Based on how things should be in the Northern Territory – but with what I believe should be a matter considered world wide.

The Department of Education and the Northern Territory Government tend to take service somewhat for granted. I believe that it is essential for teachers and school support staff to be recognised for their service.

Interestingly, those working for the Northern Territory Police, Fire, Emergency Services, and some sections of the Health Department are recognised and appreciated with service awards. That generally doesn’t happen for educators.

I have been told that a service recognition system would be too complex to organise because of the number of teachers and support staff working in NT Government Schools. A simple database maintained by the Education Department’s Human Relations Section could be set up to record details about staff service. When anniversaries come up, a simple prompt could alert the system manager of the service anniversary. The level of recognition offered should align with the number of years of completed service. The system would be maintained if staff were transferred from one school to another because of its central administration.

It should be relatively straightforward for schools to be linked with our department through an application that recognises service. If that recognition is in the school’s system, it could easily transfer to the department’s mainframe.

There is a popular belief that teachers and school staff come and go with unfortunate regularity. Many believe that educators have only short term commitments to their school roles. From the 1970s through to the 1990, many came for no more than two or three years before heading back to southern states. However, this has changed, and people are now coming for much longer periods. Many are making the Territory their permanent home. People deserve recognition and appreciation for their long-term professional commitment.

In the past

A number of years ago the Department of Education began developing a program to recognise years of service. The plan was to acknowledge those who had given ten years of service, with further recognition to be forthcoming at five yearly intervals. However, with staff turnover and the succession of people operating at the highest levels within our Department, this determination seems to have lapsed. Changes of government may have played a part in these plans being shelved.

Some consider that this level of appreciation is not very important. That is just not true.

Service recognition needs to be revisited. It is not good enough for teachers and education support personnel to remain unrecognised and unappreciated after years of devotion to their profession. This is a matter that needs urgent attention.