RFF in primary school libraries

updated 24 October 2002

Teacher-librarians should not be deployed as RFF (Release from face-to-face) teachers.

Information literacy, syllabus demands, depth of inquiry, and management of the school's resources are a high priority. Teachers and students need open, flexible access to school libraries.

See the full RFF position paper | See the Summary

Primary schools need the staffing restored, that was cut in 1989, to provide the second hour per week release for teachers.

This should be in addition to the part-time allocation, which schools deserve and need, allowing flexible staffing arrangements in schools to meet local needs.

Pending a decision and commitment from the Education Minister to a budget increase, the memo issued to schools needs to be revised:-

In the interim, while waiting for the RFF positions to be restored, a directive needs to be issued stating that the part-time teacher should be used to provide the second hour of RFF, not the teacher-librarian. An effective library is a higher priority for all schools than a discretionary staffing allowance.

An improvement to the current situation would be minor adjustments to the part-time allocation, so that it covers the full hour.

A further improvement to support the primary release entitlement would be a slight increase to the RFF and PT allocation, so that permanent and temporary RFF teachers have their own release time. i.e. 0.084 per 1.0

If a decision cannot be made to rectify this situation, and some schools continue to deploy their teacher-librarian for RFF, they could be encouraged to acknowledge the multi-faceted role and function of the library, and offer these programs for 30 of the 40 weeks (for example). The library could have non-teaching weeks for the first two weeks of the year for set up, the last three weeks of the year for stocktake, etc. Clearer guidelines about admin time are also needed. This would stop some of the exploitation and abuse of the position.

Issue	Teacher-librarians should not be deployed as RFF (Release from face-to-face) teachers. Information literacy, syllabus demands, depth of inquiry, and management of the school's resources are a high priority. Teachers and students need open, flexible access to school libraries.

Background	See the full RFF position paper \| See the Summary

Solution	Primary schools need the staffing restored, that was cut in 1989, to provide the second hour per week release for teachers. This should be in addition to the part-time allocation, which schools deserve and need, allowing flexible staffing arrangements in schools to meet local needs.

	Pending a decision and commitment from the Education Minister to a budget increase, the memo issued to schools needs to be revised:-

1	In the interim, while waiting for the RFF positions to be restored, a directive needs to be issued stating that the part-time teacher should be used to provide the second hour of RFF, not the teacher-librarian. An effective library is a higher priority for all schools than a discretionary staffing allowance.

2	An improvement to the current situation would be minor adjustments to the part-time allocation, so that it covers the full hour.

3	A further improvement to support the primary release entitlement would be a slight increase to the RFF and PT allocation, so that permanent and temporary RFF teachers have their own release time. i.e. 0.084 per 1.0

4	If a decision cannot be made to rectify this situation, and some schools continue to deploy their teacher-librarian for RFF, they could be encouraged to acknowledge the multi-faceted role and function of the library, and offer these programs for 30 of the 40 weeks (for example). The library could have non-teaching weeks for the first two weeks of the year for set up, the last three weeks of the year for stocktake, etc. Clearer guidelines about admin time are also needed. This would stop some of the exploitation and abuse of the position.

5	As soon as the budget cut can be rectified, the RFF staffing needs to be restored.