Membership growth in 2017

The QTU has a proud history spanning 128 years of being the democratic voice for the teaching profession in Queensland. Our history is full of the achievements of members who acted collectively in the face of a government or employer who wanted to retard the working conditions and salary of teachers and school leaders.

Some of the struggles and campaigns we engage in are eerily similar to those faced by generations past:

• job security and securing a pathway to permanent employment
• managing workload
• class sizes
• classification reviews for school leadership positions
• school facilities upgrades
• access to decent teacher accommodation
• defining the use of non-contact time (NCT)
• negotiating around classroom observations
• school funding
• curriculum reform
• a fair system of teacher transfers and school leader relocations
• leave entitlements such as sick, parental and special leave
• access to workers’ compensation
• improving respect for the teaching profession in the broader community
• dignity in retirement through superannuation.

This is not an exhaustive list and demonstrates the important work the Union does with and for members every day. We should celebrate the successes our collective action and strength can achieve and never take for granted the achievements of those who went before us. We also need to remember that nothing has ever been achieved as a result of the benevolence of the employer or the government of the day. Members of the QTU have campaigned hard along the way and had to fight to win our working conditions and salary improvements.

The Union provides support and advocacy for the profession at a macro level and on an individual basis in three key areas:

• industrial
• professional
• legal.

To be able to continue our important work in all three areas with and on behalf of members, we all have a responsibility to encourage potential members to join the QTU. Not only will this provide peace of mind, knowing you have the collective strength of 44,000 members across the state, but new members also gain the protection of a legal assistance scheme that is second to none.

The QTU Executive recently endorsed a strategy to grow the Union to 46,000 members by 2020. If we can achieve this target, we will have more members than at any time in our rich history. As our profession continues to grow, it is important that the Union grows with it, to ensure members receive access to effective advocacy, campaigns and services at levels they have come to expect. But more importantly, members need to know that no matter where they are located in the state, no matter how large or small their workplace, no matter what phase of learning they teach, the QTU has their back. 

You can help grow the Union in your workplace in three easy steps.

1. Take the poster from the centre of this Journal and put it up in your staff room.
2. Talk to a potential member about what being a member of the Queensland Teachers’ Union means to you.
3. Encourage that one potential member to join you and your colleagues as a member of your Union (joining is easy by following the links on the Union’s web page www.qtu.asn.au).

Our power in the workplace and the respect we have in the community, from the department and government comes from our size. When we work together we can achieve incredible things.

I am proud to be QTU. I want you to be proud too. Proud of our history, proud of the future we can all build together for our most noble and important of professions, and proud of our great state schools.

Queensland Teachers' Journal, Vol 122 No 2, 10 March 2017, p16