That's the message shared by hundreds of New England educators who walked off the job and rallied in Tamworth this week - their second day of strike action in six months - and they were joined by public school teachers at hundreds of schools across NSW.

And Wednesday's 24-hour strike by teachers from the New England North West won't be the last, according to union representatives and educators who said they were fed-up with pay cuts and overwork.

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As an assistant principal (AP), teacher Wendy Morse said she routinely worked dozens of hours more than she was paid for.

As a teaching AP at five small schools, she has to fit her responsibilities as an education leader into her two hours' of planning time budgeted per week for planning, the same number as a teacher.

Individual schools now take far more responsibility for hiring and firing and budgetary administration, but teacher leaders often have no additional time in which to do it, she said.

"An AP position is still two hours a week [off class] and it hasn't changed in 20 years," she said.

"I've been teaching 34 years and this is the first time I'm like - I want to give up, I'm done. To me it's about the working conditions."

The Teachers Federation is calling on the state government to offer wage increases of between five and 7.5 per cent, plus two additional planning hours for teachers like Ms Morse.

The wage demands would require an end to the government's decade-old legislated wage cap of 2.5 per cent on increasing public servant wages year-on-year.

Read more: Teachers strike closes 250 schools

School counsellor and Armidale Teachers' Federation president Michael Sciffer works everyday with the most vulnerable and disadvantaged children in our schools.

"I see those children denied their right to a qualified teacher in front of their class, denied access to a school with a full complement of leadership and learning support positions filled, and denied access to school counselling with nearly half of our positions vacant from Walcha to the Queensland border," Mr Sciffer said.

"The minister does not care about our students. The leadership of the department does not care about our students. It is only teachers and principals burning themselves out that ensures our students are provided with quality learning."

Mr Sciffer said he had witnessed merged classes of more than 70 students more than once at Armidale Secondary College during last term, and colleagues at other schools have told him of classes with more than 100 students and only one teacher.

"It was chaos last term," Mr Sciffer said.

"A term's worth of extras each week, thousands of permanent vacancies across the state, no casual teachers in our schools, and COVID burning through our classes and our own families like a bush fire."

Inverell Teachers' Association president Damian Fleming agreed with Mr Sciffer and said on a daily basis, primary and secondary schools throughout the Inverell region, are having difficulties finding teachers and covering classes so that students can get a 'sound education'.

"With significant increases in teacher's workload, in both volume and complexity, teachers are finding that they are working longer hours and drowning in data and administration," Mr Fleming said.

"Our schools, teachers and other staff are at breaking point, and term two has only just begun, with an increase in absenteeism, retirements and leave expected to eventuate over term two and three, which will further escalate the problems."

Read more: Places like Armidale can't even attract teachers

Oxley High School teacher Kia Stevenson said the strike action was about the future of public education.

"I think most people just think we're striking for more money. That's not the case at all. We're striking for better conditions, more teachers, so that we can do the best for these kids," Ms Stevenson said.

"For me personally, and I would hazard a guess for most of us, it's got nothing to do with with our personal circumstances. It's very much a collective push."

Region organiser Katie Sullivan said the union's "more than thanks" campaign wasn't going to stop until teachers got change.

She said the next step is "possibly more strikes".

Speaking as a teacher and a unionist, she'd be willing to go on strike again, or even to strike for multiple days in a row, she said.

Read more: Katie Sullivan takes over as New England Teacher's Federation rep

Ms Sullivan recently worked as a teaching principal at a small school and she said the situation for education leaders is "dire".

"We have students that don't have classes, they're sitting in a quadrangle for up to three periods a day because they don't have the teachers to cover them," she said.

"Out of a five-period day."

Worse, Gunnedah-based minister for education Sarah Mitchell "refuses" to meet with local teachers, at local Teachers Federation meetings, Ms Sullivan said.

Statewide, the union has claimed the government has also refused to negotiate, instead putting the strike action over to the Industrial Relations Commission.

The union hopes to be able to force the government to listen.

"The premier has indicated that there may be something in the budget, but we're not waiting until June to find that out," she said.

Minister for Education Sarah Mitchell said she has had "multiple conversations as minister with local principals and teachers".

"I have never been invited to meet with a union member in the Tamworth electorate," she said.

"I am happy to meet with the Tamworth area union reps, although currently union reps seem to walk out of schools when I walk in making discussion difficult.

"My job is to meet with teachers, students parents and other school staff and I do that every day including over the past two weeks."

As part of the unions' ongoing industrial action, federation members are authorised to walk out of schools whenever a government MP enters it.

The premier Dominic Perrottet and minister Mitchell delayed wage negotiations earlier this week until after the June budget, hinting that the wage cap policy would go.

Ms Mitchell said wage rises were "big decisions, it's billions of dollars that government needs to decide about how we're going to spend this money."

Quirindi Public School principal Ian Worley said his school is at wits' end finding enough staff. They have made personal contact with more than 500 teachers trying to find permanent or temporary staff, yet remain understaffed.

"What does it look like for a school for staff and students when there are just not enough teachers? - It's simple, ultimately, students suffer," he said.

"Eventually the goodwill on which our system exists is going to dry up and it's going to disappear."

He said the shortages have now caused the resignation of junior staff, leading to even more shortages.

"Shouldn't every student and every secondary student have a right to know that every one of their classes not only has a teacher allocated to teach them, but an appropriate specialist teacher trained in that area?"

Charmaine Endacott, assistant principal at Uralla Central School and member of the teachers' federation council said it had been a unanimous decision by councillors to go ahead with the strike.

"This has been coming for a very long time..." she said.

"We're in this desperate teacher shortage, and why can't we attract them? Because who wants to come into a job where your main focus is not teaching and you're not even getting paid for it?"

Oxley High School teacher Natasha Gillin said the problem needed to be solved or there would be no future for public education.

"My teaching career will probably finish in the next five years. I don't know who's going to take over," she said.

"I want to make sure there's a career for [the next generation] and I want to make sure there's teachers in front of our kids that are educating them, because our students are missing out."

Workloads are getting so intense, that as many as three-in-four teachers told the union in a recent survey their workload is "unmanageable".

Some 70 per cent are considering leaving education.

NSW Teachers Federation President Angelo Gavrielatos said the only way to attract new teachers into the profession was to raise pay.

"The Department of Education's own figures show that there were 77 vacant permanent teaching positions in the electorate of Tamworth last October," he said.

Some New England schools remained open on Wednesday, conducting minimal supervision, with several closing their doors entirely.

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