Teacher email accounts opposed

By Wendy Currie and Jennifer Leete

Federation Executive has placed a statewide ban on the roll-out of email addresses to all students and teachers in NSW public schools that was announced by the NSW Premier Bob Carr on March 18.

The project has cost the Government $84 million. The Government should focus on more important priorities in public education.

Technology infrastructure in schools is not adequate to implement this project.

In some staff rooms up to 10 teachers share access to one computer.

In many schools, the infrastructure is old and deteriorated. It is not unheard of for the power to fail when too many power points are turned on.

There is no real technical support for schools. Technical problems are dealt with by teachers who are self-taught. Because there is no support, these teachers are often taken away from their classes to deal with an emergency when computers and networks fail.

The Department of Education and Training's Webservices program is currently being piloted in a limited number of schools. The pilot is not complete, mainly because of the significant technical problems that have occurred, the cumbersome nature of the program and the time it takes for schools and the DET to fix the problems.

The incomplete pilot has not even been evaluated. Plans of an agreed evaluation framework have not progressed beyond the preliminary stage. Outstanding issues relating to privacy, child protection, workload, technical support and training have not been yet been addressed.

If it is rolled out to schools now it will be a 'white elephant'. The Government has failed to meet any commitments to teachers relating to this project. The announcement by the Premier that the rollout would proceed represents a reneging on commitments given that "all future decisions regarding the ISP [now called Webservices project] will be in consultation with the Federation" and that the project "should only move to the third stage once there is an agreement that implementation at the 50 new locations has been successful".

The Federation Executive also decided to withdraw from the ISP Reference Group. This group has been providing advice to the DET about implementation of the project. The Premier's announcement about the statewide rollout flies in the face of all advice provided by the reference group.

This is a premature move by the Premier. He is clearly attempting to shift the focus away from the real issues of concern to people in NSW, such as diminishing resources to public schools and TAFE colleges.

Wendy Currie is a Research Officer and Jennifer Leete is the Deputy President.

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March 2004 contents