An integrated school sports program does not automatically mean you can be required to coach, supervise sport, or have your teaching load increased.
Members working in schools with integrated sport arrangements should be familiar with their entitlements under the School Award, particularly those relating to maximum teaching time, sport supervision, and workload. Understanding your rights helps ensure integrated sport programs are implemented fairly and in accordance with Award provisions.
A common misconception is that sport supervision and teaching time can simply be combined into a single allocation of time and distributed through a timetable. However, Clause 16 of the Crown Employees (Teachers in Schools and Related Employees) Salaries and Conditions Award suggests otherwise.
In the Award:
- teaching time and sport supervision are treated as distinct components of a teacher’s workload
- maximum teaching loads are defined
- specific arrangements relating to sport supervision are outlined.
Importantly, Clause 16.6 provides that a teacher may be allocated additional teaching time in lieu of sport supervision “with the agreement of each teacher”.
If your teaching time and your sport supervision were intended to be the same thing, then there would be no need for a provision within the teacher’s agreement that allows one to be substituted for the other. Integrated sport is ultimately a timetabling model — it does not remove the Award provisions relating to teaching loads or sport supervision.
Federation’s view is that the phrase “with the agreement of each teacher” is very important in ensuring that these arrangements remain contemporary and are genuinely voluntary. Your agreement should not rest on a decision that was made years earlier, or on historical timetabling practices that have simply continued from one year to the next.
In NSW public schools, when planning, staffing and timetabling arrangements begin for the following year, you should have an opportunity to indicate whether you wish to participate in sport supervision or agree to additional teaching time in lieu of sport supervision. This approach is consistent with both the wording and intent of Clause 16.6 and it ensures that individual teacher choice remains central to the operation of the provision.
Advice provided by Federation Organiser Guy McDermott
References:
Crown Employees (Teachers in Schools and Related Employees) Salaries and Conditions Award