Right to teach/right to learn

The Right to Teach/Right to Learn campaign assists members in being confident in knowing their professional rights and responsibilities and asserting them individually and collectively at the workplace or on a systemic level.

Members will need to be cognisant of their rights in a number of key areas:

Please note: You may need your membership number and password to access some of these documents.

Please note: You may need your membership number and password to access some of these documents.

Please note: You may need your membership number and password to access some of these documents.

Please note: You may need your membership number and password to access some of these documents.

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During the EB6 campaign members from the South Queensland Region developed a ‘Just Say No’ strategy as a professional and industrial response to the Government’s inaction in attempting to resolve the dispute.  This strategy was embraced by members on a state-wide basis and invoked a concept of Assertive Professionalism.

The Right to Teach/Right to Learn campaign supports this concept and assists members in being confident in knowing their professional rights and responsibilities and asserting them individually and collectively at the workplace or on a systemic level.

The concept of ‘Assertive Professionalism’ allows members to regulate their own workload by making individual and collective determinations about how systemic and school based priorities are implemented in their own context without diminishing their important role in the classroom.

Classroom observations

In accordance with the Joint Statement on collegial engagement in classrooms, Schools should determine the nature and frequency of any classroom observations, including feedback opportunities, through consultation with teaching staff.

This consultation process must involve consideration by the Local Consultative Committee. 

The Principal, therefore, cannot simply instruct one teacher to observe another teacher’s class without the whole of the school staff being consulted.

The LCC should consider these questions:

• Who will be doing the observing? 
  • Is it a student teacher, a beginning teacher on probation or a teaching peer who is planning with that classroom teacher?
  • Is it a HOD, HOC, DP or other school leader?
    The process for evaluating teachers on probation is separate.
• How often will these occur?
  • Are the lesson observations going to be regular weekly, monthly, annually or a one-off?
• Are they for everyone, or just some teachers?
  • The statement says it should be accommodated into the normal routine of the school.
• What is the purpose of the observation in the first place?
  • The statements says that is should be positive and collegial, not inspectorial or performance checking.
• Will feedback be done? 
  • The purpose of the observation is to provide feedback to teachers to assist on reflection and improvement in their professional practice. 
  • If the lesson observation is done more in the spirit of a mentor/mentee relationship, where the Principal wants a teacher to observe another teacher who they believe is exemplary, then the LCC needs to agree that this is appropriate in the school. If staff agree, then a formal buddy system could be established at the start of the year. Teachers can volunteer to give demonstration lessons to their peers.

In summary, the QTU believes that where possible, principals, deputy principals, heads of programs should be involved in classroom observations. However, there is nothing preventing these observations being undertaken by your peers, provided a decision to allow this to occur has been taken by the LCC and has the consensus of all teaching staff. 

If you have any further queries, please don’t hesitate to contact the QTU.