Women teachers in South Australia (gaining equal pay in 1966) reunite with union as SAIT 1951; AEU 1997

The offices on Greenhill Road, Adelaide, of the South Australian branch of the Australian Education Union (AEU) that was the successor of the South Australian Institute of Teachers from 1997.

One hundred years of permanent teachers' unionism in South Australia was marked in 1997 when the South Australian Institute of Teachers became the South Australian branch of the Australian Education Union (AEU).

The South Australian Institute of Teachers, was formed in 1951 from the reuniting of the South Australian Public Teachers Union, formed in 1896, with the Women Teachers Guild. The Women Teachers Guild had broken away from the male-dominated union in 1937 over women being blocked from having representatives on the union council and salaries committee and not being satisfactorily supported in their push for equal pay with men.

These separate organisations remained apart until 1950 when teachers voted to form a single representative body called the South Australian Institute of Teachers (SAIT). SAIT covered all teachers and school assistants in the South Australia’s primary schools, preschools and secondary schools, as well as teachers in further education and non-government schools.

South Australian women teachers didn’t achieve their log-running goal of equal pay until 1966 when it was granted by the industrial courts and brought in by 1971. Ruth Gibson was a key play in achieving that goal. Gibson, the first secretary of the Women Teachers Guild in 1937, had risen within the South Australian education department to became an inspector of secondary schools in 1953, the only woman among four men at this level. At this time, she was also second president of the Australian National Council of Women leading to an international role. After retiring from the education department in 1961, Gibson was appointed to the South Australian equal pay commission, reporting to premier Thomas Playford in 1964 with an appendix arguing the “Case for equal pay for men and women teachers in South Australia”.

In the early 1980s, the South Australian Institure of Teachers rejoined the federal Australian Teachers Union (after a short hiatus in 1979 over internal divisions) and joined the South Australian United Trades and Labour Council.  The Australian Teachers Union was started in 1984, and  union mergers with the Australian Capital Territory  Teachers' Federation, Northern Territory Teachers' Federation,  South Australian Institute of Teachers and the Australian Teachers' Federation, changed its name to the Australian Education Union in 1993.

The South Australian Institute of Teachers became the South Australian branch of the Australian Education Union in 1997.