Teachers at Ballarat's Catholic primary and secondary schools are angry and upset at the "glacial" pace of negotiations for a new pay deal.
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Juggling "unsustainable" workloads after two and a half years of pandemic lockdowns, remote learning, face-to-face classes and the pressure of staff and student absences because of sickness, they are keen to secure a new deal more than 400 days after their last agreement expired.
After their colleagues at Catholic schools in the Sale Diocese secured a new agreement matching most of the salary and condition improvements won by staff in government schools, including a big focus on tackling growing teacher workloads, school staff in the Ballarat, Sandhurst (Bendigo) and Melbourne Diocese have grown more frustrated with the lack of progress in their negotiations.
The Melbourne Archdiocese Catholic Schools (MACS) negotiators also represent Ballarat and Bendigo schools in the enterprise bargaining process.
What we are confronting at the present time is a supply crisis and we need to address why people are leaving the profession - the unsustainable pressure of workload
- Brian Martin
"Their team continue to push back against our claims for improving the workloads of education staff," said Independent Education Union spokesman Brian Martin.
In a show of frustration at the lack of progress on their pay deal, a small rally will be held at the Diocese of Ballarat Catholic Education Ltd (DOBCEL) office after school on Thursday where members will deliver 'report cards' on the performance of MACS negotiators.
"Staff are working at unsustainably high levels," Mr Martin said. "They are really committed to their school communities and they have battled through the last two and a half years of lockdowns, remote learning and all those pressures.
"They have a pretty good level of resilience and dedication but they are wanting the employer group to know they need to get serious about the bargaining and stop talking about attempts to cut conditions in schools and instead agree on a reasonable outcome with us."
Mr Martin said the key issue was the "workload crisis" in schools that was contributing to staff burnout and large numbers of teachers leaving the profession.
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"What we are confronting at the present time is a supply crisis and we need to address why people are leaving the profession - the unsustainable pressure of workload."
Mr Martin said members wanted to hear from their employer what they intend to do to help reduce workload and scheduled class times for teachers. In government schools, and Catholic schools in the Sale Diocese, the extra classes that secondary teachers take to cover absences of colleagues etc will now be rolled in to their scheduled class times, instead of being on top of their scheduled classes. Staff also secured significant improvements to workload including better parental leave, and in the coming months will receive salary increases and back pay.
"This is starting to become a big problem for principals who are trying to plan for 2023 staffing but don't have a clear framework," Mr Martin said.
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