back to article Vulture South wants FORTY of you to go BACK TO SCHOOL

Okay, Australian Reg Readers: we need 40 of you to help out the CSIRO's ICT In Schools program. What is that program, we hear you ask? ICT in Schools is based on the Scientists in Schools and Mathematicians in schools programs that match professionals from both fields with schools that need some help. Both have worked well: …

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  1. Denarius
    Unhappy

    problem is

    given the current Oz manglement culture of putting HR droids, beancounters, so-called project managers aka bullies in charge at obscene wages and a blind belief in giving all contracts to known poor performers at higher cost than inhouse, I now encourage my grandchildren to avoid IT. Long hours, dropping pay, mounting paperwork and joyful bureaucratic obstruction make it too stressful. Aside from that, anything involving ACS rings my alarm bells.

    A final niggle is the observation that some of the best IT staff I have worked with did not have tertiary qualifications while some of the worst did. A few work conversations discussed this issue and came to the general conclusion that a degree indicates very little, despite it being HRs lazy way of assessing applications. A few more years and the children of non-elite Oz will only have the options of pre-Castro Cuba.

    Do not like to rain on your parade, but avoiding optimism is the only sane way to cope with current employment problems of everyone given the last 4+ governments hostility to increasing local employment options.

  2. Diogenes

    I wish somebody would coordinate all these programs.

    I do not wish to sound ungracious, as anything that gets kids choosing IST, SDD, IPT & IDT is a good thing, and therefore I would encourage participation but ...

    ...all the unis have similar outreach schemes, as do the ACS, and now the CSIRO. I understand IBM & Google also run something similar(limited to Sydney region). And that is not counting the "lets get girls into computing/engineering" programs - again all from the above mentioned organisations. It would be nice if I just had to ring/email just one place and they would contact any provider to see if they would have someone to send out.

    Edit - I have just looked at website - wow I tick all the boxes except currently working in IT - whoduthunkit ?

    Diogenes (ICT Teacher)

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I tick all the boxes except...

    having a tertiary qualification. Actual experience be damned.

    Love to sign up, but they don't want me.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      If you can't read a few pages of fairly simple text, maybe it's best you weren't teaching.

      >has a tertiary qualification...or who meets the requirements of the Australian Computer Society as a Member will be considered

      1. Trixr

        Screw the ACS, seriously. Who appointed them the gatekeepers of IT qualifications in this country?

        Bunch of old farts who like the letters "MACS" after their name. And attending useless "seminars".

        And what gets right up my nose is that anyone with some bullsh!t uni qualification can enter the ACS at a higher membership level right off the bat than someone like me with 15 years of real-world experience.

  4. RealFred

    I worked in IT at a school for over 10 years. The first thing you battle is "you're not a teacher so what do you know", followed by "we all need to have unfettered access to everything, bugger security", followed by "little Johnny smashed his laptop and needs a new one now, why don't you have spare ones"

    The one that really got to me was, "its not my job to make sure the kids don't do anything to the computers, projectors or any other pieces of equipment in the classroom", but the most famous one was "it all should just work. I shouldn't have to turn the power on for the projector"

    So no, I don't think I'll be offering my services, thanks very much.

    1. ICTinSchools

      Hi RealFred, I think you may be misunderstanding the ICT in Schools program. It is not trying to get ICT professionals into schools to be ICT support to the network. We all know ICT support gets a raw deal no matter where the workplace, most of the time it is a PEBKAC. ICT in Schools is about working with teachers and students to do things like helping a group of students enter the Young ICT Explorer competition, or first Lego League, or using Arduinos,Raspberry Pi or Galileo, or any of a thousand fun activities that you, the teacher and the students can think of.

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