The NSW Teachers Federation was ramping up its campaign to fully resource public schools in the Northern Rivers yesterday when Senior Vice President Natasha Watt asked the Prime Minister to provide the funding needed to give all kids a decent shot at life.

The NSW Teachers Federation said the National School Reform Agreement has left NSW public schools grappling with a funding shortfall of approximately 11 per cent, translating to a staggering $1.9 billion this year alone. This equates to over 10,000 permanent school-based teachers.

Regional and rural communities are bearing the majority of the teacher shortfall. According to figures released this month, there were 144 vacancies in schools in the Rural North region (which includes the Northern Rivers) affecting 54 per cent of its 267 schools.

"That's over half the schools in this area that have a teacher shortage," Ms Watt said.

"We're calling for the funding because the funding means salaries for teachers, and it means a way forward for fixing the teacher shortage. We cannot fix the teacher shortage without additional teachers. Teachers need to be well paid, they need to work under the right conditions so they can do their job properly. That's how we recruit teachers and it's how we retain them in the profession as well."

"What we want is Anthony Albanese to pay the money that hasn't been paid to date. So at the moment, the state government have put in 75% of the funds and have budgeted for that and Anthony Albanese's government have not yet budgeted the 25% that would bring us to the 100% of the schooling resource standard that we're after. And so between the two governments, you could say there's a $1.9 billion gap, but the gap really sits right now with the 25% that the federal government have not put in."

Ms Watt said teacher shortages do have an impact on student learning.

(Teachers from Richmond River High School helping reinforce the funding message with Natasha Watt)

"What this means is that when you're working in a school as a teacher, that has a shortage, you might well be taking students from another class. So your class size is big. You might not be getting your release from face-to-face teaching time so you don't get planning time or assessment time that you need to be getting in order to prepare well for the students."

"It basically means that the teachers who are currently in the system are overworked. So they got a big pay rise last year and the state government did that which is step one to ending the teaching shortage. We must have well-paid teachers. That is important, but what we now need to do is to make sure that the system is properly stocked with teachers so that they're not picking up the work of a missing teacher in the school. It also means that the withdrawal of students who need intervention programs, one-to-one teaching time for kids who need that support, is not likely to happen in a school that is short a teacher."

When asked if we have enough trained teachers to fill the shortage if the federal funding does come through, Ms Watt replied, "What we do know is that in all the countries that pay their teachers well, they have well-qualified people coming into the profession."

"It's valued culturally because it's valued monetarily and there is no shortage in those places. So what we want is for Australia to value its teachers, show that through salaries, show it through school's funding, because the school's funding ultimately on many levels means specialised teachers to do specialised support or even just a teacher to stand in front of a classroom."

"The other thing that we are aware of with the federal government is that they have no plan to put capital expenditure into the budgets of New South Wales. That means no plan to look after the infrastructure of public schools and that is relevant here as we stand outside this school that was flood-affected. It does have its plans underway. There is funding for this school to be rebuilt, but there is no money, apart from what the Albanese government currently have in place, which ends this year, of capital expenditure for public schools in New South Wales. There is no money that has been mentioned in the upcoming budget from the Albanese government. This is of great concern."