Professional experience
Why is Professional Experience important?
High quality Professional Experience is critical to ensuring that newly qualified teachers are ready to teach. Professional Experience provides the opportunity for preservice teachers (PSTs) to:
- learn and practise the art of teaching
- reflect on and learn from their experiences
- observe and be mentored by experienced teachers
- experience working in a school community
- commence their professional life as a teacher.
Preservice Teacher / School / UC interrelationships
creating high quality professional experiences
How does it happen?
The Faculty seeks around 1400 places in schools annually, for our Primary and Secondary students from 1st to 4th year. The requirement grows as this valuable placement component is included in more units. Undergraduate students are required to complete 80 or 85 days and graduate entry students complete 60. This undertaking is dependent on the support of schools in the ACT and surrounding areas in providing quality professional experience. Around 120 schools provide places for UC students.
How do we celebrate?
The Faculty acknowledges the efforts of our local schools and the work of our teacher mentors who support our PSTs on their journey into the profession of teaching with annual awards.
| Year | School |
|---|---|
| 2023 | Isabella Plains Early Childhood School |
| Ainslie School | |
| Alfred Deakin High School | |
| Bonython Primary School | |
| Kaleen Primary School | |
| 2022 | Alfred Deakin High School |
| Evelyn Scott School | |
| Wanniassa School 7-10 (Senior Campus | |
| Kingsford Smith School (Secondary) | |
| Giralang Primary School | |
| Ainslie School | |
| 2021 | Kaleen Primary |
| Amaroo school- Senior | |
| Bonython PS | |
| Calwell HS | |
| Caroline Chisholm HS | |
| Gold Creek School- Senior | |
| 2020 | Ainslie School |
| Duffy Primary School | |
| Kaleen Primary School | |
| Giralang Primary School | |
| Evatt Primary School | |
| Amaroo School (Senior) |
Mentor Awards
We celebrate our commitment to our partnership with schools and teachers by providing our PSTs with the opportunity to acknowledge their mentor/s by nominating them for the UC Faculty of Education Mentor Awards - click for more information about and winners of the Mentor Awards.
School Awards
These awards recognise the significant contributions of local schools to the UC professional experience program. The recognised schools have been selected not only for the number of preservice teachers that they have hosted in both regular placements and in school-based clinics, but also for the high-quality support that they have offered to the educators of the future. To determine the recipients, we apply a formula to make these awards equitable and divide the no. of placements hosted by each school by the number of full-time teachers eligible for mentoring within the school.
More information about our Professional Experience program
The Faculty of Education works closely with School Professional Experience Coordinators (SPECs) and Mentor Teachers (MTs) to support them in their important roles. Placement documentation is available on this site, as well as in hardcopy, on request.
More details for SPECs and mentors are available on the pages:
Information for PSTs is available on the page: