Understanding the quality and staff-capacity calculator.
A plain-language explanation of what the calculator measures, where its evidence comes from, how each result is produced and what the figures should, and should not, be used to claim.
What the calculator is designed to show.
The calculator estimates how much teacher capacity could potentially be redirected when repeated production work is reduced through stronger curriculum architecture, reusable workflows and customised digital tools.
It is not simply a “time-saving calculator”. The intended change has two parts: teachers spend less time on repetitive production tasks, while the resources they create become more consistent, comprehensive and aligned with school requirements.
Teachers retain agency over curriculum decisions. Core Education Design provides the architecture that makes higher-quality local development more achievable within the time schools realistically have.
Less unnecessary production
Reduce repeated formatting, rebuilding, requirement-checking and fragmented searching.
More valuable professional work
Redirect capacity towards sequencing, instructional refinement, feedback, collaboration and adaptation for learners.
Higher achievable quality
Build agreed pedagogical, compliance, accessibility and branding expectations into normal curriculum-development workflows.
What the Australian research establishes.
The research establishes the scale of the curriculum-planning workload and the value of better-supported curriculum development. It does not directly measure a Core Education Design implementation.
Resource sourcing and creation
Grattan surveyed more than 2,000 Australian teachers and school leaders. It found that teachers with access to comprehensive shared curriculum materials spent approximately three fewer hours each week sourcing and creating resources.
This three-hour difference is used as an evidence-informed reference point for potentially addressable work. It is not entered as a guaranteed CED saving.
Read Ending the Lesson LotteryPlanning and preparation workload
AITSL reports that 40% of full-time classroom teachers spend at least ten hours each week on lesson planning and preparation. A further substantial cohort reports spending five to nine hours.
The calculator uses ten hours as an editable starting point, not as an assumption that applies to every teacher or school.
Review AITSL Teacher Duties dataThe critical distinction: Grattan examined access to comprehensive shared materials. Core Education Design does not provide a standardised curriculum bank. It helps a school build its own architecture, templates, processes and customised tools so teachers can create school-specific resources more efficiently while retaining professional agency.
What each field means.
Every input is editable. Schools should replace the starting figures with locally credible assumptions wherever reliable information is available.
Teachers affected
The number of teachers expected to use the relevant CED-designed systems, processes, templates or tools.
- Use the whole staff only for a genuine whole-school implementation.
- For a faculty pilot, enter only the participating teachers.
Teaching weeks each year
The number of weeks in which affected teachers actively plan, develop or adapt curriculum resources.
- The default is 40 weeks.
- Adjust this if the intended implementation operates over a shorter period.
Current planning hours per teacher each week
The total weekly time currently spent on lesson planning and preparation by each affected teacher.
- The ten-hour default reflects the AITSL finding for 40% of full-time classroom teachers.
- It should be changed if school-level evidence supports a different figure.
Weekly hours spent on resource sourcing and production
The part of planning time spent finding, formatting, building, checking and revising teaching resources.
- The three-hour default is informed by Grattan’s observed difference.
- The calculator never allows this figure to exceed the entered total planning hours.
Estimated share of this work streamlined by CED
The percentage of sourcing and production work the school believes could be reduced through improved architecture, workflows and tools.
- The 50% default is an illustrative scenario, not a measured CED benchmark.
- Use a conservative figure when local implementation evidence is unavailable.
- Count only work the proposed solution can realistically streamline.
Inclusive hourly staff value
An indicative hourly value for the professional capacity represented by the modelled hours.
- It may include salary and employment on-costs if the school chooses.
- It is used to express the scale of capacity, not an available budget saving.
Hours in an equivalent working day
The number of hours used to translate redirected capacity into an easily understood equivalent number of working days.
- The default is 7.6 hours.
- This conversion does not imply teachers work only these hours each day.
How the results are calculated.
The model uses straightforward multiplication. No external school data is collected or added to the calculation.
Annual planning hours
teachers × teaching weeks × weekly planning hours
Addressable hours
teachers × teaching weeks × resource sourcing and production hours
Potential hours redirected
addressable hours × estimated share streamlined
Equivalent working days
potential hours redirected ÷ hours in an equivalent working day
Share of planning time
potential hours redirected ÷ annual planning hours × 100
Staff-capacity value
potential hours redirected × inclusive hourly staff value
Protective rule: if resource sourcing and production hours are entered above total planning hours, the calculator uses the lower total-planning figure. This prevents addressable work from being counted beyond the planning time entered.
How to read each result.
Annual planning hours modelled
The total planning and preparation time represented by all teachers in the scenario.
This establishes the size of the overall planning workload.Addressable resource-development hours
The portion of total planning time attributed to sourcing and producing resources.
It does not assume that all planning activity can or should be streamlined.Potential annual hours redirected
The addressable hours multiplied by the school’s estimated CED streamlining effect.
These hours remain professional capacity and can be redirected to higher-value work.Equivalent working days redirected
A translation of the potential hours into an equivalent number of working days.
This makes the scale easier to understand; it is not a staffing-reduction calculation.Share of total planning time
The potential hours redirected as a percentage of all planning time in the scenario.
This helps test whether the local assumption appears proportionate or implausibly high.Equivalent staff-capacity value
The potential hours multiplied by the entered inclusive hourly staff value.
This expresses the value of capacity already being consumed. It is not cash returned to the school.Worked example using the calculator defaults
This example demonstrates the arithmetic. It is not a forecast for every school.
The intended gain is better curriculum, not merely faster production.
Current planning time is often a ceiling on attainable quality. Teachers use the time available, but repeated setup and production work compete with the deeper design work required for comprehensive resources.
Limited time forces compromise
Teachers may spend substantial time planning and still be unable to build every desired quality feature into each resource.
- Repeated formatting and page construction
- Manual interpretation of recurring requirements
- Inconsistent structures between faculties or courses
- Dependence on overtime and staff goodwill
Architecture supports quality at the point of creation
Reusable structures and customised tools help teachers create resources that more consistently reflect agreed priorities.
- Explicit teaching and instructional sequencing
- High potential and gifted education
- Mastery learning and assessment design
- Accessibility, consistency and school branding
What the result does, and does not, mean.
The result can be used to
- Illustrate the possible scale of a curriculum-production constraint.
- Compare conservative local implementation scenarios.
- Support discussion about where redirected capacity would create value.
- Identify assumptions that should be tested during a pilot.
- Frame curriculum quality and workload as connected system-design issues.
The result should not be presented as
- A guaranteed outcome of engaging Core Education Design.
- Salary expenditure that can automatically be removed.
- A direct financial return, profit or cash saving.
- Evidence that Grattan or AITSL evaluated CED.
- Proof that every CED-enabled resource equals a fixed 24:1 or 38:1 development process.
Three steps to a credible scenario.
Define the actual scope
Enter only the teachers and weeks that the proposed implementation will genuinely affect.
Use local evidence
Where possible, draw on staff surveys, time sampling, faculty audits or a measured pilot rather than relying only on defaults.
Test conservatively
Use a defensible streamlining percentage, record why it was chosen and compare more than one scenario before drawing conclusions.
Return to the calculator and test your school’s assumptions.
The most useful result is not the largest number. It is a transparent, locally credible scenario that helps leaders evaluate both the capacity currently consumed and the curriculum quality stronger architecture could make achievable.