Students short-changed by teacher drought

<h4>New Zealand Principals’ Federation &lpar;NZPF&rpar; president Whetu Cormick says official views on availability of teachers and relief teachers and the reality facing principals in schools do not add up and children’s learning will suffer as a consequence&period;<&sol;h4>&NewLine;<p>&&num;8220&semi;Auckland is an obvious case&comma;&&num;8221&semi; said Mr Cormick&period; &&num;8220&semi;Principals are telling me that the pool of relievers has already reduced as more relievers have been asked to take on fixed-term or full year positions to try to meet the teacher shortage&period; But many relievers are retired teachers and do not want to take on long-term work&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&&num;8220&semi;My concern is that when children are exposed to multiple relievers in a year or when schools are forced to double up classes to cope&comma; learning is negatively affected&period; Sound learning and teaching is based on the development of strong&comma; healthy&comma; trusting relationships between the student and the teacher&period; That can’t happen when the teacher keeps changing or there are too many children in a single class&period;&&num;8221&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Auckland is not the only region scrambling to find teachers&period; &&num;8220&semi;I am hearing from principals in cities like Queenstown&comma; Tauranga and Wellington and other pockets across the country where there are teacher and reliever shortages too&comma;&&num;8221&semi; said Mr Cormick&period; <&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&&num;8220&semi;The only way to address this problem is to incentivise teachers into those difficult to staff areas because the main issues are affordable accommodation and cost of living including travel&period; Beginning teachers are not attracted to Auckland and others are leaving all for the same reasons&period;&&num;8221&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;