1,602 graduate teachers had been employed by Education Queensland by March 2009.
481 of these graduates had been given permanent full-time or part-time work.
1,121 were employed on contracts.
13 per cent of Queensland teachers who were employed on contracts in 2008 were permanently appointed for the start of 2009.
2751 of last year's education graduates applied for a position with the Queensland Department of Education this year - 2010.
By 27 January 2010 -
267 - about ten per cent - of the graduates have been given a permanent job.
520 - about twenty per cent - of the graduates were given a temporary job or a contract.
So, if you are studying teaching in 2010, you have a seventy per cent chance of being unemployed at the end of your course.
Queensland College of Teachers director John Ryan said that Queensland education graduates and schools would both benefit if there was "greater alignment of university places in education with the supply and demand of Queensland schools".
Contract teachers are only entitled to four weeks paid leave each year.
But there are 12 weeks of school holidays each year.
So employing teachers on contracts allows the Queensland Govenment to avoid paying thousands of teachers holiday pay over the Christmas period.
Some contract teachers have to find jobs to tide them over financially till their next contract begins.
One contract teacher has been mowing lawns during each Christmas holiday for the past ten years, while he waits to obtain a permanent position.
Many contract teachers are first-year teachers.
They may be unable to secure home or car loans because of their precarious employment status.
There is a surplus of teachers in southeast Queensland.
Many newly-qualified teachers do not want to move away from the south-eastern area of Queensland.
But to get permanent work in Queensland, teachers have to be willing to work for several years in the more remote areas of the state.
So teachers who do not want to "go remote" can find themselves "locked out" of permanent employment.
Do higher education institutions explain this situation clearly to prospective education students?
Education Queensland has stated that "currently Queensland's higher education institutions produce a larger number of primary graduates than Education Queensland requires for permanent, temporary or casual positions".
Is this explained clearly by the higher education institutions when students enrol to study primary education?
Why don't these institutions use this opportunity to raise the OP result required to enter teaching courses?
And older, well-qualified and experienced teachers who move to Queensland from interstate or overseas do not seem to realise they are -
* more expensive to employ,
* more experienced, more confident - and so more of a threat to principals,
* and are more likely to have families and the sort of personal responsibilities that prevent them from being sent out to the remote areas
- so they may make less attractive employees.
Teachers feel leave pinch, Tanya Chilcott, Schools Reporter, p.19, The Courier-Mail, Tuesday, 31 March, 2009
School's out for fulltime Queensland teachers, Carly Hennessy, The Sunday Mail, 20 December, 2009.
No full-time job for 9/10 teaching graduates, Tanya Chilcott, The Courier-Mail, 27 January 2009
