Teacher shortages have emerged as a key policy area of concern in Australia. The Australian Federal Government estimate shows that the demand for Secondary teachers will exceed the supply of new graduate teachers by around 4100 by 2025 (Department of Education, 2022). With teaching shortages at an all-time high, employment-based teacher education programs have become increasingly common, especially to address chronic teacher shortages in schools considered ‘hard to staff’. These employment-based programs are attractive to government and teacher education providers because of the opportunities they provide for universities to partner closely with schools with the promise of ‘immediate’ employment to graduates. Yet, the impatience (Biesta, 2019) and fast policies (Hardy, Jakhelln & Smit, 2021) that emerge in times of crisis also put pressure on university-based teacher education providers, all competing for preservice teachers in a climate of declining enrolments and persistent teacher shortages. The pressure to prioritise employment-based teacher education also creates tensions for their professed equity and social justice imperative. In this presentation, we examine what happens when teacher education shifts focus from preparing teachers as change agents to focusing on employability (Burridge & Buchanan, 2022). We address the implications of these shifting priorities for the less visible work of critical educational practice and unpack how embedding ‘employment’ in Initial Teacher Education presents opportunities and risks to the equity and social justice imperative.

Biesta, G. J. J. (2019). What kind of society does the school need? Redefining the democratic work of education in impatient times. Studies in Philosophy and Education, 38(6), 657–668. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11217-019-09675-y Burridge, N. & Buchanan, J. (2022). Teachers as Change-makers in an age of uncertainty. In Heggart, K., & Kolber, Steven. (2022). Empowering Teachers and Democratising Schooling : Perspectives from Australia. Springer. Department of Education (2022). Issues paper: Teacher Workforce shortages. Canberra: Commonwealth. Australian Government. Hardy, I., Jakhelln, R., & Smit, B. (2021). The policies and politics of teachers' initial learning: the complexity of national initial teacher education policies. Teaching Education (Columbia, S.C.), 32(3), 286–308. https://doi.org/10.1080/10476210.2020.1729115