The majority of Gippsland principals are stressed, overworked and feel under-resourced, according to the Australia Education Union taking aim at State Government’s allocation of education resources.
The annual State of Our Schools survey, which drew responses from 35 schools from across Gippsland, found 77 per cent of principals felt they had insufficient resources to ensure quality program delivery in their schools.
AEU region organiser Jeff Gray said the survey showed local principals were finding their increased workloads “unhelpfully stressful”.
“I know number of principals across the area having to take extended sick and stress leave from their jobs due to increased workloads,” Mr Gray said.
“We are coming across these crazy examples in which we have principals having to fit in quality tests on their water tanks, and training parents to use a ride-on lawnmower for occupational health and safety purposes – it’s nonsensical for a principal to have to do that.”
The survey found 83 per cent of respondents found workloads an area of concern, while 63 per cent of principals had issues with their stress levels – 15 percentage points higher than the statewide average.
Toongabbie Primary School principal and teacher Lisa Branch said most principals in the area were feeling overwhelmed by their workloads.
“There’s so much other paper work, legal and occupational health and safety issues that come across your desk which need to be done, on top of our normal roles,” Ms Branch said.
Coming from a school of 64 students and five full-time equivalent teachers, supported by a part-time administration position, Ms Branch said the school needed an extra support officer to take on the additional duties so she could focus on running the school.
“We are trying to work really close with our students at our schools and ensure we spend every moment to give them the best outcomes; it’s a really important aspect of our work but it takes a lot of time,” she said.
“For our planning days we have to pay extra teachers to come in to take classes just so we can organise ourselves.”
Responding to the union’s claims the situation had been exacerbated by recent changes to department support roles, a spokesperson for State Education Minister Martin Dixon said school satisfaction had since increased more than 10 per cent.
“The AEU has consistently opposed every attempt the Coalition Government has made to give principals greater control over resources and to shift resources out of the bureaucracy and in to schools,” the spokesperson said.
“To support school leaders the Coalition Government has worked to secure $12.2 billion of schools funding in Victoria over the next six years.”
