Matthew Maiolo

Describe, discuss and explain the legislative, administrative and organisational

requirements associated with the South Australian teaching profession.
Teaching is an intricate profession that has associated legislative, administrative and
organisational requirements that must be met and upheld. Legislative requirements refer to
teachers’ legal obligations as prescribed in certain national and state acts. Administrative
requirements refer to the policies imposed by a state’s education department, in South
Australia, this is the Department for Education. Finally, organisational requirements refer to
the policies and practices that an individual school or education site chooses to implement. In
this essay, these requirements will be explored through three themes. Each theme represents
an important component of the teaching profession that integrates, and is underpinned by,
several legislative, administrative and organisational requirements associated with the South
Australian teaching profession. The three themes that will be explored are ‘teacher
registration’, ‘maintaining student safety’ and ‘promoting the learning of all students’.
To practice as a teacher in South Australia, an education graduate must obtain their teacher
registration from the Teachers Registration Board of South Australia. Teacher registration
authenticates that the education graduate, which refers to someone who has completed an
accredited higher education qualification, such as a Bachelor of Education or a Master of
Teaching, is a qualified teaching professional and enables them to practice as a teacher in
South Australia (Teachers Registration Board of South Australia, n.d.). Teacher registration
is a legislative requirement of the teaching profession, as prescribed in the Teachers
Registration and Standards Act 2004. The purpose of this Act is to enable a governing body,
the Teachers Registration Board of South Australia, to regulate the teaching profession and
ensure that members of the profession are competent educators, demonstrated through
meeting the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers (APST), and proper persons to
have the care of children, as evidenced through the completion of required training
(Responding to Abuse and Neglect – Education and Care) and checks (Working With
Children Check) (Teachers Registration and Standards Act 2004 (SA) s. 2).
Administratively, the Department for Education has the Performance and Development
Policy, which aims to help employees continually improve in their chosen profession
(Department for Education, 2020a). This complements the requirements of teacher
registration, as a teacher at the Graduate career stage has a provisional registration (Lind,
2018). To obtain full registration, a teacher must have successfully completed a year of
teaching and provide evidence that they can meet the APST at the Proficient career stage,
which demonstrates improved practice (Lind, 2018). To assist a new teacher’s transition into
the profession and towards the Proficient career stage, it is an organisational requirement that
new teachers are supported through induction and mentoring from more experienced
colleagues (Gratch, 1998; Lind, 2018). This assistance enables a new teacher to adapt to the
teaching environment and augment the skills that they have acquired during their studies
(Lind, 2018).
Teachers are required to ensure that their students are safe. This is primarily underpinned by
the Children and Young People (Safety) Act 2017, which is legislation that recognises that
children and young people are the future of South Australia and deserve to be safe from harm
and thrive in all aspects of their lives, including education (Children and Young People
(Safety) Act 2017 (SA) s. 2). In particular, this is one of several legislation that governs
students’ school attendance and a teacher’s legal obligation to report suspicion that a child or

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young person is at risk of harm (Children and Young People (Safety) Act 2017 (SA) s. 3-5).
This legislation is supported, most generally, by the Department for Education’s Duty of Care
Policy, which requires teachers “to take reasonable care to protect another from all
reasonably foreseeable risk of harm” (Department for Education, 2020b, p. 5). More
specifically, the Department for Education’s Attendance Policy outlines the responsibilities
of all members of a school community, including teachers, to ensure that children and young
people attend school (Department for Education, 2020c). In order to fulfil the responsibilities
set out in this policy, it is expected that there a number of organisational requirements in
place at a school. The organisational requirements of teachers in relation to student
attendance include creating and implementing relevant and engaging learning experiences to
encourage regular attendance and ensuring to take the roll at the beginning of each lesson and
record non-attendance as necessary, which enables parent communication to occur and non-
attendance to be followed up (Department for Education, 2020c). Moreover, there are certain
educational and learning experiences that have an unavoidable increase in risk to students’
safety, such as school camps and excursions. However, these are important parts of a
students’ schooling experience, with excursions being valuable for students’ cognitive and
emotional development, especially in Science (Michie, 1998). The Department for Education
has the Camps and Excursions Policy and School Transport Policy, which prescribe the
requirements related to school camps and excursions from an administrative perspective. The
former policy lists aspects to be considered when planning a school camp or excursion, such
as risk management and incident reporting, whereas the latter policy summarises the
processes that need to be followed in organising school transport, including bus hire
(Department for Education, 2020d; Department for Education, 2020e). Organisationally, it is
expected that the supervising teachers obtain parental consent for the school camp or
excursion, using the consent form prepared by the Department for Education (Department for
Education, 2020d). Other organisational requirements for school camps and excursions
include completing a risk assessment and emergency procedures, ensuring an adequate
teacher-to-student supervision ratio, having a mobile phone or other communication device as
well as a master list of students and contact numbers, ensuring to bring a first aid kit and
being aware of students’ health information, including medication, allergies, disabilities and
ailments (Holden, 2006).
In addition to maintaining the safety of their students, one of the most crucial roles of a
teacher is to promote the learning of all of their students. This is governed by an extensive
range of legislation, many of which function collectively to ensure that each and every
student receives a high quality education. In fact, the Australian Education Act 2013 and the
Education and Children’s Services Act 2019 prescribe that every child is entitled to a high
quality and equitable education (Australian Education Act 2013 s. 1; Education and
Children’s Services Act 2019 (SA) s. 2). These Acts also hold an expectation that teachers
will have the skills and support they require to deliver high quality teaching to meet the
diverse needs of their students (Australian Education Act 2013 s. 1; Education and
Children’s Services Act 2019 (SA) s. 2). This expectation is reinforced in the Disability
Discrimination Act 1992, which makes it unlawful for a teacher to develop curricula that
excludes a student with a disability from meaningfully participating in their learning
(Disability Discrimination Act 1992 s. 2). In terms of administration, there is the Children
and Students with Disability Policy, which elaborates on a number of aspects, including the
meaning of reasonable adjustments and standards for participation, as well as listing

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organisational practices that can be implemented by a teacher (Department for Education,

2019). These practices include accessing and assessing the needs of a student with a disability
and then using this information to make reasonable adjustments to an approved learning
program, in order to enable the student to meaningfully participate in their learning
(Department for Education, 2019). It is important to note, however, that a teacher does not
need to address this alone. Instead, catering for the needs of a student with a disability should
be a collaborative and ongoing process, involving a number of people who know and have
been involved in the student’s learning, which may include the classroom teacher, the
student’s parents or carers, the school’s learning support team and or specialist teacher and
other relevant service providers (Vera, 2013). More generally, there are also other policies
that assist teachers in supporting the needs of and promoting the learning of all of their
students, such as the Numeracy and Literacy Strategy, which helps to guide students’
numeracy and literacy development throughout their schooling years (Department for
Education, 2013).
In summary, there are several legislative, administrative and organisational requirements that
a teacher in South Australia needs to be aware of and follow. These legislative, administrative
and organisational requirements have been examined in this essay through three themes,
including ‘teacher registration’, ‘maintaining student safety’ and ‘promoting the learning all
of students’. Each theme represented an integral component of the teaching profession.
Adhering to these legislative, administrative and organisational requirements means that a
teacher has realised their professional responsibilities, thus leading to a successful and
rewarding teaching career.
Word count: 1420

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References
Australian Education Act 2013. Retrieved from
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%20PEOPLE%20(SAFETY)%20ACT%202017/CURRENT/2017.25.AUTH.PDF.
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Lind, P. (2018). Regulating and Developing South Australia's Teachers. Bulletin (Law
Society of South Australia), 40(8), 10.

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Michie, M. (1998). Factors Influencing Secondary Science Teachers to Organise and Conduct
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