ABC News (AU)
· collected 2026-09-17 · by Madeleine Rojahn, Peter Lusted, and Adam Shirley
Teachers in Australian Capital Territory (ACT) public schools are planning further industrial action due to unresolved pay and conditions issues amid severe workforce shortages. The ACT branch of the Australian Education Union claims some teachers are managing up to 90 students as classes are "splitting" or being "collapsed," leading to minimal supervision for students during school hours. This situation is exacerbated by a lack of consistent data measuring teacher shortages, though parent surveys indicate weekly occurrences of these issues.
Written by the local model on 2026-09-17,
using this article's own text rather than the other coverage of the
same event (that is the story summary below).
In short:
Teachers are set to stop work again next week after the union says a pay and conditions offer from the government failed to meet their demands.
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offer → set → demands
Inadequate resourcing and workforce shortages have led to cases where one teacher is managing up to 90 kids due to class 'splitting' and 'collapsing', the union says.
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union → lead → splitting
One issue raised is a lack of streamlined reporting on workforce shortages, which the ACT's Education Directorate says it is addressing.
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it → raise → which
The Australian Education Union's ACT branch is predicting teachers and other school staff will stop work again next week after what it expects will be a resounding rejection of the government's latest pay and conditions offer.
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it → predict → offer
Today, there was minimal supervision for ACT public school students between 9am and 11am as union members met to consider the offer.
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members → be → offer
AEU ACT president Angela Burroughs said a formal response to the deal would be provided next week, but a no vote meant teachers and other school staff would most likely stop work again next Thursday morning.
She said members were exhausted by "a prolonged period of inadequate resourcing" in Canberra schools and wanted a guarantee of minimum staffing levels.
"This is a workforce that is ... absolutely burnt out, but is also burned by previous commitments that were never delivered on,"she said.
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that → say → commitments
Teachers managing up to 90 kids, union says
Australia is grappling with a national shortage of teachers.
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Australia → manage → teachers
Ms Burroughs explained the profession had become "less attractive" over time as teachers weighed up potential burnout with pay and conditions.
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teachers → explain → pay
Class 'splitting' and 'collapsing', Ms Burroughs said, was an "inevitable consequence" of teacher shortages.
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Burroughs → say → shortages
Splitting is described as when a teacher is unavailable, and their students are then allocated to multiple available staff.
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students → describe → staff
Collapsing is when the class cannot be split into groups, and so the whole class is placed with one teacher.
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class → split → teacher
"We are seeing one teacher having to teach huge class sizes — 50, 90 in some instances — it has gotten completely out of hand," Ms Burroughs said.
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Burroughs → see → hand
"Some really experienced school leaders are telling me that they've never known it be this bad, and that includes the COVID period."
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that → tell → period
Ms Burroughs said this could lead to the "most disruptive" cases where very different year groups were mismatched.
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groups → say → cases
"It is really hard for the classroom teacher to be able to meet such a diverse range of needs," Ms Burroughs said.
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Burroughs → meet → needs
No data to measure problem
Representative body ACT Parents' Veronica Elliot said her organisation surveyed parents and carers at the beginning of 2026, which reported that splitting and collapsing was happening weekly to fortnightly.
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splitting → measure → 2026
She said she had also heard of students going a year without a specialist maths teacher.
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students → say → teacher
"It does disrupt learning, and we know this is having a big impact on what students are able to achieve, because they just don't have a teacher in front of them," she said.
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she → disrupt → them
"The issue is that we really don't know how big of a problem it is, because the Education Directorate doesn't collect data on their ongoing vacancies, and also on the splitting and collapsing of classes."
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Directorate → know → classes
She said the data was needed to understand the scale of the problem.
"
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data → say → problem
And we then need to have a look at our staffing and work out how many more staff we need in our schools to prevent this from happening,"she said.
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we → need → this
ACT Education Directorate Director-General Jo Wood said the directorate was developing a system to show how schools were being affected.
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schools → say → system
"That automated data system will be the way that we bring visibility to that issue and then we can start to work on some really concrete systems," she said.
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she → bring → systems
Ms Wood noted the effects of a declining casual workforce and increased use of leave in a post-COVID era, saying people were being encouraged to stay home when sick.
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people → note → era
"We're in the flu season at the moment, and we're seeing more people have to access their personal leave," she said.
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she → see → leave
She said the Education Directorate had committed to working with the union and schools to better handle the issue.
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Directorate → say → issue
"So we can identify where schools are being impacted by this type of issue, and lean in and support and help them with different solutions earlier," she said.
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she → identify → solutions
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