After refusing the offer of Education Minister for the settlement of their joint agreement, Tauranga teachers yesterday dressed in black during protest.

About 603 members of Western Bay Post Primary Teachers' Association (PPTA) dressed in black to signify the day as black day for teaching. Many of them were questioning the worth Government places on their jobs.

Before rejecting the proposal of Education Minister, members of PPTA had been in consultation with Secondary Teachers' Collective Agreement (STCA) for two months.

Western Bay PPTA Regional Chairman Jason Smythe said, "Prime Minister John Key expected pay increases to outstrip inflation, but the ministry's offer - 1.5 per cent for the first year and 1 per cent the year after - was well below inflation".

According to Mr. Smythe, the offer would not help to attract new teachers and neither will it retain the current ones.

While countering to a secret ballot conducted by the union, secondary school teachers said the offer has clearly showed that the Government neither understood nor valued education.

The offer consists of a proposal according to which teachers are required to extra work when students were not at school instead of marking, planning, professional development and resource preparation they presently do at those times.