A time to celebrate teaching

20 September 2004

A time to celebrate teaching

Nearly 180 secondary teachers from Cape Reinga to Bluff will gather at the Brentwood Hotel in Wellington tomorrow for PPTA’s 2004 Annual Conference.

PPTA president Phil Smith said conference delegates would debate a number of important professional issues over the next three days, including:

how to ensure more satisfactory supervision of the international student market so schools don’t become financially dependent on them; how to ensure the teachers who supervise new trainees are valued and rewarded for the job they do; how to close the gap between schools who have advanced a long way in ICT provision and those who have not, how to ensure that the structure of PPTA works most effectively for the teachers who belong to it, and how to ensure that schools are safer places for students and teachers alike.

Mr Smith said this year’s conference was significant because it came in the light of a newly settled collective agreement which offered significant improvements in pay and conditions, and a process for adressing long-standing concerns of secondary teachers through a number of working parties focusing on professional issues.

“Teachers have endorsed a process which will see real improvements in their working conditions and which paves the way for long-term solutions to the recruitment and retention issues that have dogged the sector for too long,” he said.

The conference also includes a presentation from Massey University professor Richard Harker on social background and pupil attainments – what teachers can do, as well as addresses from education minister Trevor Mallard and National Party education spokesperson Bill English. Ends.

ENDS

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