Teacher Salaries and Education Quality
So what can governments do to get all teachers doing what our best already do? Part of the answer is to attract the best possible people to take up teaching as a career. This, in turn, will depend on making teaching more attractive. One way for governments to enhance the status of teaching is to work with the profession itself to clarify what it means to be an excellent teacher, to support the development of a national system for certifying teachers of excellence (perhaps similar to the CPA for accountants), and to pay more to teachers who meet these high standards. If the Business Council of Australia had its way, our best teachers would be paid substantially more up to $130,000 a year.
From op-ed titled ‘Back to the Classroom to Improve Education System’ by Professor Geoff Masters, The Canberra Times, 11 January 2008, p. 11.
In August 2007 the BCA released a paper, prepared in conjunction with Professor Masters, proposing a five-point plan to overhaul school education in Australia. Access the paper via the link provided here.