The Teachers Are Blowing Their Whistles!

Tonight I phoned a male teacher who had contacted me through the website.

Once again I found myself speaking with an intelligent, rational male teacher who had been driven out of work.

• Why are intelligent, rational male teachers being driven out of work in Queensland schools?

In about 2004 I was shown some unpublished research that suggested that male secondary teachers felt safest at work.

Female secondary teachers felt less safe than male secondary teachers, but still felt pretty safe.

Male primary teachers felt reasonably safe.

But female primary teachers felt very much at risk of workplace abuse.

These findings seemed to be logical at the time.

But nowadays I am often contacted by male secondary teachers, particulary men teaching maths, science or computing - areas in which there is supposed to be a shortage of teachers.

These male teachers describe to me a long chain of events in which they say that they tried to do the "right thing" - what seemed to them to be the logical and rational thing - and yet they find that have been driven into ill health and out of work.

• I have to conclude that male and female teachers who think in a very logical, rational manner - teachers who have the intelligence to understand the Departmental policies and who follow the Departmental policies correctly - are particularly vulnerable to workplace abuse.

Other groups that I feel may be at particular risk of workplace abuse are -

•  Male ( and to a lesser extent, female ) teachers who were born and educated overseas - in England, America or New Zealand.

Because they have so little experience of corruption.

And because they take the Education Department inservices seriously.

Aussie teachers seem to know that the in-services are purely ceremonial.

Aussie teachers seem to know the real policies.

I remember when I first began teaching in Queensland, I worked with a teacher who was always advising me to "go with the flow" and "don't rock the boat".

Now I realise that these are the real official policies.

•  Male ( and female ) teachers who work with special needs children.

These teachers seem to be very much at risk of false allegations.

Or of being atacked by a child, injured and retired on the grounds of ill health into a life of poverty.

• The male teacher asked me to pass on two important messages to other Queensland classroom teachers -

1. He urges Queensland classroom teachers to take complaints about workplace abuse to the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission ( QIRC ).

He found that the QTU, the CMC and the Ombudsman would not help him.

But he feels that the QIRC is "outside the system".

He feels that the QIRC commissioners have integrity.

2. He advises that teachers who are outside Brisbane can access no-win-no-fee solicitors in Brisbane by phone.

He has done that himself and he found it easy.