coffee, taking a taxi or making a phone call. For daily life, one needs coins. For dealing with students teacher need psychological small change. They need specific skills for dealing effectively and humanely with minute-to-minute happenings-the small irritations, the daily conflicts, the sudden crises. All these situations call for helpful and realistic reactions. A teacher's response has crucial consequences. It can affect a child's conduct and character for better or for worse. Making a fuss over exam results - is it worth it?