21st November 2011 9:00
By Blue Tutors
A tuition organisation in Australia has complained that there is too little regulation of tutoring, and too little collaboration between tutoring companies and schools. Reported in the Canberra Times, the Australian Tutoring Association (ATA) claim that the government are in denial about the growth of tutoring in the country, and about the desire from parents and students to integrate all aspects of their education, what they do at school, and the afterschool private tuition.
A spokesperson for ATA said that he had been given permission by a student’s parent to use violence if the student did not complete their homework, and that, upon contacting an authority (it is not made clear which one), giving them the name of a convicted paedophile and asking whether this person would need a ‘Working with Children’ clearance, they were told that it wasn’t necessary, and such a document wasn’t required for someone to become a tutor. The ATA’s contention is that there are a large number of tutors who want much more regulation and monitoring of their industry, but until the government impose tighter controls, this isn’t possible.
It is claimed that many tutors, and the agencies they work for, are contacting schools to ask for more involvement in and discussion of the school education that their students are receiving, but that school teachers, on the whole, ignore the tutors. However, a recent survey of 700 parents showed that over 90% wanted mainstream education to work in partnership with private tutors.