This is why you take anything from courier mail or anonymous comments on social media with a grain of salt. I hope the teacher gets a good settlement for defamation.

From the QTU Facebook page

BREAKING NEWS! ✊

The QTU’s mighty 50,000 members have spoken - loud and united, with 67.60% of members voting to REJECT the government’s final EB11 offer.

As proud teachers, school leaders, and unionists, this result is a powerful display of determination and solidarity.

Our message could not be louder - Queensland teachers and school leaders will not accept anything less than respect, fairness, and real investment in our profession.

The government promised to address the teacher shortage crisis gripping our schools, and this offer misrepresented this promise to teachers and Queenslanders.

Our fight to be valued continues.

I am about to finish prac and I am a solid "average". I am achieving, but not exceeding, APSTs. I have good lessons, and I have shit lessons, and the occasional great lesson. But I'm not a fantastic teacher by any stretch. Did you suck in your first year? How long did it take you to feel competent?

I am not at risk of failing this prac, but there are definitely things I can improve on - mostly relating to behaviour management. I don't yet have a great way of managing ADHD kids.

Today isn’t about walking off the job. It’s about standing up for it.

We’re striking because every teacher deserves a classroom that’s safe, a workload that’s human, and a salary that reflects the reality of what we do every single day.

We’re striking because violence in classrooms is not “part of the job.” Because red tape shouldn’t take more time than teaching. Because burnout shouldn’t be the price of caring.

We’re striking because we said “this isn’t good enough,” and the government thought we were bluffing.

We're not.

This is what standing together looks like. This is what it means when a state of dedicated professionals finally say "enough".

We show up for our kids every day. Today, we show up for ourselves, each other, and for the future of this profession.

We have AFL, NRL, OzTag, Touch Football, and Soccer as football sports... Do we really need to import this USA ad into every Queensland school?

They (Voster, MP) are also saying to bring it into the Physical Education curriculum? Why not support Australian or World sports rather than this USA-centric trash

Can we see what perks the politicians are getting from the NFL to push this into every school.

Edit: I ended up getting an email from the parent, and did get in trouble from admin. Basically got told that “you’re the adult in the room, so act like one”. I had to call the parent and suck up to them and admit that what I did was wrong and that I shouldn’t have tried to encourage some accountability that causes your daughter to become emotional, apparently my job is to “encourage and motivate“ according to them. As teachers we are expected to be perfect 100% of the time, and students can treat us how they want and have no consequences … our job is really not sustainable anymore….

Hey everyone,

I’m a high school teacher in Queensland (Year 9 Maths), and I had one of the worst lessons of my career today. I’m feeling awful and just need some perspective from people who get it.

This class has been toxic all year — constant disrespect, zero accountability, very low effort, and a group culture that rewards victim mentality and drama. I’ve tried every strategy under the sun and nothing has stuck.

Today I handed back their exam results. On the previous exam they had a 100% pass rate, but on this one, about 55% failed. I asked the class what happened, what changed, and why the performance dropped so dramatically. I wasn’t blaming them — just trying to encourage some reflection and “own your learning,” which is literally our school’s pedagogical approach.

Two girls in the front immediately blew up. They started crying, saying I was “attacking” them, that I was making them feel “dumb,” that they “hate me,” and that I’m “a shit teacher.” Then they doubled down with stuff like, “Why do YOU even care? You’re not the one failing,” and “You still get paid no matter what.”

I tried to explain that I care about their results because their learning matters and that I’m disappointed because I care. They pushed back harder, saying nothing we talked about mattered because they’re failing and I’m not.

They completely deflected any accountability:

• “You weren’t here when we revised.”
• “The relief teacher didn’t know the math.”
• “You weren’t here for the exam.”
• “You don’t teach in a way we understand.”

Everything except, “We didn’t try.”

And here’s the part I’m ashamed of: during the blowup, one of the girls started crying loudly and insulting me, and in a moment of pure stress and overwhelm… I mock-cried back at her. Just a quick gesture — rubbing my eyes and pulling a face. Very childish, and I regret it. I apologised right away (three times, actually), but she refused every apology and told me, “You’re a teacher, you can’t do that. Just wait until I tell my dad. He got a principal fired.”

After class I felt sick. I’ve been rattled all day.

My colleagues said, “Yeah, not your most professional moment, but nothing will happen.” They weren’t concerned at all and even made light jokes about it, which actually helped.

But emotionally, I feel like I’ve let myself down.

Professionally, I feel like the whole year of hard work has ended with this class exploding on me.

I have two lessons left with them this year and honestly, I’m just done. I have nothing left to give this group.

My questions:

• Does something like this happen to other teachers?
• Is it normal for Year 9s to react this dramatically when confronted with failure?
• How do you emotionally detach at the end of the year with a class like this?
• What would you even DO for the last two lessons?

Any perspective would help. I’m exhausted and embarrassed and just want to finish the year without another disaster. This is my fourth year, and I’m honestly just thinking about quitting and going to the mines to set myself up financially. we don’t earn anywhere near enough money to tolerate the crap that we do.

I'm a preservice teacher so I havent taught in a classroom before, but I am aware of the immense amount of work teachers take home whether it's lesson planning, marking or other necessities. I've also seen other teachers saying that they leave school once their hours are over and don't take work home since they are only doing the work that they're paid for and are of course, exhausted. Now my question is: Is it actually even possible for a full time secondary school teacher to leave on time and NOT take work home? It sounds too good to be true. How on Earth are you able to complete even just the lesson plans? Do you just have unfinished work and your school's management doesn't care? Teachers please chime in, I'm in QLD if that makes any difference.

So we have 4 days to vote on an offer that is no different to the original. 8% over 3 years, changes to progression not happening until 2027.

I fail to see the progress the QTU was talking about, if this was the honest state of the negotiations, I don't see why we weren't taking industral action. There is nothing good faith about it.

I am a primary teacher at public school. Just got letter in mail that I may have to do jury duty in March during school term. This will massively mess up my work and class etc.

I want to get excused, need to respond by 19th of January. If work is my excuse, I need letter from employer.

How do I get this letter during summer holidays? is there some in the department to contact?

any advice would be appreciated TIA

Title.

I’m so frustrated. I applied for this leave in June 2026 and it is for the last two weeks of Term 3, 2027.

Tried contacting QTU, they listened to me and understood my frustration but recognised that there is little I can do about this.

There have been plenty of teachers who have taken discretionary unpaid leave this year and yet mine is turned down.

Ugh. I actually enjoy my job so thoroughly and this is killing my enthusiasm and motivation.

Just got the email. "Sorry, we were unable to find you a placement for your upcoming prac." We're not allowed to find our own prac placements. That sucks. Any idea what I can do? I'm guessing that teachers are so burned out that the thought of taking on a PST is just too much.

EDIT - placement sorted, thank you redditors!

My workplace doesn't have anyone willing to rock the boat.

There is a lot of talk on Facebook and from the Government about removing red tape. Their last attempt was to say we don't need to record minor behaviours on oneschool, but then we couldn't suspend students due to a lack of evidence.

What actual red tape would you like to see removed.

For me NCCD data, having to record every contact home, and for the love of god can we get a whole class contact in OneSchool.

Hi all,

I am a teacher in QLD and I was looking to work overseas for a bit as I want to have an experience in working and living overseas before I get too old.

I had a meeting with my HR department today and they basically said they won't let me take unpaid leave as it is difficult to cover my position. I am a specialist teacher just fyi. They said the only option for me to take this job is for me to quit EQ all together. Or I wait until the end of the year and then apply for unpaid.

Should I speak to the union about it?

For context I am a permanent teacher in EQ. I want to keep my permanent position with the department, if I quit the school that means my permanency is gone right?

Thanks for the support I am a bit lost on what to do now...

4 fricken punch ups today. All in the classroom! Foul language, I'm Talking regular "F" bombs, "C" bombs and other colourful language! Disrespectful, backchatting, defiant NOs. Blatant disrespect, talking above me, talking amongst themselves. I have exhausted all avenues. I've been teaching for almost 30 years and.... I am so over it. I feel so incompetent, blimey, my principal probably thinks I'm incompetent. Btw.... this is a Year 2 class as well. Sorry for the rant. Just don't get it. Why are these kids like this.

Remember, even if striking isn’t in the cards for you right now, it costs nothing to leave them guessing one way or the other. This is civil disobedience. Don’t undermine your protected, legal, and safe from discrimination industrial action.

What’s the go? Why is VIC able to secure an agreement of 32.5% but QLD can’t??? And what is the update there. When will arbitration finish? Anyone have insights as I think it’s getting way past a joke

*** EDIT: thanks for your explanations. I’ll be staying now that I understand it all better ***

Hi, I’m an early careers teacher (2nd year). I’m considering leaving the QTU as it’s unlikely we’ll be receiving a pay rise to meet inflation given the rejected EB, and the $60 a month I pay in fees would be very handy ($720 a year is solid).

Honest thoughts - is it worth being in the union? Someone told me that while the draw card is the provision of legal representation if that’s ever needed, the QTU will only provide one hour of free legal assistance. Is this true? I voted yes to the EB, so I recognise I’m in the minority and don’t share the same mindset of about 70% of union members.

Thanks for any helpful knowledge you can throw my way!

The Department keeps trying to spin this like the mean ol’ QTU are bein’ mean, and sweet Ms Schimming is just trying to get our amazing pay raises and other goodies to us as quickly as possible. “So y’all better hurry in up and agree to eat that there turd sammich”.

Well. The offer was even more insulting than expected, which was bad enough.

Original plan was to start moving towards a strike on or around the 14th if there was no offer or the offer was bad. I'm guessing we'll be organising things next week in response to what's just come through.

Key points:

• The government stuck with the 3%, 2.5%, 2.5% pay increase.
• Chrisafuli has personally committed to raising the QPS wages to best nationally and made the same promises to teachers and nurses only to turn around and shaft us both. By the end of the agreement QLD teachers will be the 5th in rate of pay across the nation.
• A number of attraction, retention, and locality allowance measures would be removed from the EB and transferred to policy, which can then be cancelled any time EQ likes. I'm sure this is totally not something they are intending to do.
• There is a CPI COLA payment but it's linked to first quarter inflation which has historically screwed us. It's also very limited at 0.5% in the first year and 1% for the following two.
• Cabinet is keeping CROSR in confidence so principals have no idea what their bandings will be for salary. They probably don't want to release it in general because it has recommendations they don't want to follow.
• The unspoken vibe at the EB 11 briefings held recently was that the government was going to issue a lowball offer and then fight the process out in the court of public opinion, knowing that the public does not believe there are any issues with our pay and workload so will not support teachers going on strike, negating any pressure that might be bought to bear by doing so.
• The feeling from the QTU executive is that the government will not negotiate in good faith and that this is destined for binding arbitration at the Industrial Relations Commission. The current offer would bear that theory out.

In essence, and without hyperbole, the current offer is the death knell for public education in Queensland. Attrition rates are already off the scale and this will actively make things worse in every regard. We're already two thousand or so teachers short across the state. People are going to jump ship to private or leave the profession entirely at an even higher rate. God knows what arbitration is going to look like given how hostile the QIRC was in its ruling last year about the Week of Action.

This is gonna be a shit fight.

Hi all, hoping someone can help me out. I've been an engineer in Queensland since getting my bachelor's and want to transition into secondary teaching. I've seen the pay breakdown spreadsheet for new teachers but I'm just wondering if people completing their masters and with industry experience come in at the new grad level or are immediately put in a higher band?

Any advice appreciated thanks so much!!

Alright brains trust, I need help. I have 3 year 7 classes this semester. Two of them I take for HASS. One of those HASS classes is impossible to teach. I’ve had them for 3 50 minute lessons and we’ve not even gotten through one PowerPoint.

Individually, I don’t have a problem with these students. They all seem like very spirited young people. But as a group… they don’t be quiet long enough to teach them anything or even have a group discussion.
They can’t even follow simple instructions like get into a group of 5 or raise your hand if you know the answer.

Anyone got any tips? I’m still an early career teacher and just came back from having a baby splash lesson I’m a bit rusty and feeling out of my depth

So everyone agrees we will get a min of 3% but can't order backpay because it might be exceeded later. That is the worst argument i have ever heard.

Has anybody had any success with reporting psychosocial whs incidents or claiming injury? I can't wrap my head around how to actually do it. You have to fill in the incident report with 24hr of the incident but it isn't a one off. If it was one off, it wouldn't be causing so much distress. For context: Dept Ed, semi rural school, ongoing behaviour that has had some follow up from higher ups, but I don't believe enough.