Education Australia Project #61468

Give 36,000 students access to specialist teachers

by Teach For Australia

Give 36,000 students access to specialist teachers

Project Report | Mar 4, 2025
2025 School Year off to a flying start!

By Chrystal Gilkes | Stakeholder Engagement Coordinator

As always, we’ve hit the ground running! In 2025 and we're incredibly proud and excited to announce we have placed…drumroll please…167 new passionate and dedicated teachers across Australia!

This year’s group of teachers is also incredibly diverse, hailing from 34 different cultural and language backgrounds. Our country is priviledged to be made up a rich tapestry of cultures and peoples and it is so important that our teacher workforce and classrooms reflect this.

We've recently received a host of media coverage about this incredible achievement - made possible through the generosity of wonderful suporters, like YOU! We thank you, with deep sincerity.

Please read on for a snippet from the media release, which, due to the gravity of this win, was picked up by a large number of print and radio media across Australia.

In response to the nationwide teacher shortages, 167 new educators have entered classrooms in disadvantaged areas across the country this month, through our flagship Leadership Development Program.

Of these new teachers, over 40 per cent are teaching science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) subjects, with nearly half placed in regional, remote or rural areas nationwide.

Recent data from the Australian Federal Government’s Tertiary Collection of Student Information (TCSI) reveals a significant decline in domestic STEM enrolments, underscoring the critical need for more qualified STEM teachers.

Ms Melodie Potts Rosevear, the Founder of Teach For Australia, was recently interviewed about this strong start to the year, where she said, "We need STEM educators educating our kids today, so that when they go on to further learning and tertiary education, they then choose to study STEM subjects.”

“This will not only foster future innovation through powerful role models who will inspire our next generation of scientists, agricultural specialists, inventors and changemakers, but it will also help reduce the reliance on out-of-field teaching.

Our Leadership Development Program provides an ‘earn and learn’ pathway into teaching, attracting talented individuals who may not have considered a career in education.

Before switching to teaching, Sumati (not her real name) was a university researcher in science and biochemistry. She is currently in her second year of the program, teaching science

Sumati was inspired to become a teacher after she had to teach her son during COVID and loved the tangible impact she was making. She passionately believes in the transformative power of education, having seen the challenges her mother faced due to limited educational opportunities.

“I come from an Indian background where educationally we were backwards, especially for women,” said Sumati.

“None of my cousins or mother got a chance to learn. I lost my father when I was 1.5 years old, and my mum was not working. I have seen the struggle that she went through because she didn’t have a stable income. She could not raise her voice because she didn’t have an education. I thought it was very important for me to get an education so that I could get my voice back. I have a voice for myself and my family.”

Recognising the significantly lower participation rates of girls in STEM education compared to boys, Sumita is determined to break down gendered barriers for her students.

“My goal is to support women in STEM. When I know that these students have the talent for STEM subjects, I hope to encourage them into higher studies,” continued Sumati.

“When women come to science, more women can come. They can see you as role models so that more women can come forward and contribute to scientific advancements.”

We are so grateful for Sumita and her work in the classroom - being a leader, a role model, and a thoughtful, inspiting teacher!

Finding, recruiting, placing and training these incredible humans is costly. The outcomes speak for themsleves, and are impactful for generations. But in the moment, each year, we require more financial assistance to ensure that we can continue to do this important work - continue to build educational equity in a nation where it should be normal, but isn't.

So once again, we thank you for your support!

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Oct 1, 2024
Celebrating World Teachers' Day!

By Chrystal Gilkes | Stakeholder Engagement Coordinator

As World Teachers' Day is upon us, it's a great time to reflect on the unwavering commitment to educational equity which Teach For Australia techers demonstrate - every single day.

These exceptional humans choose to relocate - sometimes across the breadth of this large nation - to work in disadvantaged schools, connecting with, motivating and educating students. Without the Teach For Australia program, many of these students would simply not have access to a specialist teacher. Instead, the already overworked english teacher would also have to try their best to teach the science curriculum. In other cases, specialist subjects like music or computer science can simply not be taught, meaning those students miss out on the chance to discover their passion and skill in these areas.

Teach For Australia is celebrating 15 years of operation this year, and we're grateful to YOU for enabling the work we do to continue. Without you and your generous support, students in disadvantaged schools would lack access to life changing opportunities.

Meet Sam

It’s said that breakfast is the most important meal of the day – and Teach For Australia (TFA) teacher Sam (not his real name) is making sure every student at his school has theirs.

Sam started teaching Biology, Human Biology and Science through TFA’s Leadership Development Program in 2023 and noticed that many students would arrive at their first class complaining of being hungry.

Sam presented his idea for a breakfast club at a “pitch night” hosted by TFA and was successful in receiving funds to get it up and running.

“The response from the students has been overwhelmingly positive,” Sam said.

“Many students have come up to me during the week sharing comments like ‘I loved my toastie this morning’, ‘I’m really looking forward to breakfast club tomorrow’ and ‘Good thing this is here, I haven’t had breakfast yet’.

“The response from the staff has also been great, with the number of volunteers slowly increasing, with new faces most weeks.”

Sam's Journey

Sam joined TFA’s employment-based pathway last year because he wanted to have an impact on students’ education and lives through teaching in the classroom.

Before joining the program, he gained a bachelor’s degree in Sports Science, Exercise and Health and completed a PhD looking at the effects of nutritional supplements on female athletes’ sporting performance.

He then worked as a member of the student equity team, which engaged with students from low socio-economic schools in Western Australia, about university and education after secondary school.

“Whilst I loved this job, after six years I began feeling I could have a bigger impact on students’ education and lives by being in the classroom as a teacher, which is why I applied for the Teach For Australia program,” he said.

“The program has been a perfect fit for me. It is the right level of challenge that I was looking for in life and has allowed me to follow my aspirations of having a positive impact in the lives of young people.”

Your Impact

It's only through the financial support of our valued corporate partners, and wonderful individuals like you, that Sam's students are now attending class with a full belly, able to concentrate and achieve their potential.

THANK YOU for helping #MakeItHappen for these young students!

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Jun 27, 2024
Continuing the push for educational equity

By Chrystal Gilkes | Stakeholder Engagement Coordinator

As we reach the halfway mark in the Australian school year, it's a good time to reflect and take stock of what 2024 has given us - and the students of remote, regional and rural schools in this vast country.

But first, we acknowledge and appreciate the impact that YOU have made by supporting the journey towards educational equity. Your gift has enabled students to access a specialist teacher...students who had previously been missing out on this. Thank you!

The Problem

Educational inequity is the result of multiple complex factors. Teach For Australia chooses to focus on the people within the system. Evidence shows that teaching is the most significant in-school factor that can positively affect student achievement.

We offer leading development programs for teachers, school leaders, and mentors who can give their students the knowledge, skills and confidence to pursue their potential.

How we're helping

In one regional school in country Victoria, there is a teacher named Michael Jones (for confidentality reasons, this is a psuedonym). He went through the TFA Leadership Development Program a few years ago, and has remained at the school after he completed it. He has been working to bring science to life, starting a lunchtime science club which has been oversubscribed! He has also identified that some students weren't being stretched by the curriculum, and with additional time and energy to offer them more, they were very capable of acheiving more. He's aptly named this group he started as the High Abilities group. Each year he now brings a group of them to Melbourne for a few days, to visit univeristy campuses, corporate offices of large companies, and show them what their future could hold - if they so choose.

His aim is to provide them with choices.

"My main motivation for running things like this is to encourage educational aspiration but also to bridge the gap that exists for regional students getting into tertiary education and dispel the idea that universities are just for 'rich kids in the city'," Mr Jones said.

"If they choose to go to university or not is not my primary concern, but I do want them to make an informed decision about their future...it doesn't matter what they choose to become...the important thing is that they've had the ability to choose what they want from their future."

Without the Teach For Australia program, Michael would still be a lab tech in a mine. But thanks to being able to access this pathway to teaching and leadership, he's making a huge and important impact on students at Cobram Secondary College. We are so proud of him, and so grateful for his motivation, passion and hard work!

Next Steps

This is one beautiful example of the difference one person can make on hundreds of students. Thanks to your ongoing support, we know we can find and train and empower many more people just like Michael, to teach and lead students right across this country. Again, we thank you for being a changemaker and coming on the journey towards educational equity!

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