Deputy Opposition leader Tanya Plibersek announced the plan today (Mon 18) saying a career in teaching should be a first choice for high achievers rather than a fall-back option.
Ms Plibersek says the tax-free bursaries of $10,000 a year will be paid to recipients for the duration of a teaching degree, up to a maximum of four years, if Labor wins this year's national election.
Year 12 students with exceptional marks and people with outstanding achievements at university or in the workforce will compete for up to 1000 of the cash bonuses each year.
Ms Plibersek has told Channel 9, Labor wants to raise the status of the profession.
think it's part of what we need to do to raise the status of teaching to make sure people are competing to get into teaching degrees the same way the compete to get into medicine or law. We want our best and brightest to become teachers. We want to raise the status of the profession and this is one important way of doing it. We want people who have been the due of their high school or a university medalist or professionally successful in another career to think about going into teaching to pass on their knowledge and their skills to another generation.
The cash bonuses will be available for undergraduate and postgraduate teaching qualifications, with the plan expected to cost about $45 million-dollars over five years.
Students will have to maintain a high level of academic achievement throughout their degree to continue to be eligible for the cash bonus.
After graduating, recipients will be expected to work in public schools for a set period of time.
Ms Plibersek explains.
They have to stay in teaching for as long as they have received the bursary so if they get a bursary for one year, they have to commit to being a teacher for one year. If they get it for four years they have to stay in teaching for four years.
In January Labor said it will introduce minimum entry scores for teaching degrees if universities continue to accept poor students.
The move came after data released last year showed Australian universities were accepting students with low results.
The university sector, however, says low scores don't tell a student's full story and only represent a tiny number of teaching admissions.
Associate Professor Philip Roberts is an expert in rural and remote education at the University of Canberra.
He says end of school results are just one piece in the puzzle when it comes to attracting the best people for the job.
It's really important that we do attract high quality end of school leavers into the profession because that will really start changing the story around the attractiveness of the career. However there is a bit of an issue in linking end of school with effectiveness as a teacher because the program they enter should achieve that and all states and territories have literacy and numeracy tests that reinforce that. So it should not just be about entry, it's about the quality of the exit as well.
The announcement from Labor comes after the federal government announced if re-elected it would cancel the uni debts of teachers who commit to working for four years in remote indigenous communities.
Professor Roberts welcomes steps from the major parties to make the retention of teachers a priority - especially in regional areas.
Attracting teachers in rural and remote has been a problem for virtually the last century for as long as we have had records. It's really important we try new scheme. We used to attract people through bursaries or guaranteed placements but governments stopped doing that so it's a welcome return.
Professor Roberts says attracting teachers to remote and regional areas also needs to include the provision of housing and other support to increase long-term retention rates.
Melbourne based Indian Australian teacher Monica Raizada says its a good idea to give such bonus but continuous support is required to improve education standards.
