It’s hard but rewarding work

Weekender

By ALPHONSE BARIASI

Of all the hard jobs around, one of the hardest is being a good teacher. – Maggie Gallagher.

SCHOOL is out and teachers are on a well-deserved six-week break away from classrooms and the routine of teaching and running schools.
After the holiday issues such as leave fares, appointments and resumptions could likely start the new school year for this group of civil servants with headaches, depending on how well those matters are handled.
Among the thousands around the country, those in Port Moresby may be seen as the more privileged. It takes just a casual chat to realise that they have some long-standing issues that need attention too like their colleagues outisde of Port Moresby.
Teaching in the capital is for some reasons an attractive proposition to any new graduate or those already in the service. The capital is where everything is within reach to all. The public service machinery has its heart and brain right here and public goods and services are supposedly more accessible than anywhere else in the country.
This is where the best offerings in the commercial world are and access to the outside world through technology is better while overseas travel is cheaper by a plane ride.
In short teaching in Port Moresby should be much less stressful than in rural schools where piped water and electricity are distant dreams, where marking and lesson preparation are done under kerosene or solar lantern light.
However, the realities facing teaching in our public schools in the city are worrying, not only for teachers but also for the children they mentor.

Sobbering thought
It is a sobering to consider that what the next few years or decades turn out to be will be determined by the children who are in school today. Whether they turn out successful, independent and creative thinkers who will face the future with confidence or and blame their upbringing and education for any unfavourable circumstances later depends in some measure on teaching and teachers.
Meet three friends who are teaching in Port Moresby primary schools and share common stories with others who work under quite challenging circumstances.
Agotha has been in the teaching service for 26 years. For the past few years she has taught grade eight in Coronation Primary School located in the Boroko area.
It has not been easy when classrooms were filled to the brim with hardly enough space to move around or spend a few moments with students who needed her more than the rest of the class. One of the obvious reasons for such overcrowding is that basic primary and secondary education has been free under the tuition fee-free policy.
This past school year, she has taught 75 pupils, well over the recommended teacher to student ratio of 1:45.
We believe student numbers are similar or higher in other schools, both in towns and rural parts.
She and her colleagues teach all eight subjects in the grade eight curriculum. The inclusion of Citizenship and Christian Values will be an addition to their workload in 2020.
Many reforms
From the colonial school system to the present there have been a number of reforms to the structure and curriculum of education. There was a time when students completed six years of primary education then moved to secondary school (grades seven to 10). Then grades seven and eight were pushed back to primary level with the creation of an elementary school system with the language of instruction being a local tok ples, Tok Pisin or English.
Then outcomes-based education was introduced and phased out after a few years to be replaced by standards-based education.
We now have what’s called the 1-6-6 system, meaning one year of early childhood education, six years of primary education and a further six years of secondary education.
In all, while education experts and policy makes do their work and sit back to watch how the reforms pan out, what is decided gets thrust into the hands of teachers to implement daily. They are the first to learn the hard way any shortcomings of education reforms.
Extended hours
Unlike most other public servants and workers generally, a teacher’s day does not end when she has sent the class home. She takes the rest of her work home, where she marks papers or prepares for the next day, having fed the kids and tucked them in bed.
And her employer rewards her only for the eight hours in a classroom, forgetting what makes those eight hours either a pleasure or a chore – which reflects on her pupils anyway.
Home for most is a rented settlement dwelling because housing is not a condition of employment.
Here’s the relevant part of the Teaching Service Act dealing with housing:
1. The supply of housing is not a general condition of service for members of the teaching service.
2. Notwithstanding… it is the responsibility of governing bodies and educational agencies to ensure that within the resources available to them there is adequate provision made for the supply and maintenance of teacher housing.
3. Where, in the opinion of an appointing authority, the housing provided by an education authority to a teacher is of a suitable standard, the appointing authority may instruct the teacher to enter into a rental agreement with the education authority to pay rental and other charges applicable to the occupancy of the house (other than land rates).
We understand that in NCD, the few houses in school campuses are Education Department property so are available to both non-teaching staff of the department as well as teachers.
Agotha rents a small dwelling while some of her colleagues live in settlements like Buswara at 9-Mile and at least one comes by PMV from a village in Rigo, paying K14 daily from of her stretched pay packet.
Mathias has been teaching for a decade now. His first school was Bavaroko where for a couple of years he lived in a school office and another colleague used the library.
In the last few years, Mathias was at Taurama Primary School inside the army barracks. The school board has allowed him to live in a corner of the soldier’s mess.
Florian taught 56 grade eight students at the Pari Primary School this year. He was also expected to find his own accommodation.

Rural teachers provided housing
Where housing is concerned, teachers in rural districts are clearly better off compared to their peers in NCD and other towns because school boards are expected to provide accommodation to attract and or retain teachers.
So what keeps these overworked teachers coming back to their classrooms year after year despite the poor employment conditions?
“It’s a noble job and we love it,” Florian offers.
For Agotha seeing her students succeed later is a measure of her own success.
“We keenly follow their progress and when they eventually become successful later in life that gives us the greatest satisfaction. Nothing can compare to that.”
Mathias says he does not see himself leaving the job for anything else in the immediate future. He only looks forward to the day when job conditions are a lot better than they are.
In some countries, teachers are among the highest paid in public servants.
PNG may not be there among those countries in the near future.
However, we can and must endeavour to improve conditions so dedicated people like Agotha, Florian and Mathias are reassured that they are valued as much as they love their job.