Devolution pilot: the truth revealed

DET document shows reducing investment in public education is its real agenda.

By Mary Fogarty

The Department of Education (DET) has proceeded with its trial of increased school-based decision-making on budget, staffing mix and recruitment. This is a two-year pilot that has commenced in 47 schools in term 1 this year. The final instructions issued to participating schools consist of a complex detailed document that will certainly have principals in ever-more demanding workplaces questioning their initial decision to participate in the program.

The "Pilot Schools Instructions Document" issued to schools is a resurrection of "Your School's Right to Choose" policy, which sought to expand global budgets and deregulate staffing. Federation has made it clear that it does not support this re-run of the devolution agenda and will not agree to vary the existing award or staffing agreement conditions to facilitate it.

Section 1 of the instructions document consists of introductory comments from Trevor Fletcher, the Deputy Director-General of Schools, promoting the pilot as "an opportunity to embed improved practices that will further develop their school's capacity to locally manage resources for the benefit of students". Later in the introduction, he states that the pilot "will provide schools with the opportunity to more closely match their resource capacity with their students' needs".

A close analysis of the document establishes that in fact the pilot program has the capacity to diminish support for students' needs when executive and teaching positions are redesignated or abolished.

Section 2 simply outlines for principals the budget calculation methodology detailing staff allocations, maintenance, equity funding, global funding and professional learning.

Section 3 puts forward suggestions on how changes may be made to each of the above areas to ensure so-called "flexibility and innovation".

It is in the area of staff allocations, however, that it becomes apparent that DET's agenda is to get all participating schools to alter their staffing mix. It is stressed in this section that this process must be clear and transparent to all staff and community members. It will be an interesting exercise obtaining copies of the documentation produced by schools to see how altering the staffing mix is justified to these two affected groups.

The proposition in section 3 that details how, when an incumbent is on leave, schools have the discretion to "buy" staff resources other than relief for that position is problematic. This suggestion is qualified by the requirement that this can occur only if relief for that position is not required. However, if relief is not to be provided for positions such as teacher-librarian and careers adviser in schools, students would be disadvantaged.

Section 3 proceeds to detail the various ways in which the school's "staffing mix" can be altered. It is outlined that there must always be a principal position but that all other positions, including executive positions, are able to be considered when altering the mix.

Teachers appointed using school funds will only have their positions for the duration of the pilot, raising questions concerning their career paths at the conclusion of the program. Of great concern, however, is the provision that any position signed off by staffing services is to be a permanent position if replacing a vacant substantive or entitlement position. One such example would be the decision to replace the second deputy principal of a high school with a paraprofessional and a "less expensive" classroom teacher.

Also especially worrying is the suggestion that paraprofessionals can be employed instead of teachers. Even though they are not able to undertake teaching duties or directly supervise students, it does mean that expensive experienced teaching positions can be replaced with less expensive staff plus paraprofessionals. The status of the teaching profession could be severely impacted by the employment of a range of paraprofessionals in pilot schools.

The merging of National Partnership funds with other funds to make staffing "purchases" is also permitted and even though this needs to be discussed with the finance contact for the pilot scheme, it raises the possibility that funds will be diverted from important programs within the school, with huge impacts on student learning. This pooling of funds at the school level could also lead to funds being withdrawn from targeted funding for ESL and low-SES students.

Section 5 of the document consists of a "Price List", or what may be termed a "shopping list", for principals. This table lists all staff categories with the base rate salary for each position.

The devolution of maintenance and cleaning to principals of pilot schools is also outlined in the document. It is interesting that principals were discouraged from undertaking BER (Building the Education Revolution) programs themselves because of occupational health and safety concerns, but under the pilot scheme it is simply stated that they must be aware of OH&S issues.

It is apparent from an analysis of the "Pilot Schools Instructions Document" that the pilot program is merely an attempt by the Government to divest responsibility for maintaining the core provision of staffing, resources and funding in the state public education system under the guise of increased school-based decision-making. Experience in other school systems has shown that the real intent is to reduce the overall proportionate investment in public education.

Mary Fogarty is Research Officer.

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Last Modified: 04 Mar 2010