Monday 7 April

Tuesday 8 April [Rally at Parliament House]

Wednesday 9 April

Thursday 10 April

Friday 11 April

Saturday – Sunday, 12 – 13 April

Image of the Month I'm so bad I make Lil look good! © The West Australian "Now Mr Speaker for people who are unaware of that of course I am sorry for people who are unaware of that and have taken offence to that of course I am sorry," [McGowan] said. ABC News, 10 April 2008 Deputy Opposition leader Kim Hames said Mr McGowan gave poodles and lap dogs a bad name and should apologise. [to the poodles and lap dogs? Web] The Australian, 11 April 2008

 

Monday 7 April

• The West Australian
  
  
  • Ordered back to classrooms, 21 teachers throw in the chalk (page 16)
    by Jessica Strutt
    
    "Twenty-one desk-bound teachers in district and central offices quit after they were ordered back into the classrooms at the start of the school year.

    "Answers to questions in State Parliament reveal that, of the 187 bureaucrats ordered to return to the classroom to help alleviate the teacher shortage, 21 resigned from the Education Department. [We'll pick that up in Hansard Highlights when it's available next week. Web]

    "Shadow education minister Peter Collier said the department's failure to manage WA's teacher shortage had forced it to resort to 11th -hour, heavy-handed tactics that had backfired.

    "He said it was alarming the intransigent approach had cost the department 21 teachers when there was a desperate shortage of them.

    "It was no wonder teachers were leaving the State school system for private schools when they were treated so appallingly.

    "The Department of Education and Training is lacking in compassion… heavy-handed tactics which it used in regard to these teachers is representative of its whole attitude towards its employees," he said.

    "It is symptomatic of the culture that exists within the decision makers of the department.

    "A number of teachers are leaving and going to the private sector and you will find, almost I would say without exception, that these employees have found more meaningful occupation in the private sector."

    "The West Australian revealed last month that one of the education bureaucrats ordered to return to the classroom quit in disgust and took a job serving beer in a pub.

    "Education Department director-general Sharyn O'Neill ordered senior bureaucrats from the offices back into schools late last year as part of her "classroom first" strategy.

    "The department refused to answer questions on whether teachers ordered back into the classroom had the right to continue in their existing role if they refused to move.

    "Department deputy director-general Margery Evans said it was regrettable that some staff chose to resign rather than teach.

    "Our priority is to make sure every regular classroom has a qualified teacher and we make no apology for putting classrooms and students first," she said.

    "Staff members who were identified for a return to the classroom were all permanent classroom teachers who were on contract in central and district offices."

    From The West Australian
    
    

    
    
  • Schools' $170m stockpile sparks calls to share (page 16)
    by Keryn McKinnon
    
    "State schools have nearly $170 million in their bank accounts, up more than $30 million on just a year ago, prompting WA's top parent group to call for a major review of how government grants are allocated and spent.

    "The school rich list, compiled by the Education Department, shows 13 high schools and senior colleges each had more than $1 million in their accounts at the end of last year.

    "Between them, the richest schools had nearly $20 million. They include Tuart College with almost $3 million and Perth Modern Senior High School with more than $2 million.

    "But the poorest 13 schools between them had less than $250 000 for equipment, teaching aids and maintenance. They include Katanning, Lynwood, Bayswater and West Beechboro primary schools.

    "WA Council of State Schools Organisations president Rob Fry said the department needed to justify how it planned to spend its money.

    "Where they can't justify why the money is being held, then it should be returned to the Education Department and redistributed to more needy schools," Mr Fry said.

    "It was important schools had money in reserve for equipment replacement programs, capital works and maintenance, but any unallocated money should not be accumulated.

    "Education finance and administration deputy director-general Peter McCaffrey said the total balance of school accounts at the end of 2007 was higher than expected. Much of this came from the $48 million received from the Federal Government's investing in our schools program.

    "It is expected that schools will hold enough funds at this time of year for committed expenditures, like minor works, teaching aids, library resources and ground improvements," Mr McCaffrey said. If the money was not earmarked for specific purposes, hard questions would be asked.

    "Opposition education spokesman Peter Collier backed WACSSO's call for a review of the funding system. "P&C associations right across the state hold cake stalls to raise funds for basic amenities," he said. It was incredible so much money was sitting in some school accounts, he said.

    "WA Secondary Schools Executives Association president Rob Nairn said a lot of money would be in reserve accounts for specific projects. "Schools need to have significant money put aside for contingencies," he said.

    Ballajura Community College principal Steffan Silcox said his school had spent a lot of its $1.08 million over the January school holidays on a new carpet, painting and a library resource centre.

    "Perth Modern head Robyn White said $500,000 of her school's account was from fundraising saved over three years for a European music trip for 151 students later this year."

    From The West Australian
    
    

    
    
  • Letters to the Editor (page 22)
    
    
    • "Colin Barnett (report, 29/3) is quoted as saying: "If we want quality people in politics, we… have to pay them more."

      "This is exactly what the Teachers' Union has been telling the Government about solving the chronic teacher shortage. M. Fontaine (Missing maths teachers, Letters 28/3) asks: "Where are all our high school maths teachers?"
      
      "She is rightly concerned that her year 11 daughter has had four relief maths teachers this year. Why would you study at university for four years to become a high school maths teacher and then accept a poor salary, overcrowded classes, badly behaved students and the shambles that the OBE has created?

      "Many young, enthusiastic teachers leave the profession after a few years and a big group of highly experienced teachers will retire in a few more years. The teacher shortage can only get worse. If the Government won't listen to the teachers' union they could act on the recommendations of the Twomey Report."

      Robin Taylor, Carine
      
      

    • "I refer to Alan Carpenter's complaints about the domestic airport, which is not a state-owned facility. I think he should look in his own backyard first and I invite him to visit the metropolitan high school in which I teach. It would make the airport look like the Ritz. No air-conditioning, no hot water, no fly screens, resident cockroaches and mosquitoes, some asbestos, white ants, no staff facilities, dilapidated and poor appearance. Maybe he should consider our young people before worrying about visitors who come and go at the airport."

      Hazel Filear, Stoneville
      
      
      

• The Age
  
  
  • Shake-up targets bored teachers
    by Farrah Tomazin
    
    "Bored teachers would be moved out of the classroom and parents would get unprecedented information on how schools perform under a proposed shake-up of Victoria's education system.

    "School councils could also be overhauled and high-performing staff given financial incentives to work in the toughest areas, as Premier John Brumby moves to boost early childhood development, lift student achievement and make schools more accountable.

    "Paving the way for the biggest education revamp in years, the Government will today announce a proposed five-year blueprint covering children from birth to year 12.

    "Under the plan, parents would get more detailed information on how schools perform, not only against literacy and numeracy benchmarks, but also in terms of "adding value" for individual pupils.

    "This would involve measures such as student satisfaction surveys, parent feedback or newly developed progress measurements.

    "While the Government has opposed using "league tables" comparing school results, Education Minister Bronwyn Pike said parents deserved to have more information so they could assess their child's progress and hold their schools to account.

    "We do think parents can get more information about what they can expect from schools," she said.

    "It's about being a bit more sophisticated, and giving parents additional information that says: this is where your child is, this is where we expect they should or could be by this developmental stage, and how your school is progressing against this task."

    "The Government is also considering a minimum qualification for early childhood staff, who currently are not required to have a formal qualification.

    "In a bid to reform the school workforce, teachers who become disengaged would be encouraged to find a job elsewhere, and high-performers would be given financial incentives to work in the most challenging schools. Pushing out bored teachers is likely to be contentious, but Ms Pike said the five-year plan relied on having a high-performing and enthusiastic workforce.

    "Principals have told me that they would like to be able to encourage some teachers to move to other professions, so we need to work with them and think about ways we can do that," she said.

    "We're not talking about big numbers of people, but we want to make sure that everybody in the workforce wants to be there, and is energised about the school improvement agenda."

    "The Government will also use the blueprint to try to make private schools more transparent, amid concerns some are not providing parents with the level of information provided in government schools.

    "In struggling schools, bureaucrats could be sent in to help in the running of parent-based councils.

    "The planned changes come at a sensitive time for the Government, which is at loggerheads with teachers over wages and working conditions.

    "Australian Education Union Victorian branch president Mary Bluett warned that teachers would refuse to implement the changes unless the dispute was resolved. "They've got to show that they value their workforce rather than putting more and more requirements on them," Ms Bluett said.

    "A central part of the education blueprint will look at boosting kindergarten participation and improving services for children from birth to age eight.

    "The Government hopes to increase the number of children attending kindergarten to 95% in every municipality, reduce by 10% the number of children who have not met expected literacy and numeracy standards in year 3 and increase the proportion of 3½-year-olds attending Maternal and Child Health Service checks.

    "Children's Minister Maxine Morand said the early childhood reforms focused on three areas: increased participation, boosting the quality of services and early intervention. "It's an absolute no-brainer that the environment a child develops in is very much going to have a significant impact on their outcomes. So we want to provide the best possible environment where any child is, whether they're at home, whether they're in child care, or whether they're in kindergarten."

    "A discussion paper outlining the proposals will be released today, followed by a summit for principals and teachers on Thursday, and five weeks for community feedback.

    "Victorian Association of State Secondary Principals president Brian Burgess said he hoped schools would get the resources and time to bring in any changes. Funding is expected to be allocated in the May budget, but the Government would not say how much.
    
    EARLY CHILDHOOD

    Targets to be met over the next five years:

  • Increase the proportion of infants fully breastfed in the first six months of life

  • Increase the proportion of children attending Maternal and Child Health Service checks, particularly at 3½ years old

  • Increase to at least 95% in all municipalities the proportion of four-year-olds going to kindergarten

    Proposed Reforms
    

  • Require child-care staff to have a recognised qualification.

  • Give parents more information about child-care providers, including breaches of regulations

  • Boost the availability of children's services that offer educational programs
    
    SCHOOLS

    Targets to be met over the next five years:

  • Reduce the number of children entering schools with emotional and behavioural problems

  • Increase by 5% the number of students performing well above expected levels in literacy and numeracy

  • Reduce by 10% the number of children who have not met expected year 3 learning standards

  • Reduce by 15% the gap for Koori students in reading, writing and numeracy

    Proposed Reforms

  • Encourage teachers who have become disengaged to leave the profession

  • Give top teachers financial incentives to work in struggling schools

  • Adopt Britain's Teach First program, which encourages top graduates to work in the toughest schools
    

    From The Age at link
    
    

  • Analysis
    Let the revolution begin
    by Farrah Tomazin
    
    "The proposed education blueprint sets out the Government's planned direction for early childhood and schools over the next five years.

    "Centred on three main themes — creating a culture of excellence, overhauling the teaching workforce and developing stronger links between schools and parents who often feel that the school is the enemy — the reforms are as contentious as they are ambitious.

    "Proposals include giving parents unprecedented information to compare the performance of schools, encouraging teachers who have become disengaged with their job to work elsewhere, allowing Education Department bureaucrats to intervene in school councils if they're not governing properly, and potentially requiring anyone who works in child care to get proper qualifications.

    "Not everyone will agree with the hardline stance the Government is taking. But importantly, and necessarily, the blueprint is underpinned by a genuine acceptance that although Victoria's 800,000 students are doing pretty well, there is room for improvement.

    "Too many schools are underperforming, particularly in the north and west of Melbourne where many students are from poorer backgrounds. Schools don't always accept full responsibility for their students' results. Parents aren't getting the information they need to make informed decisions or adequately monitor their children's progress. In some cases, teacher complacency is dragging the system down and hindering students.

    "The reforms are a sign of Premier John Brumby, Education Minister Bronwyn Pike and Children's Minister Maxine Morand telling the workforce mediocrity is not good enough.

    "But pushing for radical change is one thing; providing funds to back it up is another. Brumby knows grand plans and motherhood statements mean little without the necessary resources, or without staff being given the time to implement changes. He knows that for his agenda to have any chance of success, it must have the support of teachers, the very workforce the Government has been at loggerheads with since last year over better wages and working conditions.

    "If there were any time to resolve the teachers' enterprise bargaining dispute — so that everyone can work towards the shared goal of raising the bar in schools — it's now. The Government must now match the rhetoric with millions of dollars in funding in the May budget. Only then can Victoria's own "education revolution" begin." [emphasis added]
    
    From The Age at link
    
    
    

  • Summiteers to present a productive slant on finger-painting and pay-when-you-can loans
    by Katharine Murphy
    
    "Why all the fuss about teaching children to read at five, wonders Melbourne management professor and consultant Joshua Gans. [Another bean counter advising on education policy? Web]

    "Why not wait until they are seven, as they do in some Scandinavian countries? Why not stick with finger painting or basic numeracy? Something more in tune with the front-of-mind problem-solving abilities of a five-year-old (how much is that Freddo Frog and do I have enough in my money box to buy it?).

    "Professor Gans is one of the participants in a session of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's 2020 Summit this month devoted to ideas for boosting Australia's productivity.

    "Mr Rudd says he wants new, quality ideas to inform his policy settings. Well, here is a new line of inquiry from one of his invitees: by teaching reading early, are we crowding out an alternative approach that would give children better educational nourishment for the skills required later on?

    "I think we need to know a lot more. I'm not at all convinced that pushing kids to read at four and five is the way to go," Professor Gans told The Age ahead of his trip to the Canberra talkfest..."

    Full story in The Age at link
    
    
    
  • The Monday Education Section has been updated and includes 13 articles
    
    
    • I'll highlight some when time permits and include with Tuesday's or Wednesday's news. Web
      

  
  

• The Australian
  
  
  • Top End training just all 'pretend'
    by Sian Powell
    
    "Vocational training for Aborigines in the Northern Territory is a sham, with a wide range of weeks-long courses delivered to participants who can neither read the instructional material nor write to take notes.

    "Remote communities complain that young men go off to train for course after course but do not learn anything useful," Helen Hughes writes in a Centre for Independent Studies paper titled Indigenous Education in the Northern Territory.

    "Non-indigenous tradesmen have to be brought in to even large indigenous communities to do the simplest electrical, plumbing and other construction jobs.

    "Indigenous staff with a certificate III in clerical work and administration cannot draft simple letters, maintain financial data, write minutes at meetings, or maintain communication by email." ...
    
    Full story in The Australian at link
    
    
    

• The Washington Post
  
  
  • Federal Report Fuels a Quarter-Century of Restructuring, and Controversy
    by Valerie Strauss
    
    'A NATION AT RISK: THE IMPERATIVE FOR EDUCATIONAL REFORM'
    
    "Twenty-five years ago, the federal government report "A Nation at Risk: The Imperative for Educational Reform" launched an era of efforts to improve public schools that continues today.

    "The authors used combative language, starting with the title, to issue a call to action to elected officials and educators to set new academic standards and improve teacher quality. The report was the product of an 18-member panel assembled in 1981 by Terrel H. Bell, who was secretary of education at the time, to examine the public education system.

    "The report wasn't the first call for education reform, but it garnered unusual attention because of its plain language, which linked the future of the economy to public schooling, and because of the times in which it was delivered.

    "Ronald Reagan was president, and many newly resurgent conservatives wanted to eliminate the Department of Education, institute school vouchers and make other changes to the public education system. Some, including then-Attorney General Edwin Meese III, opposed the report because it made no mention of those issues. Others said many of its conclusions and recommendations were based on inaccurate data and hazy reasoning.

    "Still, the report fueled new interest in education reform, launched the standards movement and influenced the Bush administration's creation of the No Child Left Behind law..."

    Full Story in The Washington Post at link
    
    
    
    
• The Sydney Morning Herald
  
  
  • Put equity back into learning
    
    This is an edited version of a speech delivered by the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Education, Julia Gillard, at the annual Higher Education Summit on Thursday.
    
    "An education revolution to create one of the most highly educated and skilled nations on Earth." This was the mandate Kevin Rudd asked the Australian people for on November 24 last year, and they gave it.

    "It is a mandate for change that places education - in fact all aspects of our human capital - at the centre of the nation's economic and social investment priorities.

    "The future will belong to the nations with the best human capital and the most inclusive societies. Equity is important to our education and training systems in so many ways.

    "It is of course an important moral issue for our country. A nation that thinks of itself as essentially egalitarian cannot sit by idly while those from disadvantaged backgrounds are denied the life opportunities that come from higher education - things like higher incomes, career progression, intellectual fulfilment and self-knowledge.

    "It is also an important economic issue. Productivity Commission research has found that the right sort of early childhood, education, skills and workforce development policies could increase participation by 0.7 per cent and productivity by up to 1.2 per cent by 2030. This would translate to an increase in gross domestic product of about 2.2 per cent, or about $26 billion in today's dollars.

    "But we have a major problem with equity. While we have many high achievers, our tail of lower performers is long. We suffer from weak literacy performance in the bottom layer of school students and high drop-out rates.

    "When it comes to university education, while total numbers of students have grown spectacularly since the early 1980s, the socio-economic mix of students has hardly changed for the last 40 to 50 years.

    "The participation rate of disadvantaged groups, notably students from low socio-economic backgrounds, indigenous Australians, and Australians from regional and remote areas, remains low.

    "Between 2001 and 2006 the higher education participation rate of regional students fell from 19 per cent to below 18 per cent, and regional students were 7 per cent less likely to complete 12 years of school than city students. In remote areas the gap is 17 per cent.

    "Indigenous Australians make up 2.3 per cent of the population but only 1.2 per cent of higher education students.

    "While they may not constitute the overriding reason why people from poorer families are not entering university in greater numbers, the compounding effects of rising fees and living costs, combined with narrower access to financial support, must be taking their toll.

    "It is time to address the inter-generational cycle of educational disadvantage, something the Government cares deeply about. We will be a Government that takes impartial expert opinion and evidence seriously before we make important policy decisions.

    "That is why we want your input, ideas and energy as we set about making Australia's education system better and more equitable."

    From The Sydney Morning Herald at link

Tuesday 8 April [Rally at Parliament House]

• The West Australian
  
  
  • Thousands to back teachers at protest rally (page 18)
    by Bethany Hiatt

    "Around 4000 people are expected to rally outside Parliament House this afternoon to protest against the State Government's failure to resolve the teachers' pay dispute.

    "State School Teachers Union president Anne Gisborne said parents, private school teachers and members of other unions were invited to join public school teachers at the rally to show support for its campaign for better conditions and pay rises of more than 20 per cent over three years.

    "We would be expecting between three and four thousand at the very least," she said. "Our members are getting increasingly anxious, agitated and angry with this Government that, towards the end of term one, 2008, we still do not have an offer on the table."

    "Teachers have refused to take part in activities outside school hours such as excursions and camps since the start of the year and thousands walked off the job for half a day on February 28.

    "The WA Industrial Relations Commission yesterday reserved its decision on whether the SSTU defied its order to call off the half-day strike.

    "Commission acting president Mark Ritter said it regarded the breach as a serious matter which required several weeks consideration.

    "Penalties it could impose range from requiring the union to promise not to repeat the action, a $2000 fine or an appearance before the full bench to explain why the union should not be suspended or deregistered.

    "The commission last month requested more information on the number of schools which were forced to close or had classes disrupted by the stop-work meetings on February 28.

    "A submission from the Department of Education and Training said 35 schools had been closed. More than 530 of 760 State schools, or 70 per cents, reported a third or more of their students were absent for part or all of the day. About 60 per cent of schools, or 434, reported that a third or more of teachers were away. Just over half, or 405 schools, reported that one third of its teachers and one third of students were away.

    "SSTU lawyer Toby Borgeest argued that learning programs would not have been significantly disrupted by the absence of many students and teachers for part of one day. He said the union should not be penalized heavily because it had not resorted to strike action for many years.

    "But Mr Ritter said the union could have sought a stay of the commission's order so the stop-work meeting could go ahead, rather than deliberately ignoring its directive."

    From The West Australian
    
    
    

• ABC News
  
  
  • Hostile reception for Education Minister
    
    "The State Education Minister Mark McGowan has addressed about one thousand protesters at a teachers union rally.

    "The State School Teachers Union had earlier denied Mr McGowan the opportunity to speak at the rally at state parliament, but teachers overwhelmingly voted to hear him.

    "The protest is the latest in a chain of events designed to draw attention to ongoing pay negotiations with the government.

    "Mr McGowan spoke briefly to the crowd before he was booed off by the group.

    "Last December, union members voted to reject a $685-million pay offer because it failed to meet teachers' concerns over salaries and workloads.

    "The union is still facing possible deregistration after it defied an order to call off a stop work meeting in February."
    
    From ABC News at link
    
    
    

  • Teachers to rally for pay claim
    
    "The State School Teachers Union is expecting about 4,000 people to attend a rally outside Parliament House today to draw attention to an ongoing pay claim.

    "The union is already being prosecuted by the Industrial Relations Commission for breaching an order to call off a half day stop work meeting in February.

    "The Commission's Acting President Mark Ritter has described the breach as serious and has reserved his decision on a penalty.

    "The union's president Anne Gisborne says the union is now considering a range of other industrial action and will hold a rally after school today.

    "We would be expecting 3 or 4 thousand at the very least," she said.

    "We've opened an invitation for people from the independent sector to join us, we've also called on our union colleagues through Unions WA, to be there and to share with us clear messaging to government that they need to deal with this matter."

    "Ms Gisborne says union members are frustrated.

    "We have calls on a daily basis asking us what is going on, what is the Government doing in respect to this situation, and telling us that they will support us fully in whatever action we decide to undertake."

    From ABC News at link
    
    
    
  • NSW teachers' strike tipped
    
    "It is looking increasingly likely that teachers will strike for 24 hours next month against the New South Wales Government's new school staffing policies.

    "Schools across NSW were affected this morning as thousands of teachers held stop-work meetings to discuss changes to school staffing policies, which the union opposes.

    "The Teachers Federation believes regional and rural schools will be hurt by the NSW Government's plans to allow principals to individually hire teachers, instead of the Education Department controlling staff movements.

    "The federation says the move will undermine an incentive scheme, under which teachers are encouraged to work in regional areas in exchange for a placement on the top of the transfers list for a more desirable posting later in their careers.

    "Up to 200 teachers at a meeting in the northern Sydney suburb of Willoughby voted in support of a 24-hour strike this morning.

    "Federation president Maree O'Halloran says she expects similar results from other meetings when they become known

    "I'm very confident. One of the reasons I wanted to come here [Willoughby] is that I know this is one of the areas where we will be able to get teachers," she said.

    "It won't be an area that's disadvantaged under the new system, but it was so good to see the teachers here, so many of them here, because they're concerned about the rights of all students."

    "She says unanimous support for industrial action has been shown at several Sydney meetings.

    "We're ready to take 24 hours of industrial action about this issue if we don't have a settlement," she said.

    "Greens MP John Kaye says Education Minister John Della Bosca needs to negotiate with the union to avoid strike action.

    "Unless the Minister is deliberately picking a fight with public sector teachers in NSW, he has to listen to what happened this morning, to what clearly will be overwhelming opposition and to sit down and to talk to teachers and to find out from their experience what's wrong with his plan and try and fix it," he said.

    "The Education Department says major industrial action would be a disproportionate response to the changes."

    From ABC News at link
    
    
    

• Television Evening News
  
  
  • All four networks had stories on the Rally, with the most extensive coverage on Channel 7.
    
    
    
    
• The Sydney Morning Herald
  
  
  • [NSW] Teachers vote to strike for 24 hours
    by Anna Patty [with AAP]
    

    "Teachers across NSW have voted to go on strike for 24 hours next month.

    "NSW Teachers Federation President, Maree OHalloran, said about 20,000 votes had been counted by midday, with 99 per cent of the teachers who attended a Sky Channel meeting voting to endorse industrial action.

    "Ms O'Halloran said this was a strong result.

    "Teachers are protesting against the State Government's plan to allow school principals to hire teachers instead of having them allocated by the NSW Department of Education.

    "The new staffing agreement would displace the teacher transfer system, which allows teachers to accumulate points for working in remote or hard to staff areas of NSW.

    "Under the existing incentive scheme, teachers are encouraged to take up rural and remote postings, making them eligible to go to the top of the transfer list for a more desirable posting later in their career.

    "Ms O'Halloran said she called on the Minister for Education and Industrial Relations, John Della Bosca, to return to the negotiating table to settle the dispute without further disruption.

    Stopwork meeting today

    "A stopwork meeting this morning by teachers disrupted classroom sessions, but caused temporary shutdowns to less than 5 per cent of schools, the Education Department says.

    "Michael Coutts-Trotter, director-general of education, said the proposed change would be an option to the centralised system, since the most eligible teacher might not always be the most suitable teacher for a specific school.

    "It's impossible to make that judgment from a bureaucratic staffing operation in an office in Blacktown. It's best made by that school community," Mr Coutts-Trotter told Macquarie Radio.

    "He estimated that 70 of the 2240 public schools would not be able to operate because of the strike.

    "Ms O'Halloran said TAFE teachers would also stop work to protest against a Government proposal to remove the requirement for permanent TAFE instructors to have teacher education qualifications.

    "The quality of education provision will be undermined over time," Ms O'Halloran said in a statement.

    "TAFE teachers call on the NSW Government to reverse their decision and maintain university level teacher education qualifications as standard for TAFE."

    From The Sydney Morning Herald at link

 

• The Australian
  
  
• Pay for top teachers to work in tough schools
  by Rick Wallace, Victorian political reporter
  
  "Talented teachers would be paid more to work in tough schools, and burnt-out staff would be encouraged to leave the profession under an education blueprint released by the Victorian Government yesterday.

  "The plan, released for public comment, calls for parents to receive more information about school performance.

  "Education Minister Bronwyn Pike said the Government wanted talented teachers to help lift standards in under-performing schools.

  "We're prepared to offer incentives to make sure we get some of our best teachers to move," she said.

  "Ms Pike said parents were entitled to more information about the performance of state schools and how they "added value" to students' education and performed in literacy and numeracy.

  "What we want to see are measurements of progress within our schools, and league tables are often a very crude way of comparing performance," she said.

  "Every school is different, every school has different priorities, different strengths and different weaknesses. But what we want to know is that every school is improving."

  "Australian Education Union chief Mary Bluett said the plan was long overdue because the Government had known about the problems for more than a decade.

  "She said schools needed better resources for the plan to succeed, and attacked Ms Pike over the push to get rid of "disengaged" teachers.

  "I don't know how many burnt-out teachers Bronwyn thinks there are, but I find it quite amazing that where we have a teacher shortage, she's talking about getting rid of some of our teachers." [emphasis added]

  "Opposition education spokesman Martin Dixon said the Government's record meant parents should be suspicious about the plan.

  "What happened to the first blueprint? The blueprint that was released about four or five years ago gave us the worst funding in education, the poorest-paid teachers and the worst results of any mainland state as far as academic performance is concerned," he said. "So I'm a bit sceptical about any blueprint."

  "Education consultant Kevin Donnelly said the blueprint bore a striking resemblance to two others released by the Victorian Government, in 2002 and 2003.

  "He said it made no sense to release another blueprint without tackling the underlying issues of teacher quality, the curriculum and giving principals the power to hire and fire." [emphasis added]
  
  From The Australian at link
  
  
  

• Call to offer freedom through schooling
  by Justine Ferrari, Education writer
  
  "Indigenous children will be locked up in their communities and sentenced to live as exotic tourist attractions if denied the same quality of education as the rest of the nation.

  "The executive director of the Indigenous Education Leadership Institute in Queensland, Chris Sarra, yesterday rejected the notion children in remote areas need only enough education to survive in local communities.

  "Dr Sarra said there was a mindset pervading the education field that the more educated Aboriginal children were, the less Aboriginal they became.

  "It isn't the case. The truth is the more we educate Aboriginal children, the more we strengthen Aboriginal identity," hesaid.

  "This is where the schools of the Left need to understand that some people can get so open-minded about these things that their brains fall out. Locking people away in communities may suit the purposes of someone who wants to retain Aboriginal people as an exotic reminder of an ancient past.

  "But Aboriginal people want more than that, and we have every right to expect schools to deliver - to retain that connection to an ancient past with pride but enable us to step into a bolder, brighter future.

  "If they choose to remain in their own communities, that's their business, but we at least have to be content that we have given them the intellectual and social capacity to move beyond."

  "The Weekend Australian on Saturday reported a paper by Helen Hughes arguing indigenous children in remote areas of the Northern Territory were condemned to failure by a system of educational apartheid offering a second-rate curriculum in make-believe schools..."
  
  Full story in The Australian at link
  
  
  

• Teenage gang attacks school
  
  Terrified students were forced to cower under desks and hide in cupboards yesterday as a gang of youths armed with a machete and baseball bats allegedly smashed their way through a high school in Sydney's west.
  
  Similar stories in other papers
  
  
  
  
• The Age
  
  
  • Gillard puts geography on the map
    by Jewel Topsfield, Canberra
    
    "A national geography curriculum will be developed after a report warned of a decline in the quality of teaching of the subject and plummeting student numbers.

    "Education Minister Julia Gillard said the report's findings highlighted teachers' concerns that content, rigour and skills were lost when geography was amalgamated with other subjects into the catch-all "studies of society and the environment".

    "The Rudd Government is committed to the development of a national curriculum in geography," Ms Gillard said.

    "The report, commissioned by the former government, found the geography content of broad subjects such as studies of society and environment was often taught by teachers who had no training in geography and no great enthusiasm for it.

    "(Teachers) find that students taking up geography in the final years of high school are lacking much of the basic knowledge needed for that level of study," said the report by management consultants Erebus International.

    "Although geography was now studied by relatively few students at senior secondary levels, young people needed to be taught basic skills such as map reading and data interpretation, the report said.

    "Victoria is reintroducing geography as a separate subject in the humanities domain after watching the number of students decline from more than 4000 in 1992 to just over 2500 in 2004."

    "Ms Gillard said the new National Curriculum Board — which is developing a national curriculum in maths, English, science and history for all students from kindergarten to year 12 — would also be instructed to create a "rigorous, world-class" geography and foreign languages curriculum.

    "The report said the number of students studying geography in Australia had been declining since at least the early 1990s.

    "One reason was a failure to engage students, with some teachers taking a "capes and bays" approach to the subject, requiring students to memorise geographical details such as the rivers of northern NSW.

    "It is now inconceivable that science could be adequately taught without access to laboratory practical experience, yet geography is routinely taught through 'chalk and talk'," the report said.

    "It also pointed to the shortage of suitably qualified geography teachers and the loss of priority for geography. NSW is the only state or territory where it is taught as a separate, mandatory subject from years 7 to 10.

    "The Erebus study was announced last year following concerns that geography had become too generalist and issues-led and that it focused too heavily on social studies."

    From The Age at link
    
    
    
    
  • The fundamentals still apply
    by Farrah Tomazin
    
    If you want better schools, work on the teaching. The State Government's education blueprint is as simple - and as difficult - as that.

    "Tony Simpson knows a thing or two about tackling disadvantage in schools. As the principal of Copperfield College, in Melbourne's west, he's spent years dealing with students who have done it tough in an often inequitable education system.

    "The school has 1900 students across three campuses in Kings Park, Sydenham, and Delahey. When it comes to disadvantage, it's ranked in the bottom 20% of the state on socio-economic benchmarks.

    "Ask Simpson what he thinks should be done to improve the lot of students like his, and his answer is simple: resource schools properly, improve the transition to primary school, and above all, lift teaching quality.

    "There's absolutely no doubt that the teacher in front of the classroom is the factor that will have the greatest impact on the learning of their kids. So we need to engage our teachers, provide them with realistic pathways within teaching, and attracting them to stay in teaching in our system - and in our state," says Simpson, a 35-year schools veteran and a principal for the past 10 years.

    "But while most punters know there's room for much improvement in Victoria's education system, just how you achieve that goal is a moot point.

    "Yesterday, the Brumby Government set about trying find the answers, announcing plans for a massive shake-up in child care, kindergarten and schools.

    "Paving the way for the biggest education revamp in years, the proposed reforms are as contentious as they are ambitious. Bored teachers would be moved out of the classroom and encouraged to find jobs elsewhere. Parents would get unprecedented information on how their schools perform. Education Department bureaucrats could intervene in school councils if they're not governing properly. Anyone who works in child care would be required to get a proper qualification. And private schools would be made more accountable for their results.
    
    "Education Minister Bronwyn Pike says the five-year "education blueprint" centres on three themes: creating a "culture of excellence" in the education system, overhaul the teaching workforce, and developing stronger links between schools and parents, who often feel that "the school is the enemy".

    "But the plan comes at a critical time for the Government, which for months has been at loggerheads with teachers over wages and working conditions. No sooner had Pike and Children's Minister Maxine Morand released a discussion paper on their five-year blueprint yesterday, when the criticism came flooding in.

    "What people will see is simply another increase in their workloads," says Mick Butler, a teacher at the Heidelberg Teaching Unit, a school for children with behavioural problems who have failed in the mainstream education system.

    "The intent is good, but the problem is, without increased resources, and without the idea of getting a workforce that believes it is valued by the Government that is asking them to implement these initiatives, it may be it very difficult." ...
    
    "Another contentious feature of the blueprint is a plan to remove disengaged teachers from the classroom. For the Government, the message is simple: if you don't want to be there, leave - and make way for talented new blood to enter the profession.

    "Victorian Principals Association president Fred Ackerman reckons the push for renewal is long overdue. Having spent many years working in schools, Ackerman knows all too well how disillusioned teachers can drag the system down.

    "We have a disproportionate number of people who have been in the game a very long time, who started work in a different era in terms of the teaching and learning that was required," Ackerman says.

    "Things have moved on for them, and some of those teachers are now disenfranchised and disillusioned. I don't mean that in a critical sense, it's just a fact of life. So there is a need to do something about providing firm pathways for those teachers to transition to other work, there's no doubt about that."

    "But Australian Education Union branch president Mary Bluett is not so convinced. She doesn't deny that there are some teachers who may be better off elsewhere, but adds that much of the reason why teachers become disengaged comes down to two things: pay and working conditions - the very issues the Government has refused to resolved despite months of enterprise bargaining negotiations with the union.

    "According to Bluett, the figures speak for themselves: Victorian teachers, who earn $65,414 at the top of the classroom scale, are the lowest-paid in the nation. The state's schools are funded $891 less per student than the Australian average. The number of teachers on contract employment is now almost at Kennett government levels. If the Government is serious about reforming the workforce, she says, then pay them more..." [emphasis added]
    
    Full story in The Age at link
    
    
    

  • Op Ed
    Smart kids deserve our help, too
    
    It's unfair to sacrifice bright students for a misguided ideology.
    
    "... The Victorian Government last week announced the detail of a pre-election promise to build two more selective secondary schools in Melbourne in addition to MacRob and its boys' equivalent, Melbourne High. The two co-ed campuses will be built at a cost of $40 million in growth areas Berwick (for 1200 students) and Wyndham Vale (800 students), with plans to open for year 9 students in 2010.

    "Now, no one likes a smart-arse, and MacRob and Melbourne High aren't exactly popular among much of their state school fraternity. The usual ideology-driven objections have been raised over the plan for their co-ed clones. The accusation that they are elitist has been thrown down like an unanswerable slur..."
    
    
    

  • Some stories of potential interest from yesterday's 'Monday Education Section'
    
    
    • Educating Julia
      
      She's Deputy Prime Minister and the busiest minister in Canberra. So does Julia Gillard have time to run an education revolution?
      
      
      
    • Cream can leave a sour taste
      
      A sharp debate ignites over the role of new selective high schools.
      
      
      
    • Maths still out for the count
      
      As government funds fall short, experts warn of dire peril.
      

Wednesday 9 April

• The West Australian
  
  
  • Teachers warn State to listen to them or pay at the ballot box (page 5)
    by Yasmine Phillips
    
    "Teachers last night threatened to make their pay dispute with the State Government an election issue as hundreds of people rallied outside Parliament House in a vocal protest.
    
    "State School Teachers Union president Anne Gisborne addressed the 2000-strong crowd as teachers waved signs and chanted slogans, condemning the Carpenter Government for not protecting the future of the State’s education system.
    
    “Education in WA is in crisis and don’t be convinced otherwise,” she told the rally. “The future of education in this State depends on us.”
    
    "Ms Gisborne warned that WA teachers would voice their opposition at the ballot box if the Government did not strike a deal with the union soon. “Think big, be courageous and forward-thinking for the now and the long-term,” she said. “Progress our log of claims and guarantee kids a classroom with a qualified teacher.”
    
    "Education Minister Mark McGowan had to confront deafening jeers as he urged teachers to consider what the Government had already offered.
    
    “We agree on the more important things and those important things are that teachers deserve a good pay rise, especially those in more difficult schools or in schools in country WA,” he said. “As a Government we have been negotiating in good faith with the State School Teachers Union.”
    
    "But as teachers continued to demand better pay, improved working conditions and smaller class sizes, Mr McGowan said negotiations were a “two-way street”.
    
    "Ms Gisborne said the union would consider various methods of industrial action as State school teachers continued to seek across-the-board pay rises of more than 20 per cent over three years in increasingly bitter talks with the Department of Education and Training. She argued that staff were “exhausted” and students were being “short-changed” under a system which did not offer teaching as a “profession of choice”.
    
    "Another 2000 signatures were presented to South-West MLC Matt Benson and added to the existing petition of 4000 in support of the union’s stance.
    
    "Last night, teachers voted unanimously to uphold the union’s log of claims and condemn the Carpenter Government for its failure to deliver a fair offer in a timely fashion.
    
    "Ms Gisborne said teacher shortages could worsen if TAFE lecturers and primary and secondary school teachers continued to suffer."
    
    From The West Australian at link
    
    

Front Page photograph


  © The West Australian





• Op Ed
  Paper on indigenous schooling shines light on shortcomings of the decision-makers (page 21)
  by Tony Rutherford
  
  "Over the last few years, the Centre for Independent Studies in Sydney has very much blazed the trail in drawing attention to the unconscionable conditions of non-urban Aboriginals in the Northern Territory…."

  "Hughes cites the example of students entering the new Tiwi Islands College: out of 50 students about 70 per cent had a reading age of Year 1 or less. In another (unnamed) place, when the children were tested - at the parents' insistence and against the wishes of the Territory's Education Department - not one out of 27 children, aged from 5 to 17, showed a level of literacy higher than Year 1.

  "Not surprisingly, the department has stopped publishing performance results for remote indigenous students.

  "Many of the teachers at these schools hold inadequate qualifications. Among newly qualified teachers, there is a problem familiar to this State: new and inexperienced teachers are sent out with a promise of returning to civilisation after three years. And these teachers suffer from having learnt methods - such as "whole word" teaching of literacy - not very useful at best, but utterly inappropriate to the indigenous context.

  "Perhaps the worst is the curriculum devised for these children."

  "The all-too frequently assumption is that indigenous children cannot absorb language or mathematical skills unless they come framed as "culturally appropriate". This is plainly silly: their counterparts who attend mainstream schools in Darwin or Alice Springs cope perfectly well with a standard curriculum…"

  "Last week, Independent MP Liz Constable published the answers to questions put to the Government about staffing and course availability in public high schools. The information was fairly appalling.

  "As the subsequent story in The West Australian pointed out, 47 public high schools do not offer English literature in Years 11 and 12; more than 30 do not offer languages other than English; 23 schools do not offer Year 12 calculus. Three metropolitan high schools do not offer English literature, chemistry, physics, applicable maths and languages other than English.

  "As Dr Constable pointed out, this satisfies the community, "by giving the impression that kids at Shenton, Perth Modern and Churchlands SHS can do the subjects but not the kids at Busselton, Belmont or Kwinana because it's too hard and they don't need it…."
  "It would be bad enough if these problems were merely the result of the Education Department's ongoing staffing difficulties. In some cases that must be indeed the cause. And the Minister has defended the department's practice on the grounds that if there is no demand there is no point in offering the course - without stopping to ask why there might be no demand.

  "But it is also sadly true that many teachers have for some time now been almost unconsciously scaling back their expectations of what their students can do. They are helped in this by a curriculum which is plagued by passing fashions of relevance.

  "The notion that comics. Cartoons, text messaging and internet language are all equally valid with standard English and canonical literacy texts is just one example of this. At the level of both the school and the bureaucracy the assumption is growing that students from lower socioeconomic groups are destined to stay there.

  "The notion of challenging them, of making a difference, of offering unlimited opportunity, is dying.

  "As in the Northern Territory, choices about the future are narrowing.

  "The very idea that another Nobel prize winner might come from Kalgoorlie is now barely tenable.

  "The idea that one might come from the Tiwi Islands is not much less tenable, at least for the time being.

  "But there is a difference here: in the Territory, much of the pressure for change is coming from indigenous parents.

  "Oddly, they seem to have more determination than their white counterparts in Perth's suburbs."

  Full story in The West Australian
  
  

  
  
• Study finds hard maths a turn-off (page 18)
  by Bethany Hiatt

  "High school students are avoiding hard maths subjects because of a lack of qualified maths teachers, poor experiences in primary and lower school maths classes and because they can get better marks in less-demanding subjects, a new national report has found.

  "The report's authors warned that Australia could struggle to fill skilled jobs without a critical mass of young people with the requisite maths concepts to take up careers in science, technology and engineering.

  "They recommended that universities should offer bonus marks to students taking harder maths and called on governments to develop more incentives to get maths graduates into maths teaching and to keep them there.

  "The report, by the Australian Association of Mathematics Teachers and researchers from the University of New England, also found that students were deterred from taking higher level maths in Years 11 and 12 because of their perceptions of their own ability , irrelevant and shallow maths content and poor understanding of career options in the field.

  "The sad thing is that by not having higher mathematics, there are a number of really valuable and important careers for Australia that Australian children haven't got access to, such as engineering, anything in the sciences, being a maths teacher and economics," UNE academic John Pegg said.

  "We've got governments who are allowing teachers to teach in these areas who are not fully qualified."

  "Changes to university prerequisites meant more students were taking courses in engineering, science and technology without a solid foundation in maths," he said.

  "High school student culture had also changed, with more people doing part-time jobs rather than studying.

  "The number of children who have got part-time jobs is really quite amazing and that time doesn't come out of their social activities, it comes out of their study activities," he said.

  "Federal Education Minister Julia Gillard reiterated the Government would halve HECS fees from 2009 for university maths students when she released the report yesterday.

  "However, she did not offer any new funding to encourage more students to study advanced maths."

  From The West Australian
  
  Also see similar stories from The Australian over the past several days.
  
  
  

• The Australian
  
  
• Maths courses a minus: Gillard
  by Patricia Karvelas, Political correspondent
  
  "Students are being put off studying maths because teachers do not have enough expertise to teach it, courses are too dense, and there is not enough information about career opportunities.

  "Education Minister Julia Gillard said the results of a disturbing new study were not surprising, given that a quarter of junior secondary maths teachers had not completed one year of university study in the subject.

  "The report, titled Maths? Why Not?, prepared by the Australian Association of Mathematics Teachers and the University of New England with funding of $57,400 from the federal Government, was released yesterday. [Report not yet available on the AAMT website. Web]

  "It highlights key factors that deter students from studying higher-level maths in senior secondary years, including negative experiences of junior secondary maths, poor perceptions of their own ability, and lack of understanding of career options in the field.

  "The report finds a key factor in deterring students is the number of secondary teachers who are teaching maths even though it is outside their training and expertise, making it difficult to engage students in a potentially demanding subject.

  "The report found syllabus and curriculum frameworks contained so much content they did not leave sufficient time for the consolidation of understanding and knowledge.

  "And the heavy student workloads associated with higher-level maths courses also deterred students.

  "The report was critical of teaching and learning practices that did not adequately support the learning of mathematics from primary school through to secondary school.

  "Pedagogical approaches do not engage students because teachers are often required to teach outside their area of expertise," it says.

  "Another problem is that subject choices are based more on their mark potential for university tertiary entrance scores than on their preparation for tertiary study.

  "The report found university information lacked clarity or was ambiguous about the prerequisites needed to undertake mathematics-rich courses.

  "Career advice gave students an incomplete picture of the options from maths, the study found.

  "Ms Gillard said that to ensure the nation's productivity and competitiveness in the global knowledge economy, the anti-maths trend must be reversed.

  "We must ensure an interest in maths is inspired in our youth, who will provide the skills vital for our nation's future wellbeing," she said.

  "To encourage more people to study maths at university, from 2009 the Rudd Government will halve the HECS fees for new maths students while they are studying and then halve the HECS repayments of maths graduates if they take up work in a relevant maths occupation, particularly teaching."

  "She said the new National Curriculum Board would play a key role in responding to the report's finding that overcrowded maths curriculums hindered school students in learning maths."

  From The Australian at link
  
  
  
• Op Ed
  Bring on the reading revolution
  by Janet Albrechtsen
  
  "If the steady stream of dismal statistics has numbed the national consciousness about indigenous educational failures, consider this.
  
  "In remote learning centres - note they are not even called schools - Mem Fox's picture book Wombat Divine was the only book used to teach literacy to indigenous children from years 1 to 10 during the final term in 2005. As Helen Hughes, professor emeritus at the Australian National University and a senior fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies, revealed in a paper released on Monday, indigenous students were taught to read by guessing whole words.

  "Is it any wonder that statistics tell us that pitifully few indigenous children learn how to read? Surely, then, an education revolution starts at the most basic level: when children learn to read.

  "As a Labor Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd is uniquely placed to bury some enduring myths about Aboriginal education in general and the teaching of reading in particular.

  "The comparisons and anecdotes in Hughes's paper tell a bleak story in a way statistics never can. The present generation of indigenous children is less literate than that of their grandparents, who attended missionary schools. Immigrants receive better instruction in English than indigenous children.

  "Is it any wonder that, as Hughes reports, "two bright, well-brought-up girls of 15 and 16 who had attended the Homeland Learning Centre where Wombat Divine had been a text for (years) 9 and 10 respectively could not read The Cat in the Hat, write a paragraph describing their journey from East Arnhem Land to Sydney without assistance with almost every word, did not know when to use capital letters, thought there were 100 minutes in the hour, did not know how many weeks there are in a year, how many grams in a kilogram, how to divide a piece of material in two or how to add, let alone subtract, numbers higher than 10".

  "None of this is accidental. It is the result of deliberate policies that gave primacy to culture above all else. Put it down to an indulgence by anthropologists wanting to freeze indigenous people in time so they could study them. Put it down to education bureaucrats who believed that a mainstream education did not suit indigenous children.

  "Make no mistake: as Hughes concludes, indigenous children have been the victims of educational apartheid. About the time that assimilation became a dirty word, indigenous education went into free fall, dragged down by cultural imperatives that sidelined educational outcomes. Nowhere is that disaster better illustrated than in the teaching of reading.

  "Indigenous students are taught to read in a "culturally appropriate way". Apparently, culturally appropriate reading means exposing indigenous children to a pretty picture book about a wombat. Fox is a fine Australian author. Her books, such as Wombat Divine, have delighted thousands of children. She is a strong advocate that if a parent reads good books to their child, that child will learn to read. But reciting and reading are different skills.

  "It is here that Fox's influence as a vocal critic of phonics has not served children well. And it has proven disastrous for the most disadvantaged, those children without the luxury of a home full of books and parents who read to them.

  "Indigenous schools remain caught in the whole-word educational fad favoured by so-called progressive educators. For too long, those who control education in this country have derided phonics as the preferred reading method of conservatives. They treated the basic tool of teaching sounds that make up words as a throwback to the conservative 1950s.

  "Education luminaries such as Brian Cambourne said phonics was a tool to maintain prevailing power structures. The so-called progressive '70s could do better by students, they said. For Cambourne, literacy needed to be re-framed as a social movement that could be used to challenge the political status quo. Mundane tools such as learning the sounds that comprise the words on a page were dumped in favour of teaching students to think critically.

  "However, progress did not follow. It is difficult to think critically about a piece of writing if one cannot read fluently. Children are expected to memorise whole words, learn to read as if by osmosis, without knowing the basic building blocks. When learning basic skills was sidelined, children suffered. And disadvantaged children suffered the most. It is nothing short of reprehensible that our most disadvantaged students are subjected to such illogical reading instruction.

  "Learning to read starts with the most basic of basics. Phonics teaches children the one-letter, two-letter and three-letter sounds that make up words. They learn how to read and how to solve problems by thinking logically. Confronted with a new word, a child trained in phonics will break it down into sound blocks. By building it back up with those sounds they can decipher the word. If working out how to read a new word is empowering for a four-year-old, it is critical for a 17-year-old.

  "Yet those schools that say they teach a balance of whole word and phonics have, in essence, sidelined any systematic teaching of phonics. How could it be otherwise given that teachers are themselves not taught how to teach phonics in any meaningful way?

  "The biggest hurdle to reform is ideology. The left-wing teachers unions have become the latter-day equivalent of the Maritime Union of Australia, blocking sensible reform at every step. Be it phonics or merit-based pay, a notion that most teachers support, or greater freedom for principals in the hiring and firing of teachers, unions have blocked reform, preferring a cushy status quo. And their so-called progressive barrackers in the universities that teach the teachers are with them all the way.

  "As the leader of a Labor Government, Rudd can make a difference to the next generation of indigenous children. The PM has a unique chance to tackle the critics in a way the Howard government never could. When the Howard government spoke of the importance of phonics, critics regarded it as some conservative conspiracy aimed at keeping people in their place and dulling their critical senses. It never made sense, of course. Critical faculties tend to improve most when people learn to read well and enjoy reading.

  "And just imagine if Julia Gillard, the education revolution minister from the Labor Party's left faction no less, chose to confront the ideological critics of phonics? If Rudd and Gillard are serious about an education revolution, let it begin in the classrooms of indigenous children. Let it begin by telling it like it is. Learning the sounds that make up words is not a politically driven agenda. It is about literacy. It is the key to social mobility. Until that small step is taken, indigenous children will continue to suffer."

  From The Australian at link
  
  
  
  
• Op Ed
  Good science isn't about consensus
  by Professor Don Aitkin
  
  Australia is faced, over the next generation at least and almost certainly much longer, with two environmental problems of great significance. They are, first, how to manage water and, second, how to find acceptable alternatives to oil-based energy. Global warming is not one of those two issues, at least for me, and I see it as a distraction.
  
  
  
• Op Ed
  Two awful truths
  by Gavin Moody
  
  "Guy Healy's report that universities have handed back a total of 4,041 places since the Commonwealth Grant Scheme was introduced in 2005 discloses two awful truths. And the full picture is probably worse than that reported by Healy.
  
  "A university has two options if it does not fill its target for Commonwealth-supported student load for a year. It could conclude that its failure to fill its target load was a temporary blip and it could still aim to fill its target in the future. The result would be that the university would lose funding for the unfilled places for a year, but it would return to its planned funding level if it filled its planned student load in subsequent years.

  "Alternatively, the university could conclude that it is unlikely to be able to fill its target load in the medium term and ‘hand back’ places to the Commonwealth, permanently reducing its planned student load and funding level.

  "Healy’s report of universities handing back 4,041 places seems to cover the second option, but not the first option where universities have failed to fill their Commonwealth targets temporarily for a year. So the total unfilled Commonwealth funded student load is likely to be rather higher than 4,041 places since 2005.

  "This leads us to the first awful truth, that publicly funded higher education has not been able to maintain its popularity in the face of competition from employment and competition from private providers offering privately funded places backed and subsidised by the Australian Government’s Fee-help loan scheme.

  "For the second awful truth we need to note that the Australian Government gives universities not only a student load target but also a funding target. A university might suffer a fall in demand from engineering and science students but still fill its total student load target by enrolling more business and law students. The Australian Government contributes $14,363 towards each engineering and science place but only $1,674 towards each business and law place. A university that fills a shortfall in engineering and science students with business and law students may meet its student load target but it will miss its funding target and the Australian Government will cut its funding accordingly.

  "The second awful truth is that many universities have probably failed to meet their funding target, that the funding targets introduced by former education minister Brendan Nelson were probably unworkable even in the best of circumstances, but that the public still doesn’t know for sure because the Commonwealth still hasn’t published its higher education report for 2006, let alone for 2007. The Commonwealth’s delay in publishing its higher education reports is very poor practice and undermines the sector’s accountability."

  From The Australian at link
  
  
  
• School rampage accused in court
  
  The teenage gang members charged with rampaging through a western Sydney school planned further criminal activities after their arrest, police said yesterday.

  The five boys, aged from 14 to 16, have been charged with a combined total of 101 offences after they allegedly attacked Merrylands High School on Monday morning.
  

  • The Age: High school attackers glorify violence on the net
    
    
    
    
• Letters to the Editor: Why must they be defined by traditional culture?

Thursday 10 April

• Department of Education and Training Media Statement
  
  
  • Department asks IRC to act as independent umpire in teacher pay dispute
    
    The Department of Education and Training today made an application asking the Western Australia Industrial Relations Commission to formally determine appropriate salaries and conditions for teachers and administrators in public schools.
    
    This follows seven months of negotiations with the State School Teachers’ Union for a replacement enterprise bargaining agreement.
    
    Director General Sharyn O’Neill said the progress of the negotiations had been slow and the Department had formed the view that there is no prospect of the parties reaching agreement.
    
    “I am concerned that if we do not bring in a neutral umpire now, there is a potential for relations between the Union and the Department to deteriorate to an extent which would not be in the interest of teachers and schools,” she said.
    
    “The protracted negotiations have frustrated many people, including teachers.
    
    “It is important that schools continue to function effectively and harmoniously.
    
    “I do not want there to be a situation where children’s experiences at schools could be affected by these protracted negotiations with no agreement in sight.
    
    “That is why asking the IRC to act as an independent umpire is the best move forward for everybody.”
    
    
    
    
• SSTUWA Media Statement
  
  
  • Negotiating in Good Faith
    
    Less than 24 hours after the Minister for Education and Training Mark McGowan told a rally of over 2000 teachers that he and his Department were "negotiating in good faith" they have walked away from negotiations on the EBA for teachers and administrators and dumped the entire process in the hands of the WA Industrial Relations Commission.
    
    President of the State School Teachers' Union of WA, Ms Anne Gisborne said tonight that it was bitterly disappointing - but not surprising.
    
    "Throughout this entire protracted series of talks the issues have been blurred with misinformation and misleading statements from the Minister and an unwillingness to recognize the depth of feeling amongst the employees of the Department," she added.
    
    "At the same time the Minister has hidden the Twomey Report, a document that he commissioned in a bid to get information about teacher retirements, the teacher shortage and why teachers in Western Australia are unhappy, and strategies and solutions to these problems" said Ms Gisborne.
    
    Ms Gisborne said that the Minister and the Department had simply refused to try and understand that issues like planning and preparation time for primary teachers and administrators, workload, class sizes and student behavior are major issues - and that with increased interest rates and increased costs of living, teachers' wages have effectively fallen.
    
    We know that this arbitration process will be protracted. It will have the Department pitted against its employees, in dispute over the veracity of the claims being put forward, and lead to a further deterioration in the relationships between the Department and teachers and administrators.
    
    "The actions of the Department and the Minister will simply result in greater dissatisfaction amongst teachers with the potential for more early resignations and a greater teacher shortage," said Ms Gisborne.
    Ms Gisborne said that she was exceptionally concerned about the impact that the dispute will have on students and their learning.
    
    Authorised by David A Kelly, General Secretary, State School Teachers' Union of WA, 150 Adelaide Terrace, East Perth
    Union President Anne Gisborne is available on 0413 995 020
    
    
    
    
• ABC News
  
  
  • Teachers dispute referred for arbitration
    
    "The Education Department has referred the teachers pay dispute to the Industrial Relations Commission for arbitration.

    "State school teachers have asked for a 20 per cent pay rise over three years as well as smaller class sizes and more preparation time.

    "Negotiations have stalled, with the government unwilling to offer more than 13 per cent and the Education Department says after seven months, there is no resolution in sight.

    "Teachers are asking for a 20 per cent pay rise over three years and improved working conditions.

    "The Director General of Education Sharyn O'Neill says it is time for the independent umpire to step in.

    "Look I understand that people have been frustrated, teachers have been frustrated, parents have been frustrated about moving this issue forward," she said.

    "That's exactly why I want to put it in the hands of an independent umpire so that we can get a good deal, we can get on with it, get on with education."

    "The Union's Anne Gisborne will fight moves by the department to end the bargaining period.

    "Whilst the commission will obviously attempt to balance the interest of both parties, the commission and the commissioner are not involved in education and we would argue that the best people in the best position to come to some satisfactory resolution are people who can talk the language of education," she said."

    From ABC News at link
    
    
    
  • Premier apologises for minister
    
    
    • "Ethnic branch stacker" a common phrase: McGowan
      
      "Now Mr Speaker for people who are unaware of that of course I am sorry for people who are unaware of that and have taken offence to that of course I am sorry," [McGowan] said.
      
      
      
      
• The West Australian
  
  
  • Inside Cover (page 2)
    Chalkie's way with words
    
    "Graeme Gillespie loved The West Australian's front page photo of 2000 teachers protesting outside Parliament House, including an angry chalkie holding a placard that accused Education Minister Mark "Sneakers" McGowan of being mendacious. "I can't imagine it being held up at a CFMEU rally," mused Graeme. "They'd just have 'you lying bastard McGowan'."
    
    "Same meaning of course."
    
    From The West Australian

  
  
  © The West Australian
  
  
  

  Also (page 6):
  
  
  © The West Australian
  
  Premier apologises for minister
  ABC News
  
  
  

  • First WA schools under the Spotlight [page 19 in some editions]

    "Armadale and Carnarvon Senior High are the first State schools to be put under the spotlight by a new expert group set up to overhaul struggling schools. Department of Education and Training director-general Sharyn O'Neill said the expert review group would outline strategies for improvement in the schools it works with, especially those which could be performing better. "Previously school reviews were carried out at the local level by a district director working with the school over a two-year period," she said. "The new review process is about a group of experts, including the State's most senior principals and educators, working with school principals, staff and communities to achieve high standards in targeted areas within each school." The review would analyse data, including student achievement results from Statewide literacy and numeracy testing and management of student behaviour, in the five days they spent at each school. Report findings will be made public." [Good to know that in five days the experts will come in and sort out you lot... Web]

    From The West Australian [some editions only]
    
    
    

• The Australian
  
  
  • Op Ed
    Debate will stick to ALP script
    by Kevin Donnelly
    
    "I did not apply to join Kevin Rudd's 2020 Summit nor was I invited, but I had assumed it was being held to foster open and spirited debate on the burning issues of the day.

    "That was until I read the summit background paper entitled Education, Skills and the Productivity Agenda. The loaded title alone is enough to show that the conference has been organised to mimic the Rudd Government's agenda, with little scope given to those who might disagree.

    "The first mistake is to define education in terms of its economic and utilitarian value.

    "Education, instead of being dealt with in its own right, is valued for its ability to contribute to "prosperity, productivity and global competitiveness", completely ignoring the cultural role of learning or the need to give young Australians a strong and enduring ethical and spiritual framework.

    "The paper's arguments for early childhood education and the need for investment to overcome disadvantage simply mirrors ALP policy documents released before the federal election.

    "Why go to the trouble and expense of organising a summit to endorse policies that have already been agreedto?

    "There is more evidence that the summit is more about spin than substance in the way contested issues are presented as if they are settled beyond dispute. It is accepted as given that early childhood education is good, that more government investment is essential, that Australian students perform well and that educational disadvantage is pronounced.

    "Yet those following the early childhood education debate in Britain will know that experts such as Steve Biddulph and Penelope Leach argue that formal day care is often counterproductive, both financially and in terms of child and family wellbeing.

    "The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development's Education at a Glance 2007 and the McKinsey report How the World's Best-performing School Systems Come Out on Top agree that more investment is not the solution and that there are more effective ways to raise standards.

    "Other claims in the briefing paper are simply disingenuous. It claims, for example, that "at primary and secondary level, Australian students perform well compared to their international peers", but cites only one test result, the Program for International Student Assessment 2003 test organised by the OECD. Not only do the more recent 2006 PISA results show Australian students dropping from second to sixth place on the literacy ladder, but the more credible Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study tests, carried out in 1995, 1999 and 2003 in Years 4 and 8, consistently place Australian students in the second XI when it comes to performance.

    "Deputy Prime Minister and Education Minister Julia Gillard argues that Australia's education system reinforces disadvantage and the summit background paper argues "there are wide variations across sectors, socioeconomic status and culture" when it comes to performance.

    "Once again, the facts prove otherwise. Based on research undertaken by Unicef investigating how effective education systems are in reducing disadvantage and published in a 2002 report, Australia is ranked fifth out of 24 countries.

    "Based on the 2006 PISA results, in the words of Geoff Masters, the head of the Australian Council for Educational Research, "the relationship between socioeconomic background and student achievement in Australia is weaker than the OECD average; Australia is high quality-high equity".

    "One way to determine if an event like the 2020 Summit is rigged is to ask what has been excluded from the agenda. From what the background paper and related questions leave out, it is clear that the summit is biased towards a predetermined outcome. Incredibly, the summit paper fails to address the question of what should be taught in our classrooms.

    "Debates about Australia's adoption of a substandard, politically correct curriculum, best illustrated by Tasmania's Essential Learnings and Western Australia's introduction of outcomes-based education at Years 11 and 12, are conveniently ignored.

    "Also missing is any hint of discussion on rescuing schools from provider capture or what we can learn from the world's best education systems when developing a national curriculum.

    "And the fundamental question of the purpose of education in an age when many of the young are disengaged and culturally illiterate is not on the agenda."

    Kevin Donnelly is director of Melbourne-based Education Strategies and author of Dumbing Down (Hardie Grant Books).

    From The Australian at link
    
    
    
    
• The Age
  
  
  • Teachers hit at Brumby plan
    by Farrah Tomazin
    

    KEY POINTS

    • Teachers and the Government fail to broker a wage deal despite the education union softening its demands.
    • The Government plans to air its big five-year shake-up but teachers say they won't co-operate.
      

  "Premier John Brumby's bid to overhaul Victoria's education system has been dealt a blow by public and private school teachers boycotting the plan in pursuit of a better wage deal.

  "The move comes after negotiations between teachers and the Government yesterday failed to broker a new wage deal — despite the union softening its pay claim of 30% over three years to a claim of pay parity with NSW.

  "Teacher unions representing private and public schools will today refuse to take part in an education summit designed by the Government to spruik its "education blueprint" — an ambitious five-year strategy to tackle student underperformance, revamp child-care services and make schools more accountable for their results.

  "The blueprint paves the way for a shake-up in education and early childhood development. Proposals include: giving top teachers financial incentives to work in underperforming schools; encouraging disengaged teachers to find jobs elsewhere; giving parents unprecedented information on how their schools perform; and requiring anyone who works in child care to get a proper qualification.

  "Australian Education Union branch president Mary Bluett warned it would be "arrogant in the extreme" for Mr Brumby to expect teachers to implement his proposed reforms without paying them more money.

  "If Brumby is not prepared to recognise the past contribution of teachers and principals to delivering on his government's agenda, then he cannot expect our support," Ms Bluett said.

  "The Government and teachers — the lowest paid in the country — have been fighting over pay and working conditions for 18 months.

  "The Government has so far only offered 3.25% a year.

  "Ms Bluett said yesterday that the union had changed its position to a claim for pay parity with NSW where teachers earn 15% more at the top of the scale and 9.5% more at the bottom of the scale. She said it was critical to bridge the gap before the start of school next year if schools were to retain and attract teachers in Victoria.

  "It is believed the union was prepared to give ground on its claim to lower class sizes to 20 students a class to get a better wage deal.

  "Education Minister Bronwyn Pike remained tight-lipped about negotiations yesterday.

  "Asked if the Government was prepared to accept the union's refined position, her spokeswoman, Emma Stenhouse, said: "We are pleased that negotiations are taking place and progressing well. We won't be publicly discussing individual aspects of the negotiations."

  "Without an improved wage offer, teachers will step up their campaign from next week."

  From The Age at link
  
  

• The Independent
  
  
  • University degrees are a waste of time – the damning verdict of British students
    
    Undergraduates fear that the Government's drive to get half of young people into university will make degrees worthless and leave them struggling to get a good job after graduation, an official report revealed yesterday.

Friday 11 April

• The West Australian
  
  
  • Teacher pay row risks new courses (page 17)
    by Bethany Hiatt

    "Teachers have threatened to ban the implementation of more than 30 Year 11 courses due to start next year if the State Government does not produce a satisfactory pay offer by the end of June.

    "State School Teachers Union members at Applecross Senior High have called on the union to extend its ban on unpaid overtime to stop preparation for the courses.

    "If a satisfactory enterprise bargaining agreement is not in place by June 23, 2008, then members refuse to implement the new courses in 2009 - regardless of when the EBA is reached," their motion says.

    "The West Australian understands other union branches are drafting similar motions which will be considered by the union's executive next week.

    "A head of department at Applecross said teachers would have to do a lot of unpaid "overtime to get so many new courses ready for next year but the union's current ban on extra work made this impossible.

    "Even though some school time had been set aside for the courses, it would not cover all that needed to be done, including writing programs, lesson plans and assessment items and attending faculty meetings after school. If a new pay offer was not finalised by June, it would be too late.

    "I don't have a problem with implementing the courses as such but I don't want staff to be faced with a very short time line because the kids will be the losers in all this," he said. His motion was backed unanimously by about 30 Applecross teachers.

    "The proposed boycott could derail the start of courses such as geography, history, literature and chemistry which have already been postponed twice.

    "The push to ban all work on new courses comes as the Department of Education and Training attempts to pull out of pay talks and resort to arbitration.

    "Director-general Sharyn O'Neill has made and application asking the WA Industrial Relations Commission to formally determine teachers' salaries and conditions. Ms O'Neill said that after seven month of negotiations the department had decided there was "no prospect of the parties reaching agreement". The WAIRC is yet to decide whether the dispute should go to arbitration.

    "SSTU president Anne Gisborne said the union would fight the application to end the bargaining period. Going to arbitration had the potential to pit the department against its employees and was likely to further delay a resolution.

    "Ms Gisborne said "directive one" - which bans members from doing any unpaid overtime - would continue in term two but she could not comment on the push to block preparation for new courses. Options for industrial action would also be considered next week.

    "Education Minister Mark McGowan declined to comment." [emphasis added]

    From The West Australian
    
    

    
    
  • Letter to the Editor (page 22)
    
    
    • In Short

      "Mark McGowan showed his true colours when he fronted the teachers' rally at Parliament House on Tuesday. He was ineffectual, inadequate and downright insulting. His performance has hardened the resolve of teachers in the government system to hold out for what they so rightly deserve - fair pay and fair working conditions. It is the very same system that let me down because of a recruitment process that defies logic and caused me to seek a teaching position in the private system. If you think there is a teacher shortage now, you ain't seen nothing yet."

      Lisa Thomas, Perth
      
      
      

• The Age
  
  
  • Pouring money into schools 'doesn't work'
    by Farrah Tomazin
    
    "The man who helped radically overhaul the British education system has warned the State Government that pouring billions of dollars into schools and reducing class sizes won't be enough to lift underperformance.

    "Instead, Premier John Brumby should improve teaching quality and make sure resources are properly directed to where they are needed most, according to Sir Michael Barber, a former leading adviser to then British prime minister Tony Blair.

    "The first lesson is that just spending money — and more and more of it — doesn't work. It's all about how that money is spent that makes the difference," Sir Michael said.

    "And simply reducing student-teacher ratios, or simply increasing the spend per student doesn't work either … It may be a good thing to keep student-teacher ratios down, but on its own, it won't make a difference."

    "Sir Michael was speaking via video-link to an audience of senior Government figures and leading education experts at a summit in Melbourne yesterday.

    "Hosted by Education Minister Bronwyn Pike and Children's Minister Maxine Morand, the summit was held to spruik the Government's new "education blueprint" — a five-year strategy designed to lift student achievement, boost child-care services, and make schools more accountable for their results.

    "Proposals include giving top teachers financial incentives to work in struggling schools, removing bored teachers from the classroom, giving parents new information to compare schools, and making every child-care worker get a proper qualification.

    "But Sir Michael — now the head of leading consultancy firm McKinsey's Global Education Practice — urged the Government to sharpen its focus on improving its teachers, telling the two ministers: "The quality of an education system cannot exceed the quality of its teachers." [emphasis added]

    "And unless Victoria had a highly effective education system, socio-economic differences would continue to have a significant impact on how students performed, he said.

    "The Government's blueprint paves the way for a massive shake-up in schools and early childhood development in Victoria. But it has already proved contentious, with the public and private school teacher unions boycotting yesterday's summit in protest at their wages and working conditions.

    "The Government and Victorian teachers have been at loggerheads for the past 18 months over pay. Despite three state-wide teacher strikes and weeks of rolling stoppages, the Government is yet to move from its offer of an annual 3.25% increase, well short of the teachers' push for pay parity with NSW.

    "Handing out leaflets to summit guests outside the Grand Hyatt, the Victorian Independent Education Union general secretary, Deb James, said it was a "bit rich" for the Government to expect teachers to support the proposed reforms without giving them a much-needed pay rise.

    "Opposition education spokesman Martin Dixon said the new blueprint was an admission that the Government's first wave of school reforms, launched in 2003, had failed, especially in boosting teacher quality.

    "While the key to a world-class education system was attracting and retaining the best and brightest teachers, "the opposite is happening here in Victoria," Mr Dixon said. But Ms Pike said the Government was serious about education being its "number one priority". "They aren't just mere words or some kind of glib tag-line," she said."

    From The Age at link
    
    
    
  • Cuts take toll on 'overworked' Melbourne Uni staff
    
    Increased workloads and stress among Melbourne University staff has raised questions about the university's call for more voluntary redundancies in the embattled arts faculty.
    
    
    
    
• The Sydney Morning Herald
  
  
  • Computer needs of schools kept secret
    by Yuko Narushima
    
    "The Federal Government is refusing to say which schools were eligible for the first round of its computer giveaway because to do so would flag the country's most inadequately resourced schools. [And that would look bad for State Labor Governments? Web]
    
    "A national audit identified 937 secondary schools as most in need of funding after it found senior students there had to share computers with seven or more other people.

    "We have collected initial audit data and identified the schools most in need," a spokeswoman for the Minister for Education, Julia Gillard, said yesterday. "We didn't feel we had a right to advertise which schools had a ratio of one computer for eight students or worse."

    "But the Opposition spokesman on education, Tony Smith, said the secrecy was motivated by a desire to protect state Labor ministers who would be embarrassed by the list.

    "[It also] makes a mockery of Kevin Rudd's promise of open and accountable government," he said. "Parents have a right to know what is really going on at their child's school and what resources are actually available." ...
    
    Full story in The Sydney Morning Herald at link
    
    
    

• The Australian
  
  
  • Stop-gap jobs 'ruin career chances'
    by Rosemary Bennett
    

    "Graduates who take stop-gap jobs after leaving university can get so depressed by the boredom of their work that they damage their proper career chances, according to British research.

    "They would be better off staying on the dole, the study says. After nine months of low-grade work, the British graduates were more distressed, less motivated and more likely to fall into depression than those who were unemployed.

    "Motivation was so low among graduates who had typically taken jobs in restaurants, shops or lower-level clerical work that they had mostly given up hope of getting into their chosen profession.

    "Those who were not working remained far more optimistic that they would soon get the break they needed to start their career.

    "The findings run contrary to the received wisdom that people are always better off in work, whatever the job."...

    Full story in The Australian at link
    
    

  
  
  • Review to reverse skills shortage [late update from April 10]
    AAP
    

    "The federal Government's review of higher education aims to increase productivity and ease the skills shortage, Employment Participation Minister Brendan O'Connor says.

    "Addressing the Higher Education HR conference in Sydney today, Mr O'Connor said the review announced last month by Education Minister Julia Gillard would reverse the skills shortage.

    "It would look at creating high performance institutions and improving the sector's contribution to increased economic productivity and labour market participation, he said.

    “Increasing productivity will be critical for Australia in the coming years, particularly under the cloud of the current skills shortage,” Mr O'Connor said.

    “A lack of investment by the former Liberal government in education and training has left our nation with the biggest shortages in labour ever experienced.”

    "The review would also look at improving university funding arrangements, allow wider access to higher education for students from all backgrounds and ensure high education standards, he said.

    “Our Government knows the education system is important not only for its contribution to the economy but also in building critical thinking and giving us a better understanding of our place in the world,” Mr O'Connor said."

    From The Australian at link
    
    
    

• Letter to the Editor
  
  
  • Education prospects remote
    
    "Education in the remote indigenous communities of the Northern Territory is a complex social undertaking.

    "As one of the many providers of education in such communities, the Catholic education system has been alarmed by the decline in literacy and numeracy rates in remote indigenous communities throughout the Northern Territory over the past 20 years (``Bring on the reading revolution’’, 9/4).

    "If students do not attend school at least 80per cent of the time, then they have little chance of achieving adequate outcomes but the average attendance by students in most remote communities ranges from 50 per cent to 70 per cent.

    "And there is little or no literacy and numeracy support at home.

    "Think too, of the impact of communities’ dysfunction on the idealism and performance of the teachers.

    "They have to deal with remoteness, an unfamiliar cultural setting, loneliness, irregularity of student attendance and disillusionment from a lack of tangible results. If the solution to the decline in literacy and numeracy were as simple as it must seem to academics and the general public who live several thousand kilometers away, the problem would have been solved long ago."
    
    Michael Avery, director, Catholic Education NT
    Father Malcolm Fyfe, Chairman, NT Catholic Education Council, Berrimah, NT

 

• The Washington Post
  
  
  • 700 Teachers Are Offered Buyout
    by V. Dion Haynes
    
    Longtime Educators Would Receive $20,000 Bonus to Leave System This Year
    
    "D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee said yesterday that the school system will offer buyouts to as many as 700 teachers nearing retirement or working at 50 schools slated either for closure or an academic overhaul.

    "In introducing the program, called the Teacher Transition Award, city and school leaders said they recognize the widespread uncertainty expressed by many teachers over what likely will be a tumultuous new school year. In the fall, Rhee plans to close 23 schools and reorganize 27 others where students have repeatedly lagged on the system's standardized tests, two initiatives that are expected to displace numerous teachers..."
    
    Full story in The Washington Post at link
    
    
    

• The Independent
  
  
  • Schools should be free to have big classes [late pickup from 10 April]
    
    The National Union of Teachers is threatening to strike unless the Government introduces a legal maximum class size of 20. Meanwhile, schools minister Jim Knight was booed at another teaching union conference when he suggested that larger classes might sometimes be acceptable, leading to predictable groans that the Government favoured "classes of 70".

Saturday – Sunday, 12 – 13 April

• The Sunday Times
  
  
  • Teacher assaults up 23pc in WA schools
    by Paul Lampathakis
    
    "Nearly three teachers and other staff are assaulted by students each day in Western Australian schools, with reported attacks jumping by 23 per cent on last year.

    "The Education Department confirmed this week there were 511 such violent incidents in public schools in 2007, compared with 415 in 2006.

    "The department said the violence related to all school staff, including teachers, education assistants, administration staff, ground staff and cleaners.

    "The teachers' union insisted the number of incidents was still highly under-reported, and that teachers were the most common victims.

    "On a daily basis, teachers are spat on, bitten and hit,'' WA State School Teachers' Union president Anne Gisborne said.

    "This behaviour goes from the pre-primary teacher who's bitten or hit... up to the high school teacher who has a knife drawn on them.

    "It's shocking to think that children as young as four and five are also inclined to use violence.

    "Schools are a microcosm of the community that reflect the escalating violence and bullying occurring in the wider community. It's something that is happening in private schools, too.''

    "Ms Gisborne said special education teachers were particularly vulnerable, and while official figures were high, the "real numbers'' were much higher.

    "Under-reporting was rife because some teachers were so accustomed to violence they no longer complained, while some schools discouraged reporting.

    "She backed Education Minister Mark McGowan's push for more parental responsibility.
    
    "But Ms Gisborne added Mr McGowan also needed to recognise the level of violence and dedicate more resources to the problem.

    "Opposition education spokesman Peter Collier called for an automatic one-week suspension for students who assaulted teachers, so staff would be immediately protected.

    "It's every teacher's legitimate expectation that they should be able to attend their school on the understanding that it is a safe working environment,'' he said.

    "These figures make it is obvious that the Education Department is not doing enough to protect our teachers.

    "Is it any wonder that we have a teachers shortage?''

    "Mr Collier applauded the establishment of new behaviour management centres, but said they only catered for a "minute number of students''.

    "He said discipline was out of control in public schools, evidenced by the fact that 10,468 students were suspended in 2007 -- up 37.6 per cent on 2004. [emphasis added]

    "Education Department deputy director-general of schools Margery Evans said the department had a "no tolerance'' stance on violence in its 770 public schools.

    "More than $16.5 million was spent yearly on behaviour management and discipline strategies, while schools had to develop behaviour management programs.

    "The department had also set up three trial behaviour management centres where secondary students with the most challenging behaviour were removed from their schools and put into special educational programs.

    "Mr McGowan said the Government's zero tolerance approach to violent and extreme behaviour was evidenced by the increase in suspensions at state schools.

    "He said Mr Collier's one-week suspension approach was simplistic because students in special needs schools and centres would also be kicked out when their behaviour was "often beyond their control and understandable''."

    From The Sunday Times at link [Also read / post comments at that link]
    
    
    
    
• The Age [Saturday]
  
  
  • Gillard push for parents to get details on school performance
    by Farrah Tomazin
    
    "The Federal Government will push the states to give parents unprecedented information on how schools perform, in one of the first tests of co-operative federalism in education.

    "Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard will use her first education ministers meeting in Melbourne next week to discuss plans for a more comprehensive reporting system.

    "Ms Gillard told The Age she wanted all schools to be accountable for their results, and raised concerns parents weren't getting enough reliable information on how their schools perform.

    "I think we need to understand in a much more sophisticated way what's going on in schools," Ms Gillard said. "And I think the more information that enables people to understand it in a sophisticated way, the better."

    "The Government plans to publish the annual results of individual primary and secondary schools on national literacy and numeracy tests, which begin next month, for students in grades 3, 5, 7 and 9.

    "It will also talk to the states about measuring how schools "add value" to students, and is keen for a reporting system that reflects the challenges faced by each school, for instance through socioeconomic data, or trends between similar schools.

    "While Ms Gillard insisted the plan would not result in "league tables" that could name and shame schools, principals and teachers fear that could be an unwanted consequence.

    "We would oppose any system that unfairly stigmatises schools," Victorian Principals Association president Fred Ackerman said.

    "Asked if improved reporting could pave the way for league tables, Ms Gillard said: "I don't think that's an appropriate term, and I don't think that's what's being discussed.

    "What is being discussed is people getting appropriate and reliable information about the education system, and information about what's happening at their local school."

    "Thursday's education ministers meeting will be a testing ground for the new era of cooperative federalism in education between the states and the Commonwealth. Under the former government, state ministers often rejected the proposals of the education minister, who would threaten to withhold funding from their schools.

    "Ms Gillard's meeting is expected to be more collaborative than those in recent years. In Victoria, a new reporting regime is unlikely to be resisted by the Brumby Government — which has made greater school transparency a key feature of its five-year "education blueprint" announced last week — provided schools aren't unfairly stigmatised.

    "It's about being a bit more sophisticated and giving parents additional information," state Education Minister Bronwyn Pike said.

    "Australian State Secondary Principals Association president Andrew Blair said he supported giving parents more information, "provided schools are given increased resources to achieve improved outcomes".

    "Victorian Principals Association president Fred Ackerman said that in addition to performance data and "value-add" information, school funding and socio-economic details should be published to give parents a clearer picture as to why (or why not) their school was doing well."

    From The Age at link
    
    Similar story in The Sydney Morning Herald
    
    
    
    
  • Teachers in bid to boost religious tolerance
    
    Teachers from Muslim and Christian high schools are working on a shared curriculum to combat religious stereotypes and promote tolerance among students.
    
    
    
    
  • Students get their say in the future
    
    As part of the 2020 Summit, students at more than 500 schools across the country took part in their own mini-summits, discussing everything from indigenous health and education to how to tackle an ageing population.
    
    
    
    
• The West Australian
  
  
  • Editorial
    Gillard should come clean on computers for schools (page 20)

    "Education Minister Julia Gillard is being less than frank with the Australian people about the Federal Government's computers-for-schools giveaway, which was a key election promise.

    "She refused this week to name the schools that would be the first to benefit - those that have the biggest needs - and has been evasive about some costs that may have to be met by the States.

    "She should not have to be told that taxpayers are entitled to know how their money is spent, even if this might embarrass the States with the neediest schools."

    From The West Australian
    
    

  • Letters to the Editor (page 23)

    There were several letters slamming Education Minister Mark McGowan's racial outburst. They have no direct link to education issues and were not considered worth typing in their entirety. But I couldn't resist including this one:

    • Slur on poodles
      
      "I was very perturbed to see the headline (10/4) in which Mark McGowan was labelled the "Premier's poodle". While I usually appreciate the way in which The West Australian reports the news, I feel that this was absolutely unacceptable reporting. As a poodle owner and schoolteacher, I feel that this was a blatant slur on the character of all poodles."
      
      Andrew Bell, Woodvale
      
      
      

• The Sunday Age
  
  
  • Baillieu promises pay boon for teachers
    by Jason Dowling
    
    "Victoria's underpaid teachers would win a massive pay increase under a state Coalition government.

    "Opposition Leader Ted Baillieu will today announce that a Coalition government in Victoria would make Victorian teachers the highest-paid in Australia.

    "Victorian children should be Australia's best-educated," Mr Baillieu said.

    "The Coalition plan, to be announced at the Victorian State Liberal Council meeting in Melbourne today, would pump an additional $396 million over three years into teachers' pay packets.

    "The pay pledge could see some senior teachers in Victoria receiving a rise of as much as $10,000 a year, with junior teachers gaining an extra $4000.

    "A starting teacher currently receives about $46,000 a year in Victoria, compared with more than $50,000 in NSW, while a top Victorian teacher receives about $65,000, compared with $75,000 in NSW.

    "Victorian parents should not endure a situation where our teachers continue to receive the lowest levels of pay in Australia," Mr Baillieu said.

    "The Victorian Government and Australian Education Union are currently engaged in a bitter pay dispute.

    "The union's Victorian president, Mary Bluett, has said the union was seeking pay parity with NSW.

    "The State Government is currently offering a pay increase of 3.25% a year.

    "Mr Baillieu will tell the meeting today: "The strength of our population is not in its numbers but in its intellectual capacity …

    "If our children are to be the best minds in the nation, they must be taught by the best educators in the nation, and the best educators are in high demand." [Are you reading this, Troy Buswell?]

    From The Sunday Age at link
    
    
    
    
• The Times
  
  
• Quadruple training for teachers [late update from 11 April]
  by William Stewart
  
  Proposal to increase training and classroom observation, rather than pay, for better teaching.

  "Teacher training should be quadrupled, according to an influential think tank, which argues that England’s schools system needs better teaching to become world-class. A report next month from the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR), which has close ties to the Government, will recommend that all teachers receive 20 days in-service training per year.

  "It wants to see teacher pay rises more closely linked to the levels of training, and decisions about what course they go on taken away from schools and given to teachers. Julia Margo, associate director of the IPPR, said an analysis of GCSE results had shown that, once a child’s background was taken into account, the quality of their teacher was the single most important factor determining the pupil’s performance, beating other variables such as class size.

  “If we had really effective teachers then we would not be performing so poorly internationally,” she said. “The buck stops with teachers.

  “If you want a world-class education system, you need to be investing your money on the training and development of your workforce, not on teacher pay.” [emphasis added]

  "The plans are likely to anger unions, which want increased pay. They feel teachers are scapegoats for problems in the education system. Ofsted’s last annual report said that only 3 per cent of teaching in England was inadequate. But the IPPR’s proposals are significant because ministers have already proposed increasing training to make teaching a masters-level profession.

  "The think tank will argue that the best way to improve poor teacher performance is through lesson observation. It recommends making it compulsory for all teachers to watch colleagues teach four times a term, and eight times a term for heads and senior management.

  "The IPPR will also recommend that responsibility for in-service training budgets is taken away from schools and given to the Training and Development Agency for schools (TDA).

  "Money would go to individual teachers who would select their own courses, conferences or visits for 10 days of external training every year. Another 10 days would be spent on school-based training.

  "Teachers are supposed to get five days in-service training a year. But Ms Margo said the amount of teacher training in England was “absymal” compared to top performing education systems.

  "The huge expansion, to be phased in gradually by 2020, could create financial challenges for schools paying for cover. But Ms Margo said the proposals would not involve “a scary amount of money.”

  "Derek Davies, head of Stretford High, Manchester, said: “I agree with the principle of more training but increasing it to 20 days a year is just not going to be practical. It isn’t a problem that more money for extra cover would remedy; it is the break in the consistency of teaching that can be damaging for pupils.”

  From The Times at link
  
  
  
  
• The Sydney Morning Herald
  
  
  • Letter to the Editor
    
    
    • Add creativity to make the maths equation work
      

      "As a mathematics teacher of 22 years, I applaud Julia Gillard for dipping her toe into the "maths drain" issue so early in her tenure ("Students avoid doing the maths", April 9).

      "The alarming statistics about unqualified teachers are not new. A more recent one is the number of qualified people who leave the profession within five years. It will take more than HECS discounts to counter this.

      "The problem is not a shortage of qualified maths teachers, but a shortage of maths teachers willing to work as maths teachers. Their skills are paid much more highly in other professions. [emphasis added] Perhaps it is time to look at differentiated pay scales for difficult-to-staff subjects and schools.

      "The world needs people who can solve problems, but creative thought and investigation are not valued in the NSW HSC. Many talented mathematicians lose interest before year 12 because the syllabus does not ignite their curiosity nor allow them to use their intuition creatively.

      "For example, students in NSW spend weeks learning to draw a limited range of co-ordinate graphs, which they know can be drawn on a computer in seconds. They gain no appreciation of how these curves are used in the "real world". Will the computers promised by Kevin Rudd be used effectively? I doubt it, unless their use is made obligatory in mathematics, not "suggested".

      "Students in other states get a different dose of the usefulness of mathematics. The time is ripe for a national kindergarten-to-year-12 mathematics curriculum.

      "Please nationalise the first year of university too, for it is they who determine so much of what happens in our secondary classrooms, it is they who resist change in the high school syllabuses and it is they who are struggling to fill their courses with capable students."

      Stuart Palmer, Head of mathematics, PLC Sydney

  
  
  
  • School out to crucify critic, says Greens MP
    
    A conservative Christian school misused the courts to silence a whistleblower who had accused it of multimillion-dollar Centrelink and tax fraud, State Parliament has heard.

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This page last updated 11 August, 2008 11:47 PM