UNEMPLOYED TEACHERS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22136, 14 December 1933, Page 10

UNEMPLOYED TEACHERS

THE RATIONING SCHEME ADVERSE MOTION DEFEATED. - A (Pee United Pbess Association.) WELLINGTON, December 13. A resolution contending that the scheme inaugurated last year for the rationing, of work among unemployed'teachers was not in the interests of the lower-paid section, and that therefore the Education Department should be urged' to abandon it, . wa« the subject of -a motion which was defeated by eight votes to four at the monthly meeting of the Wellington Education Board to-day. ' • Embodied in the motion, which was moved by Mr' T. W. M’Donald, was a proposal that the following system should be adopted in lieu of the rationing sheme;—(a) That the highest graded unemployed ex-Training College student* be selected to fill all probationary assistantships for the full period of one year; (b) that all other temporary and relieving positions, including additional assistantships,' be, allocated among teachers remaining on the unemployed list ‘in the order of their grading, and be paid according . to the- relieving teachers’ , schedule. The effect of the motion, it was contended, would be to,stabilise school staffs for a full year where probationary as- j sistanta were authorised, instead of there haying to be the three. changes required under the present system. 1 _ The senior inspector, Mr D. Macaskill, said he considered that the rationing system wag working as well as any system might, be expected to work. It wa* hi» opinion that as many teachers should be maintained in employment as possible. The Director of Education had assured him that the department was not saving one penny., ' If permanent work were given to certain teachers the board would be doing a distinct unkindness to the remainder whom it would be unable to employ.