Monday 12 May

Tuesday 13 May [Federal Budget]

Wednesday 14 May

Thursday 15 May

Friday 16 May

Saturday – Sunday, 17 – 18 May

 

Monday 12 May

• The West Australian
  
  
  • Teachers test the mood for strike (page 3)
    by Michael Bennett

    "Parents are facing the prospect of teacher strikes over the next fortnight as the teachers' union prepares to canvass its members to gauge whether strike action will be the next step in its pay dispute with the State Government.

    "WA State School Teachers Union president Anne Gisborne said yesterday that the appetite for strike action would be measured by a survey distributed to members this week after a hearing tomorrow at the WA Industrial Relations Commission where the union will voice its serious concerns in respect to the pay negotiations.

    "Ms Gisborne said comments made at the weekend by Education Minister Mark McGowan, which alluded to no further increases in funding for teachers' salaries following the $639 million State Budget allocation, were extremely distressing in the current climate.

    "The allocation for the teachers' enterprise bargaining agreement in the State Budget was on par with a December offer rejected by teachers.

    "In the context of the commentary from the Treasurer following the State Budget and the comments by the Minister, I imagine the survey will be of greater significance," Ms Gisborne said. "We would be looking at various types of activity that would take teachers out of schools, along the line of strike action.

    "I think it is extremely distressing for the union and its members and I dare say all employees of the (education) department because everybody gets covered by the same terms and conditions."

    "The Government's last offer was close to a 14 per cent rise while the union is pushing for a 20 per cent-plus pay rise over three years.

    "The union will also head to the commission today in an attempt to resolve the issues surrounding the national literacy and numeracy tests.

    "A boycott of the tests imposed by the union was lifted last Thursday following commission orders but inflammatory remarks made in a letter to schools by the Education Department's John Serich have angered union members.

    "Mr Serich said teachers who failed to administer the tests to students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 would have their pay docked until they resumed full duties.

    "The union will communicate its concerns to the Education Department this morning before heading to the commission.

    "Ms Gisborne described the move by the department as heavy-handed and unnecessary.

    "We will be raising our concerns at the heavy-handed nature of the department attempting to deal with this issue," she said. "We are concerned that there may be a turnaround and an attempt to sanction members who for whatever reason may choose not to be doing the test."

    "Mr McGowan declined to comment before the commission hearings."

    From The West Australian
    
    

    
    
  • Letter to the Editor (page 22)
    
    
    • Accurate report

      "I must thank The West Australian for its accuracy of reporting. When the principal of a Catholic college in Karratha was frustrated by the difficulty of securing staff, Education Minister Mark McGowan stated that he was "well aware of the challenges involved in staffing regional schools" (report, 9/5).

      "Of course he is aware of the problem but he is not prepared to do anything about it because he is afraid of rocking the ALP caucus boat.

      "Mr McGowan knows what to do about the disastrous teacher shortage in WA because he is one of the few people who has read the $480,000 Twomey Taskforce report.

      "Instead of doing the honourable thing and at least releasing the document, our Minister attacks the integrity of teachers.

      "Meanwhile, Victoria has awarded significant pay rises to its teachers to make them the best paid in our land. I wonder if the WAIRC, will be allowed access to the Twomey Report as it considers the worth of a WA teacher's pay claim?"

      Andrew Bell, Woodvale
      

      
      
      
• The Sydney Morning Herald
  
  
  • Literacy test threat to NSW funding
    by Stephanie Peatling
    
    "The Federal Government is threatening to freeze NSW out of its scheme to fund disadvantaged schools because the State Government is refusing to hand over individual schools' results from national literacy and numeracy tests.

    "About 1 million students in years 3, 5, 7 and 9 will sit the tests over three days this week in an attempt by state and federal governments to gain a clearer picture of how students are faring on numeracy, reading, writing, spelling, punctuation and grammar.

    "But the State Government has accused the Federal Government of wanting to take "too simplistic" an approach to work out which schools are in the areas of greatest need.

    "As well as giving parents a chance to see how their child is faring, the tests will help the Federal Government in its plans to introduce a national curriculum.

    "The row has all the elements of the dispute that bedevilled relations between NSW and the previous federal education minister, Julie Bishop, who threatened to withhold funding to the state system until the NSW Government toed the line.

    "The Minister for Education, Julia Gillard, said this week's tests were "the first time we have genuinely had a national test".

    "In the past there have been state-based tests and attempts to moderate them. Now we will have a more comprehensive set of information," Ms Gillard said.

    "Despite calls for a "plain English" approach to report cards, students will not be graded using the familiar A to E system. Instead, a series of 10 bands has been developed. Each band has a description of the types of exercises required to pass it. [emphasis added]

    "The bands will also be used to highlight bright students who would benefit from accelerated programs and to pick out poorly performing students who may need remedial teaching.

    "Ms Gillard said that she had "broad agreement" from state and territory education ministers that they would also make available to the Federal Government the performance of individual schools.

    "That information will be used to determine areas of need."

    "The Federal Government wants to use the information to direct funding to schools with students who may need more help because they have language difficulties or other learning impediments.

    "The NSW Minister for Education, John Della Bosca, met Ms Gillard to discuss the issue last week but remains unconvinced the results of the tests should be used to determine where funding is directed.

    "A spokesman for Mr Della Bosca said although NSW was supportive of national testing it was "too simplistic" to use one test as the basis for funding.

    "It's quite a blunt instrument. We need to be more sophisticated," the spokesman said.

    "Mr Della Bosca is also concerned the information would be used to develop league tables based on schools' performances.

    "The existing education funding arrangement between state and federal governments runs out later this year.

    "Talks have begun about how best to allocate money for the next four-year funSding period."

    From The Sydney Morning Herald at link
    
    
    
  • Editorial
    Memo Kevin Rudd: this is not a campaign budget
    
    In education, Labor will have to recast the funding formula for private schools, to remove the no-disadvantage provision under which more schools are now funded as exceptions than are funded according to the rules. It must bring order to Howard-era anomalies such as federally funded technical colleges.
    
    
    
  • Avoiding the flue: schools told to open windows to clear the air
    
    As snow swirls around school classrooms in the Blue Mountains this winter, students are being advised by the NSW Government to leave the windows wide open for the sake of their health.
    
    
    
    
• The Age
  
  
  • The Monday Education Section has 12 stories this week, including these five:
    
    
    • The big trade off
      by Caroline Milburn
      

      "Broadening the curriculum to try to stop teens from dropping out of school has not been as successful as governments had hoped.

      "A national study shows that over the past 10 years policy efforts to lift low school-retention rates have focused on expanding trades and vocational education at senior secondary level. But the study says the approach needs questioning because schools are not having a big effect in improving the number of students who complete year 12. About 75% of Australia's students finish secondary school, a figure below that of many European countries.

      "Despite substantial increases in participation in vocational education in schools and other policy initiatives, school retention has increased only marginally by about three percentage points since the mid-1990s," reports the study by Dr Gary Marks, a senior research fellow at the Australian Council for Educational Research.

      "The study, published recently in the international education journal School Effectiveness and School Improvement, is the latest and most comprehensive examination of the factors that influence when a student leaves school. It analysed interviews with 8905 students aged 17 and 18 in 2005 who had sat Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) tests in reading, maths and science when they were 15. They came from 315 schools in the government and independent sectors.

      "The study's findings reveal a student's academic performance is by far the most important influence on whether he or she leaves school before completing year 12. It is four times more important than the next most influential factor - a student's socioeconomic background.

      "The odds of school leaving for students at the fifth percentile (towards the bottom) of the distribution of average test scores are a staggering 50 times the odds of school leaving for students at the 95th percentile," the study says.

      "The study also examined factors at the school level, such as student attitudes to school and teachers, disciplinary climates, mean test scores and differences between schools to see what effect they had on the likelihood of a student dropping out of school.

      "It found that schools do not have a strong independent influence on early school leaving, with attendance at a non-government school making only a marginal difference in the likelihood of a student finishing year 12 compared with the other individual student variables included in the study, such as PISA scores.

      "A lot of people think that if they send their kid to a particular school they will do brilliantly, but most schools are much the same," Dr Marks says. "There are schools at the extremes of the spectrum. Some schools do much better than expected, given their student population, in getting their kids to complete year 12, while some do much worse than expected. But most schools are in the middle and have no relative effect on improving student retention rates."

      "The Rudd Government has promised to boost school retention rates to 90% by 2020. As part of that strategy, it will spend $2.5 billion on building new trade centres in all of Australia's 2650 secondary schools.

      "However, Dr Marks' study warns that increasing the vocational component of schools is unlikely to attract many potential early school leavers. "Since school leavers are predominantly low achievers, it is unlikely that an extra year or two in the predominantly academic environment of upper secondary school would be beneficial," the study says.

      "Resources would be better directed by providing appropriate post-school education and training once they have entered the labour force."

      "Dr Marks says the findings of his study also point to the need for education authorities to intervene earlier in a child's schooling to identify literacy and numeracy problems and offer better remedial programs. However, he says, many struggling students faced with staying at school or getting a job and earning money choose the latter option.

      "In policy circles people say, 'Oh, if only we could make year 12 more interesting for these kids, they would stay'. But when you ask kids why they leave, more than half say to get a job or to start an apprenticeship. They want to be independent."

      "The study also warns that broadening the vocational curriculum in government schools could be counterproductive and weaken the public school system by spreading its resources and staff too thinly.

      "A study released last year by a Monash University researcher showed that the average ENTER score of government schools that offered the Victorian Certificate of Applied Learning had declined compared with government schools that did not offer the vocational courses.

      "There's a danger in asking government schools to do everything," Dr Marks says. "The non-government sector is not going to do it, they're not going to offer a comprehensive vocational educational program.

      "Can schools really cater for students who want to do medicine and students who want to be a car mechanic . . . Rather than putting a technical wing in every high school the Government would be better off putting money into vocational education and training in specialised institutions such as TAFEs."

      Dropping out

      "Students are more likely to leave school before completing year 12 if they are:

      • Academically weak
      • Male
      • From a low socio-economic backgroun
      • From an Anglo-Saxon backgroun
      • Live outside the main capital cities
      • Live with a single parent or in a blended family"

    Source: Do Schools Matter for Early School Leaving? ACER

    From The Age at link
    
    

    • OpEd
      Myths drive 'failing schools' ploy
      by Graeme Smithies
      

      "A recurring theme of current educational debate is what should be done about "underperforming" or even "failing" schools. Schemes to pay higher wages to "high-performing" teachers to work in such schools - as well as regular calls by politicians for improved "accountability" - reinforce the view that a number of schools fit this "underperforming" category. The latest State Government blueprint seems to be based on this same assumption.

      "I have never seen a definition of what constitutes an underperforming school, but those who use the term generally imply that the academic performance of its students, as measured by VCE results or literacy and numeracy testing, is below expected standards, or the standards achieved by schools in different suburbs.

      "The implication is that teachers at such a school are not doing their jobs well enough - and if they work harder, improve their methods or are replaced by better teachers, the problem will be solved.

      "The concept of the underperforming or failing school is based on a number of myths. The first is that student performance is entirely dependent on what happens in school, and that it is a consequence solely of the activities of teachers and principals and not of any factors outside the school.

      "The second myth is that all students come to school equally prepared, with equal ability and with equal levels of motivation, so that all they need is excellent teaching to excel.

      "At the end of 2006, I retired after 35 years as a teacher and administrator, mostly in schools in the so-called "disadvantaged" northern suburbs. After the school at which I was vice-principal was closed in 1992, I spent the next 11 years attached to the Northern Metropolitan Office of the Education Department, relieving in principal-class vacancies, mostly in the northern suburbs.

      "In all I worked in almost half the secondary schools in the north, for periods varying from one term to a full year. In that time I did not see one instance of a school I would describe as "underperforming", let alone "failing".

      "I did see many students who could be described as "underperforming" and as educationally disadvantaged, but this "underperformance" was almost entirely due to factors outside the school. For more than 40 years researchers have identified a variety of socio-economic factors that can influence a child's educational performance. Proponents of the underperforming school fallacy seem to ignore these factors.

      "Students who start school with the best chances of ultimate success will come from a home where the parents are well educated and where education is highly valued; where the child's imagination and cognitive development have been stimulated and enriched by a wide variety of play and other creative experiences; where English is the first language, and the parents and other adults with whom the child has contact have strong linguistic skills in the English language.

      "They will come from homes where the child is read to frequently, the parents read and are seen to enjoy reading, and there is a large variety of reading matter; and the child has had at least a year of pre-school experience before starting school.

      "The absence of any or all of these factors will affect a child's readiness for school. Lower parental levels of education, limited linguistic ability, lack of reading and books in the home, little use of the English language in families of non-English-speaking backgrounds, high levels of family unemployment and non-attendance at kindergarten are all more prevalent in the northern and western suburbs.

      "It follows that larger numbers of children arrive at school less well prepared than is likely in more affluent areas.

      "What this means for schools and teachers in the "disadvantaged" parts of Melbourne is that they will encounter a wider range of abilities in their students, and the proportion of students who are starting a long way behind their peers is likely to be much higher.

      "Many teachers in some of our disadvantaged suburbs first have to teach some children how to hold a book, because they have never seen one in their homes. Teachers attempt to take into account the differences between students when developing their teaching programs, but those starting a long way behind often never really catch up.

      "Most primary schools employ programs to assist students experiencing literacy difficulties, but such programs have to be attempted within the staffing and resource limitations applied by the department.

      "The fact that significant numbers of students never really catch up is an indication that insufficient resources have been provided to schools attempting to overcome student disadvantage- not an indication of underperforming teachers and principals. The needs simply exceed the available resources.

      "Secondary schools also face greater difficulties in the northern and western suburbs. Students who have fallen behind in primary schools will often become negative and disruptive influences as they hit adolescence.

      "Secondary teachers also design their teaching programs to cater for a wide range of abilities, but even the best teachers will find some students so resistant to any program as to be effectively unteachable in a normal classroom. A small number of alternative settings are provided, but these are too few, with long waiting lists.

      "Northern-suburban schools have thousands of excellent teachers. They may have smaller numbers of high-achieving students, but those students do as well as students in any other suburb.

      "The apparent underperformance by many of the students in those schools is a direct result of factors outside the control of the school - the socio-economic, demographic and family factors that children have experienced before they start school, and which they continue to experience in the 17 hours of every school day that they are not at school.

      "The concept of the underperforming school is simply a tool for politicians to disguise their own unwillingness to provide appropriate resources to the education system to help lessen the impact of social inequality."

      Graeme Smithies is a retired teacher and assistant principal who spent about 25 of his 35 years in schools in the northern suburbs.

      From The Age at link

      
      
    • Schools open to scrutiny after same-sex ban
      by Christopher Bantick
      

      "The decision last month by Brisbane's Anglican Church Grammar School - commonly known as Churchie - to ban same-sex partners from attending a year 12 formal raises two important questions: The first is whether the all-boy school was right to do so; the second, did this amount to discrimination?

      "In response to the first question, the school's headmaster, Jonathan Hensman was unambiguous: "The senior dinner dance is an opportunity for our young men to escort young women in a formal school environment. We don't intend to change our practice..."

      Full story in The Age at link
      
      
      

    • Call to save campus services
      by Bridie Smith
      

      "University students have called on the Federal Government to include funding in tomorrow's budget to soften the impact of voluntary student unionism or risk the collapse of more essential student services on campuses across the country.

      "As the Government considers the findings of an inquiry into the impact of voluntary student unionism, the national student body called for urgent financial help to tide student organisations over while a new model of funding was established..."
      

      Full story in The Age at link
      
      
      

    • Mind your language
      by Denise Ryan
      

      "'Did you have a good weekend?" Teacher Mary Nicholls asks the class of 12 refugees and one migrant to repeat these unfamiliar English words after her. The students, mostly from Burma and Sudan, cautiously reply. "Yes, thank you. How about you?"

      "It's the first lesson for one student, while another has been attending this class for nine months. Some students didn't know how to hold a pencil when they arrived and, having never gone to school, are illiterate in their first language. Others learnt some English at school or in refugee camps.

      "Welcome to a beginner class in spoken and written English at the Croydon campus of Swinburne University of Technology. This diverse group is receiving 510 hours of free English lessons under the Federal Government's Adult Migrant English Program..."
      

      Full story in The Age at link
      
      
      

  • Op Ed
    We're teaching children, not fattening pigs
    by Maureen Douglas (principal of Spensley Street Primary School in Clifton Hill)
    
    "If you want to fatten a pig, you don't keep weighing it. This analogy for what is happening in American schools was made by Jon Scieszkca, a highly regarded children's author and US ambassador for children's literature.

    "Now it's time for us in Australia to be mindful of what has happened to teaching and learning in American and English schools since the introduction of national curriculum and high-stakes standardised testing.

    "This week, as children in years 3, 5, 7 and 9 face national literacy and numeracy tests, I think it's time to stop and ask what we want for our students. Of course we want our students to be literate and numerate, but I think we want a lot more.

    "At Spensley Street Primary School, we have used Terry Johnson's "traits of a successful learner" to describe the characteristics we want our students to develop over seven years of primary schooling. These include encouraging students to be thoughtful, industrious, generative, empathetic, strategic, to be prepared to take risks, to have knowledge and self-esteem.

    "Primary school is a unique and important time in our children's lives, a time when they are developing an understanding of themselves as learners and as friends. We want to give them time to develop; we don't want them labelled as "successes" or "failures" so early in their formal education. We want to respect and nurture this unique time in their lives.

    "We know that students learn in different ways, at different rates and have differing strengths and skills. In a primary school we want to acknowledge this diversity and cater for the whole child.

    "Research from the United States and England, where tests have taken on "high stakes" status, has produced evidence of overwhelming negative impact on students, teachers and schools.

    "I found it confronting to see what happened in classrooms during a recent trip to America. I was struck by the rigidity of classrooms, geared to preparing and teaching to the test. Play times were limited to no more than 30 minutes per day; students were streamed according to their ability and openly named as the top group, the middle group and the bottom group and removed from their home group for "drill" sessions for large parts of each day.

    "For students who fail, there are special programs before and after school and throughout the summer. Teachers talked to me about the breakdown in the trusting relationships with their students because their focus has moved from students to instilling the content of the test.

    "I watched many classrooms where students were being drilled and given sample multiple choice tests that encouraged them to believe that there is only ever one right answer. I watched as students read, not for enjoyment and not books, but excerpts of texts.

    "As they read they were expected to follow the drill sheet that told them to follow a set procedure: read the questions three times, "slash the trash" as they read, underline the key words. Teachers talked openly about students being turned off reading.

    "In England, researchers have found that teachers are leaving the profession in droves because of their sense of disillusion about a system that undermines teacher judgement in favour of test results.

    "Teachers are losing the ability to make judgements about students and plan appropriate programs. That is why head teachers are asking for the responsibility of assessment to be handed back to schools rather than the current national testing program.

    "A national testing program is not the answer, nor is it the way, as Education Minister Julia Gillard suggests, to give the "best understanding of what's happening in our education system". Nor will national tests "make sure we're keeping the system working the way we want it to".

    "I want to suggest that the key to successful schools and successful students is the teaching staff — all the research tells us that. It is foolish to ignore teachers' perspective about students' achievement. We are the ones who, in partnership with families, are in the best possible position to make sound professional judgements over time and using a variety of assessment tools.

    "It's time for politicians to walk the talk rather than rely on simplistic tests to make judgements about students' and schools' performance. Let teachers demonstrate their skills. Let's not go down the path that has clearly failed in both the US and England because you certainly don't fatten a pig by constantly weighing it.

    From The Age at link
    
    

  • Letters to the Editor
    
    
    • Tough principals

      "Poaching principals is good policy" (Letters, 10/5) contains a couple of serious flaws that need addressing. Given that private schools are havens of selected students and where expulsion is preferred to counselling for poor behaviour, it would seem reasonable to assume that their principals would lack the ticker to handle the state school omnibus down the street.

      "Contrary to the notion of "scant understanding of present trends in pedagogical research", state principals undergo a rigorous examination of their modernity during their selection process. Many of them could claim a major role in the development of the VCE, which private principals still find difficult to come to terms with."

      Graeme Lee (retired principal), Fitzroy
      
      

    • The tried and true

      "There is nothing new in the "explicit teaching" method that principal John Fleming is using to teach young students (The Age, 10/5). In fact we were using it 50 years ago. Now it is critical to use both inquiry-based teaching and the explicit method. There are still only so many ways of instilling knowledge and a love of learning into children, while maintaining the ability to use every teaching method tried and tested to match each child in the classroom.

      "It is a pity, however, that this inspirational principal has been lured to the private school system when the disadvantaged students at the Bellfield Primary School could benefit so much more than the Haileybury students. While the students of Haileybury will no doubt gain, it is certainly a loss to the state system when we lose a principal of John Fleming's calibre."

      Annie Young, Bendigo
      
      

    • Furthermore
      
      "Leftist ideologues in the ALP know that one way to bring Catholic schools to heel is to cut funding (Age, 10/5). This is happening now, and is the thin edge of the wedge. Supporters of Catholic education should be aware of what the State Government is up to."

      Peter D. Surkitt, Hawthorne
      
      
      

• ABC News
  
  
  • Interview with Federal Education Minister Julia Gillard
    National Assessment Program Literacy and Numeracy
    
    
    
    
• The Daily Mail
  
  
  • School improves exam results after introducing 8-minute lessons for all GCSE subjects
    
    "A school has seen its GCSE science results improve after introducing 'bite-sized' lessons just eight minutes long.

    "Now the method, which boosted results by an average of half a grade, is to be used for all subjects.

    "Pupils aged 13 to 15 at Monkseaton Community High School will have an eight-minute lesson followed by a ten-minute break for sport or word games.

    "The lesson will then be repeated, using a different teaching method.

    "The Tyneside school is thought to be the first in the UK to adopt the "space learning" system, based on U.S research suggesting the memory develops most effectively with repeated short bursts of learning.

    "School headmaster Paul Kelley said: "It may seem bizarre to teach an eight minute lesson, break for 10 minutes to dribble a basketball and then repeat the process, but it works.

    "In rigorous evaluation, students show improvement regardless of subject, teacher or their ability."

    "The school hit the headlines in 2000 when pupil Laura Spence was rejected by Oxford despite a prediction of five A grade A-levels."

    From The Daily Mail at link
    
    
    
    
  • Pupils are 'being harmed by test overload', MPs warn
    by Rebecca Camber and Laura Clark
    
    "An obsession with testing threatens to damage a generation of schoolchildren, MPs are warning.

    "An influential report will recommend the national testing regime be scaled back.

    "In its first major report since forming last year, the Commons schools select committee is expected to say tomorrow that the current system is not fit for purpose.

    "The MPs will point to concerns that children spend too much time being drilled to pass tests at the expense of real gains in their knowledge and understanding.

    "Under the current mass testing, backed by the Government, pupils face compulsory tests in the three Rs at seven, 11 and 14. [Sounds familiar!  Web]

    "On the eve of publication, chairman Barry Sheerman condemned the testing culture.

    "The Labour MP told the BBC's Panorama programme: "There's something wrong with the amount of testing and assessment we're doing, the quality of testing and assessment and the unseen consequences for the whole school culture.

    "It is still a culture where the success of a child, of a teacher, of a school, is linked to testing, testing, testing, that is the problem."

    "He also attacked proposed reform of the Sats system, under which pupils would be tested at any time from the age of seven. Mr Sheerman said that would put them under continuous pressure.

    "The all-party committee is expected to recommend a greater role for teacher assessment and a consideration of a sampling approach which would see only a percentage of pupils tested each year.

    "Panorama also interviewed teachers and pupils for tonight's programme.

    "But Schools Minister Jim Knight MP has defended Sats.

    "He said: "I look at the fact that our results are improving year on year and standards in our schools are rising, and part of the reasons for that are tests and tables."

    From The Daily Mail at link
    
    
    
    
• The Australian
  
  
  • 'Dreamtime' over in Aboriginal studies
    by Justine Ferrari and Lauren Wilson
    
    "Dreamtime is no longer an acceptable term to describe the collection of Aboriginal creation stories, and should be referred to as The Dreaming or The Dreamings.

    "And the structure of traditional Aboriginal society should not be described as primitive - but as complex and diverse, and the term "native" should be replaced by "indigenous groups" or "language groups".

    "Advice for teaching indigenous students, which has been prepared by the West Australian and South Australian education departments, contains lists of appropriate words to describe Aboriginal people and culture.

    "The West Australian document, part of its Aboriginal Perspectives Across the Curriculum project, contains the headings "less appropriate terminology" and "more appropriate terminology", and sets out unsuitable words and their substitutes..."
    
    Full story in The Australian at link

Tuesday 13 May

• Federal Budget articles related to education [all late updates from The Australian website]
  
  
  • Schools funding boost for education revolution
    by Justine Ferrari, Education writer
    

    "Schools will receive a 12.5 per cent boost in funding over the next four years, with the bulk of extra spending funding the Education Revolution measures unveiled by the Government in the election campaign last year.

    "As part of its commitment to ensure every four-year-old has access to high-quality early childhood education in the year before they start school, the Rudd Government is funding the development of a national preschool curriculum taught by a qualified early childhood teacher.

    "The budget allocates $126.6 million over four years to train and retrain early childhood teachers and workers including incentives to improve their qualifications such as waiving TAFE fees and national accreditation standards for child care.

    "The Government is also investing an extra $200 million in its program to provide computer access to every student in years 9 to 12 and has cut literacy and numeracy programs introduced by the Howard government to fund its own National Action Plan on Literacy and Numeracy, worth $577.4 million over four years.

    "The quality of school facilities is addressing through $457 million for capital works and $1.7 billion in total over four years to be spent on maintenance and infrastructure.

    "Kevin Rudd's insistence that Australian students need to speak an Asian language receives $62.4 million over three years under the National Asian Languages and Studies in Schools program, providing extra classes in high schools, teacher training and support and specialist curriculum for advanced students.

    EDUCATION SNAPSHOT
    The Government is pursuing long-term reform across the whole education system, including early childhood education and care, schooling, vocational education and training, and higher education.

    Education Investment Fund
    The Government will establish an Education Investment Fund (absorbing the Higher Education Endowment Fund) with an initial allocation of about $11 billion for higher education and vocational education and training facilities.

    'A cooperative approach'
    The Government is working with the States through COAG to develop long-term reform plans to boost the quality of education and training. The key goals include:
    
    Iimproving access to high quality early childhood education and care
    Providing greater flexibility to schools to lift student outcomes
    Lifting teaching quality
    Creating a fl exible and competitive national vocational training system
    Boosting the skill level of the Australian workforce
    
    Early childhood education
    $534 million over five years for universal access to a preschool year for all four year olds by 2013.
    $337 million to improve quality of, and access to, early childhood education and care, particularly for disadvantaged children.
    
    Schools
    
    Investment in schools includes:
    $1.2 billion over five years for the Digital Education Revolution to deliver computers and communications technologies to all Year 9-12 students
    $2.5 billion over 10 years for Trade Training Centres in Schools
    $577 million to improve literacy and numeracy outcomes for students
    $62 million over three years for the National Asian Languages and Studies in Schools Program
    $20 million to establish a National Curriculum Board.
    These initiatives will assist in lifting the Year 12 or equivalent attainment rate to 90 per cent by 2020.

    Higher education
    $500 million by 30 June 2008
    $626 million to reduce the cost of studying maths and science at university and to reduce HECS-HELP repayments for science and maths graduates who undertake work in a related field
    Skills and workforce development
    $1.9 billion to deliver up to 630,000 additional training places over five years.

    From The Australian at link
    
    

  • $11bn in unis cash bonanza
    by Stephen Matchett
    

    "Universities are among the few winners in tonight's budget, with Education Minister Julia Gillard announcing an immediate injection into the system of $500million.

    "The one-off Renewal Fund is intended to help universities "rebuild their campus infrastructure after 11 years of Howard government neglect".

    "The unexpected announcement is an early dividend from a new $11 billion resource, the Education Investment Fund, which adds $5 billion in new money to the previous government's $6 billion Higher Education Endowment Fund.

    "We are unlikely to see vice-chancellors dancing in the streets, that would be too scary, but we'll be dancing privately in our offices and lounge rooms," said RMIT University vice-chancellor Margaret Gardner.

    "Commentators across the sector welcomed the new emphasis on infrastructure with Innovative Research Universities Australia chairman John Yovich putting the maintenance backlog at about $1.5 billion.

    "Universities Australia chief executive Glenn Withers said the budget provided an "overall very welcome down payment on the higher education component of the education revolution".

    "But a common disappointment was lack of action on services and income support for students.

    "National Union of Students president Angus McFarland was "shocked and disappointed" that out of $7 billion in new funding for universities, "not one cent" would go to restore essential student services.

    "Unlike the HEEF, which could outlay income only from interest, the Rudd Government's combined treasury will have no annual cap on allocations. The EIF will begin to operate in the 2009 financial year, giving the Government ample opportunity to adopt, amend and advocate the outcomes of the higher education and research reviews now under way, before committing its funds.

    "While the EIF will be managed by the board of guardians of the commonwealth's overall investment body, the Future Fund, the new resource will have its own board advising Gillard and Innovation Minister Kim Carr on funding applications.

    "The Government said: "This means that substantial investment can be made in our educational institutions in the coming years, transforming the capacity of these sectors to educate and train Australians."

    "However in a move that some in the sector will find ominous, vocational education institutions will also have access to the new fund, as well as universities and research institutions. This engagement with the technical and further education sector is in addition to the $2.5 billion over 10 years committed to trade training centres in schools.

    "HEEF board chairman Phil Clark, who has been asked to help oversee the transition to the new fund, welcomed the new broader endowment structure and the end to an inflexible reliance on earnings.

    "The $11 million is good but the totally integrated framework (of the new fund) is the real winner; most people will miss that," he said.

    "Mike Gallagher, executive director of the Group of Eight universities, said the willingness to spend capital from the endowment fund represented "a major shift". "Otherwise it would just be this drip (of interest earnings) over many years, a couple of hundred of million a year," he said. "We're billions behind the rest of the world."

    "Dr Withers welcomed the one-off, $500 million infrastructure renewal fund as "a surrogate for proper indexation of block grants".

    "National Tertiary Education Union president Carolyn Allport said it was "a very good budget for higher education ... it certainly exceeded our expectations.

    "The education revolution has started," she said.

    "Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations president Nigel Palmer said: "Promises were honoured but opportunities were missed. CAPA was disappointed that the APA stipend rate and the award duration were not increased.

    "The EIF is the standout announcement among an otherwise lacklustre collection of largely expected announcements delivering on election promises.

    "As anticipated, the Government has established 11,000 new commonwealth supported student places in place of the full-fee paying berths for undergraduates.

    "It was not clear last night whether the Government expects universities to bear any loss between fee income lost and what the commonwealth allocates to fund places in the various cost bands.

    "And in a decision that will disappoint university administrators and many student activists there is no mention of supplementary funding or a HECS-style fee arrangement to pay for campus services previously provided by compulsory student union fees. However "student amenities" are one of the areas, along with libraries, laboratories and lecture theatres, eligible for the immediate $500 million cash injection.

    "The overall budget theme of education as the engine of economic growth is reflected in a range of small funding measures intended to expand student numbers in areas where skill shortages are emerging or anticipated."

    From The Australian at link
    
    

  • Swan gets mixed grades from educators
    by Brendan O'Keefe
    

    "A leading educator praised the budget and said it was taking education in the right direction.

    "Professor Ian Chubb, vice-chancellor of the Australian National University, said universities were finally receiving the funding for infrastructure they had needed for so long.

    "All in all it's an excellent package and it's heading in a significant way in the right direction,'' Professor Chubb said.

    "I think that they've made some judicious and wise investments in higher education.''

    "He said the $5 billion education infrastructure fund would help universities compete in the international market for talent.

    "He welcomed the extra places for students and praised the government for keeping its election promises.

    "That's not something we're used to,'' he said.

    "Meanwhile the Australian Education Union welcomed the Budget but said it did not go far enough towards boosting public education.

    "Union federal president Angelo Gavrielatos said a more dramatic investment was needed to lift overall student performances, and address underachievement.

    "While funding their election commitments is welcome, it fails to address years of chronic underfunding and systematic neglect, courtesy of the Howard government,'' Mr Gavrielatos said.

    "He said the education future fund looked too far to the future.

    "Quite frankly what we require is an investment in education right now,'' he said.

    "Mr Gavrielatos said Prime Minister Kevin Rudd had previously noted the need to boost indigenous, rural and special education, but the government had not done so in the budget.

    "It's a pity that those areas have not received a dramatic investment in education,'' he said."

    From The Australian at link
    
    
    

  • Full fee ban 'akin to bar on private school places'
    by Brendan O'Keefe
    

    "The abolition of domestic full-fee places at Australian universities was akin to banning secondary students from private high schools, a critic of the Labor policy has said.

    "University of Sydney vice-chancellor Gavin Brown said cutting fee-paying places would cost the institution $30million in the first four years and $20million a year after that.

    "The Labor policy was due to start next year.

    "In November, Labor promised universities between $300million and $400million in compensation.

    "Universities criticised the policy, saying it would force them to either cut staff or to rely more heavily on fee-paying international students, or both, to recoup lost income..."

    Full story in The Australian at link
    
    

  • Students in protest raid over cuts to arts staff
    

    About 50 Melbourne University students protesting against academic staff cuts at the arts faculty yesterday invaded a building in an attempt to disrupt a university council meeting, trying at one stage to break through security guards blocking a liftwell.
    
    
    

  • $56.4m for indigenous literacy
    

    In keeping with the Government's commitment of ensuring the basics are right, the main strategy for halving the gap in school performance between indigenous and non-indigenous students is a $56.4 million program to expand the delivery of intensive literacy and numeracy programs.
    
    
    

• Federal Education Minister Julia Gillard's media release on the budget
  
  
  • An Education Revolution to secure our economic future
    
    
    
    
• The West Australian
  
  
  • Teachers can swap to avoid tests (page 4)
    by Beatrice Thomas

    "State schoolteachers will not have their pay docked for refusing to administer the national reading, writing and maths tests provided they swap duties with another teacher who will oversee the exams, under an agreement brokered at the WA Industrial Relations Commission late yesterday.

    "The State School Teachers Union and Education Department emerged from a one-hour conference with Commission Jennifer Harrison to confirm that teachers would be allowed to swap so they could avoid administering the tests provided the arrangement was approved by the principal.

    "The tests - known as the National Assessment Plan Literacy and Numeracy exams for Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 - are sure to go ahead after the union issued a directive on Friday to lift a boycott.

    "The Education Department immediately warned that teachers who simply refused to administer tests without alternative arrangements would have their pay cut. A letter to schools by Education Department human resources executive director John Serich on Friday angered union members by warning that teachers who failed to administer the tests would have their pay docked until they resumed full duties.

    "Late yesterday, Mr Serich issued a statement saying: "Teachers who have made an acceptable arrangement with their principal to perform other teaching duties while the tests are under way will not have their pay docked. Where teachers simply refuse to administer the testing without alternative arrangements acceptable to the principal being in place, their pay will be docked."

    "Union president Anne Gisborne said she was happy with the outcome, saying the resolution would allow teachers to convey their concerns while abiding by the commission's order last week.

    "Alternative people will be taking the class and supervising the implementation of the tests," she said.

    "The SSTU had lodged an application for an urgent hearing yesterday morning, arguing that the department's circular attempted to "create undue stress among its teachers", was "unnecessarily intimidating" and failed to "foster and promote good industrial relations with its employees".

    "Mr Serich said he was confident teachers would approach the tests professionally and put the needs of students first.

    "The union will canvass its members this week to gauge whether strikes will be the next step in its separate pay dispute with the State Government.

    "The department and union will be back at the commission today to report on the progress of negotiations.

    "The union will use the meeting to raise concerns about comments by Education Minister Mark McGowan which alluded to no further increases in funding for teachers' salaries after the $639 million State Budget allocation last week."

    From The West Australian
    
    Similar story on ABC News
    
    

  • SSTUWA Update
    
    
    • DET Backdown on docking pay
      
      
      
      
• The Australian
  
  
  • Backdown on school 'league tables'
    by Justine Ferrari, Education writer
    
    "The Rudd Government is backing away from its election commitment to publish the results of individual schools in national literacy and numeracy tests, which would have allowed "league tables" comparing schools across the nation.

    "Education Minister Julia Gillard yesterday said the results of the first national literacy and numeracy tests, which start today, would be provided to parents and schools but not be available more widely.

    "When asked on ABC radio yesterday if schools' results would be available to parents outside that particular school, Ms Gillard said: "At this stage, what parents are going to get is their own report card. We're talking to state and territory governments about the best use of this information."

    "In the week before the federal election, Kevin Rudd and then education spokesman Stephen Smith released a policy document called Federal Labor's Commitment To Lift School Standards.

    "Under the sub-heading of Greater accountability, the document says: "A Rudd Labor government will publish the annual results of individual primary and secondary schools on national reading, writing and numeracy assessments for students in grades 3, 5, 7 and 9. Publication of school performance information will form an integral part of federal Labor's plan to improve literacy and numeracy ..."

    "The states and territories have agreed to provide the results of their schools to the commonwealth for the first time. But there is no agreement that they be published, with Queensland, NSW and South Australia adamantly opposed to so-called league tables. [emphasis added]

    "When asked about the election commitment, a spokeswoman for Ms Gillard said broad agreement had been reached with the states and territories for the commonwealth to receive results school by school. "Building on this agreement, we will be working with our state and territory colleagues to deliver our election commitment in full."

    "But The Australian understands that Queensland and NSW have agreed to provide school-by-school results to the federal Government on the condition that they are not used to help in the compilation of league tables.

    "NSW Education Minister John Della Bosca also opposes the results from the literacy and numeracy tests being used to identify disadvantaged schools for extra funding.

    "Mr Della Bosca yesterday said league tables were a "silly idea" and that using literacy and numeracy results to determine disadvantaged schools funding was too simplistic.

    "Each NSW school already reports to the school community on how the school is performing in a number of areas, including performance and standardised tests," a spokesman said.

    "Queensland Education Minister Rod Welford said the state had agreed only to provide school-by-school results to assist the commonwealth in identifying schools and students most in need of extra assistance.

    "We have always unequivocally rejected the proposition that league tables of schools for this narrow set of tests should be published," he said.

    "They're not representative of anything in relation to the school. It would be misleading and deceptive. They won't be published in the first year and what happens after that is still to be discussed."

    "South Australian Education Minister Jane Lomax-Smith supported the existing practice where schools published information for parents in their annual reports.

    "I remain opposed to league tables," she said.

    "The Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs yesterday released the agreed approach to national testing, signed by the commonwealth, and all states and territories except NSW.

    "The Australian understands that NSW refused to approve the release after receiving it at 5pm on Friday without any prior consultation and after its suggested amendments were rejected.

    "The release also details a system of 10 bands of achievement for student performance stretching across the four grades, and sets the lowest band as those Year 3 students failing to meet national benchmarks.

    "It is understood there was no prior consultation with the states about the number of bands for grading student results, nor where they should be set."
    
    From The Australian at link
    
    See related story in The Age
    
    
    

  • Testing time for remote students
    by Natasha Robinson
    
    "Maj O'Neill, principal of the remote St Francis Xavier School at the Northern Territory community of Daly River, reckons sitting her students down for today's inaugural national literacy and numeracy testing will be a bit like "getting a tooth pulled".

    "You have to get through the pain to have the benefit later," she told The Australian from the community, 220km southwest of Darwin.

    "The pain lies in confronting the large gulf in the ability to read, write and count that exists between indigenous children in Daly River and privileged, non-indigenous children in the capital cities.

    "But for Ms O'Neill, the benefit will be that the teachers, bureaucrats and governments in charge of closing the gap in indigenous disadvantage will finally have the proper data to be able to see just how big the job ahead of them really is.

    "Anxiety exists among teachers and the education union about the national assessment program, which replaces the Territory's Multi-level Assessment Program.

    "Previously, teachers exercised a degree of discretion during the testing process, sometimes sitting a Year 5 student down to a Year 3 level test, or helping students by reading the questions for them. None of that will be allowed under the national testing model.

    "The Australian Education Union's Northern Territory president Nadine Williams said yesterday that concern also existed about the content of the tests and whether the questions would be relevant to the knowledge base of remote indigenous students.

    "If you don't start from where a child has their knowledge base, then the result is failure," Ms Williams said.

    "National benchmark figures on literacy and numeracy are already bad in the Territory, where fewer than 20 per cent of indigenous students at remote schools meet the national benchmark for reading.

    "Some fear that under the new national testing regime, the figures will be worse.

    "But the education department's deputy chief executive of education services, Ken Davies, said yesterday that the national test results would be structured so as to move away from the pass or fail model of a child either meeting benchmark or not.

    "Under the new results model, students will be placed in a band scale of achievement, meaning that their progress will be able to be tracked.

    "This is about building a way forward and it is certainly not about dooming kids to continuous failure," Mr Davies said."

From The Australian at link

• Op Ed
  Lower age of voting
  by Phillip Adams
  
  Hence my suggestion of a compromise. Non-compulsory voting for 16 and 17-year-olds.
  
  The arguments for L-plating at our polls begin with the undeniable fact that in 2008 many high schoolers know a hell of a lot more about politics, global and national, than their parents, who need to be compelled to apply the be-stringed pencil of Australian democracy to a ballot paper. My 16-year-old and her high school pals are years ahead of the 16-year-olds of my generation, for whom Menzies, Chifley and Calwell might have been the names of obscure elements on the periodic table.
  
  
  

• The Age
  
  
  • Questions over schools test
    by Farrah Tomazin
    
    "Parents will get unprecedented information showing whether their children are high or low achievers as part of Australia's first national literacy and numeracy test.

    "But the three-day program, which begins today, has already proved controversial, with some union teachers refusing to administer the exam and education experts questioning its value.

    "About 1 million children in years 3, 5, 7 and 9 will take part in the test over the next three days, as state and federal governments seek a more accurate snapshot of how students fare in reading, writing and maths.

    "For the first time, student achievement will be measured across 10 new bands for each of the key subject areas.

    "Parents will eventually get a report card showing how their child measures against national benchmarks, and also what "band" their child is in for their year level.

    "Federal Education Minister Julia Gillard said the findings would allow governments to direct resources to where they are needed most.

    "Obviously this is a tool that helps us identify where additional assistance is needed," she said.

    "But in some states or territories — including the Northern Territory and South Australia — union teachers are opposing the test, or refusing to take part in protest against their governments over school resourcing or teacher wages.

    "In Victoria, the education union called off plans to boycott the test after securing a $2 billion wage deal with the Brumby Government last week.

    "Others doubt whether the program will provide valuable information to parents.

    "RMIT University associate professor Kerry Hempenstall said the literacy test was badly designed because it only looked at comprehension, and failed to adequately reflect areas that were also important, such as decoding, vocabulary and reading fluency, he said.

    "He also said the multiple choice format of the test gave students a one-in-four chance of getting a question right.

    "If the benchmark were to be set at 25%, then almost all the students will reach the acceptable level," he said." [emphasis added]

    From The Age at link [See the following RMIT media statement for more info]
    
    
    
  • RMIT University Media Statement [12 May]
    
    
    • Expert Comment – National literacy tests

      Children across Australia will undertake a series of tests to examine their literacy and numeracy skills this week but an RMIT University literacy expert says the assessments are unlikely to produce useful information.

      Associate Professor Kerry Hempenstall said the multiple choice literacy task set as part of the National Assessment Program Literacy and Numeracy (Naplan) tests for year 3, 5, 7 and 9 students was badly designed for assessing reading achievement.

      “National assessment is a good thing as it enables the evaluation of our teaching system,” Associate Professor Hempenstall said.

      “Too often informal assessment done at school fails to reflect the child’s true literacy development – we see many children in the RMIT Clinic with significant reading problems despite parents having been assured by their school over several years that the child was doing well.

      “However, the current reading test looks only at comprehension so it doesn’t adequately reflect the elements that the science of reading has emphasised as areas of risk, which also include decoding, vocabulary, phonemic awareness and reading fluency.

      “The multiple choice format also gives students a one-in-four chance of getting a question right without having understood a word of the question.

      “If the benchmark were to be set at 25 per cent, then almost all the students will reach the acceptable level.”

      Associate Professor Hempenstall said the reading task needed to be revamped to better reflect literacy development and the benchmark for what constituted acceptable performance in the literacy tests needed to be transparent.

      “Currently, this benchmark can be raised or lowered at whim and no one is any the wiser,” he said.

      “Authorities can lower what they consider acceptable performance and so laud the approach to reading instruction currently being promoted.”

      Associate Professor Hempenstall, an expert on reading development, corrective reading and literacy, is available for comment on the Naplan tests.

      For interviews: RMIT University’s Dr Kerry Hempenstall, (03) 9925 7522 or 0418 357 041.

      For general media enquiries: RMIT University Media and Communications, Gosia Kaszubska, (03) 9925 3176 or 0417 510 735.
      
      
      

  • Letters to the Editor
    
    
    • I want to know

      "Maureen Douglas (Opinion, 12/5) says that nationalised testing will lead to children being labelled as "failures" and teachers focusing on instilling content. As someone who believes in the value of education, I would like to know, before sending my child into the unknown, how well primary schools in my local area perform in an educational sense, with respect to the national average. I would like all children to be tested.

      "A child who fails an academic test is not a failure, but a primary school where the majority of children are below the national average is failing the children.

      "Similarly, a school that is well above the national average must be doing something right, educationally speaking. If teachers focus on instilling content, that's OK by me. I would like be able to go to a Department of Education website, enter my postcode, and be able to make a fast yet informed decision about which primary school open nights I should attend or avoid. And (shock, horror), I might discover that the private school down the road isn't really doing that much better than the public school."

      Richard Hall, Greensborough
      
      

    • Success and failure

      "What Maureen Douglas proposes is yet another attempt to erode educational standards by pretending that all students can succeed all the time. Children in our schools need to be encouraged to see failure as an event, not a state.

      "Second, it's a fallacy to suggest that national tests preclude a teacher from communicating his/her perspective or using other assessment tools as a complement to the tests.

      "Third, testing is about providing parents, teachers and students with valuable and objective information about their school progress. If a student is having trouble, remedial action can be taken as soon as possible.

      "Finally, it is no coincidence that those who oppose accountability measures are almost always the ones who are being held accountable. Indeed, those who most fervently oppose the testing of students are usually the ones with a keen self-interest in keeping parents in the dark — teachers and administrators."

      Brendan Duong, West Sunshine
      
      

    • Taking up the fight

      "Thank goodness for the voice of sanity: a primary principal who values the state of childhood and the unique nature of each living, breathing child. Thank goodness for a school that aims to develop students as thoughtful, empathetic, risk-taking beings. Maureen Douglas shows courage in continuing to fight for values that once underpinned Victorian education but have been replaced by conformity, standardisation, test preparation and testing." [Thank Goodness... Even if they can't read, write or do sums, they will be thoughtful and empathetic.  Web]

      Lorraine Wilson, North Carlton

Wednesday 14 May

Alston's Budget Overview

© The West Australian

[now replace Wayne Swan with Carpenter, or McGowan, or DET...
substitute "teachers" for "the rich"...]

• The Australian
  
  
  • The Budget 2008 Special Edition contains many articles and opinion pieces, including:
    
    
    • Students at centre of learning future
      by Justine Ferrari, Education writer
      
      "The Labor Government intends to influence the way reading and maths is taught in schools as part of a $577.4 million program to improve literacy and numeracy standards. [see following analysis story]

      "In an Education Revolution budget that provides a real increase of 12.5 per cent for schools, almost $2.2 billion will be spent on school infrastructure and maintenance, and an extra $200 million for the National Secondary Schools Computer Fund promised during the election campaign.

      "The budget commits to Labor's election promises, including $2.5 billion over the next 10 years for trades training centres in high schools, $62.4 million over three years for teaching Asian languages and $1 billion a year for an Education Tax Refund, providing up to $375 a year for primary students and $750 a year for high school students.

      "The Government axed the Howard government's literacy and numeracy programs to help fund its National Action Plan on Literacy and Numeracy, including tuition vouchers for students failing literacy and numeracy benchmarks, worth $464.7 million over four years to 2011-12, summer schools for teachers, worth $96.2 million over four years, and a scheme to reward schools up to $50,000 for improvements in student results.

      "The budget papers say the National Action Plan is a first critical step in ensuring children have mastered the fundamental learning tools, without which they "will be impoverished learners and unable to contribute fully to society".

      "In a statement, Education Minister Julia Gillard said the plan would use the results from the first national tests in literacy and numeracy, which started yesterday, and evidence from around the world to determine the best methods for improving student proficiency.

      "As an integral part of the National Action Plan, the Rudd Government will provide $10 million to gather research and data to inform an evidence-based approach to literacy and numeracy programs and teacher professional development," she said.

      "Recent public debate over the teaching of reading has prompted a swing back towards teaching children the letter-sound combinations that make up the English language, eschewing the whole-language theories that learning to read is as natural as learning to speak. [emphasis added]

      "The budget papers say a key reform challenge is to improve the quality of teaching that takes place in the classroom and that there is evidence that the literacy and numeracy skills of teachers have been falling.

      "The budget recognises the poorly maintained infrastructure of many schools, particularly in the public system, and allocates $457 million on school capital works and $1.7 billion over four years on maintenance and infrastructure. In addition, the Government will invest $62.5 million over four years on its Local Schools Working Together pilot program, which will encourage government and non-government schools to share facilities.

      "In keeping with the Government's election commitment boosting the study of an Asian language, the National Asian Languages and Studies in Schools program will add extra classes in high schools, teacher training and support and specialist curriculum for advanced students.

      "The extra money for the Digital Education Revolution brings the total investment to $1.2 billion over five years, and the Government will provide funding for the government and non-government school systems to develop a unified technical framework and fund the administration costs of the non-government bodies handling funding.

      "The federal Government has been engaged in discussions with the states and territories over the funding of the initial costs of installing the computers, including any necessary upgrades, and the ongoing costs of maintaining and providing technical support for the computers."

      From The Australian at link
      
      
      
    • Analysis
      Gillard wants techniques that work
      by Justine Ferrari
      
      "Wondering whatever happened to the Education Revolution? Julia Gillard last night made clear her approach. It's not just about money - it's about challenging questionable teaching methods.

      "The Education Minister has signalled she is prepared to take teachers on where it matters: in the classroom. In a direct foray into the divisive Reading Wars, Gillard is talking about making sure that teachers use proven methods in teaching children how to read and how to add up.

      "The revolution will come in changing the thinking of teachers so they embrace practices based on the evidence of what works and not the latest scatterbrain idea dreamed up by some dusty academic who rarely enters a classroom, much less teaches kids. [emphasis added]

      "The Rudd Government says in its National Action Plan on Literacy and Numeracy that an evidence-based approach will take primacy.

      "As an integral component of the National Action Plan, the Rudd Government will provide $10 million to gather research and data to inform an evidence-based approach to literacy and numeracy programs and teacher professional development," Gillard's budget release says.

      "This is about what works."

      "The budget papers talk of the importance of ensuring that teacher training is grounded in the evidence, and in the practical skills required of teachers in the classroom.

      "The real battleground facing Gillard will be in the education faculties in universities, which are responsible for training new teachers and seemingly willing to be captured by the latest ideology sweeping the world.

      "Teaching children to sound out words was thrown out in favour of whole-language techniques, teaching reading as if by osmosis. Direct explicit instruction was replaced by student-centred learning -- teachers no longer pass on knowledge and skills, but are "facilitators" for students directing their own learning. [emphasis added]

      "Rote learning of times tables is deemed boring, as are the rules of grammar and spelling, and not fundamental to developing sophisticated skills and understanding.

      "For too long, the education debate has been mired in claim and counter-claim. Pedagogical techniques are rarely subjected to large-scale scientific-standard control testing. Most educational research is quantitative, making assertions based on the experience of a handful of students.

      "In the case of reading, a large control study was conducted a few years ago comparing children in Scotland, taught to read using phonics, and students in New Zealand, taught using whole language. The Scottish children had reading skills a year or more ahead of their New Zealand peers. But these results have been roundly rejected by the whole-language proponents.

      "That is the scale of the challenge facing Gillard: the evidence is not enough to convince the ideologues. The revolution must be as much a cultural revolution as a revolution in education."

      From The Australian at link
      
      
      
    • School result reports backed
      by Justine Ferrari
      
      "The public reporting of student and school results substantially improves performance, the budget papers say, adding weight to arguments in favour of "league tables" comparing schools across the nation.

      "The argument runs counter to recent comments backing away from the idea by Education Minister Julia Gillard.

      "As reported in The Australian yesterday, Ms Gillard has refused to endorse an election commitment that the Government will publish the results of individual schools in national tests of literacy and numeracy, which started yesterday.

      "But in a statement on boosting Australia's productive capacity, the budget papers mount an argument for publishing school-by-school results of national tests, and individual student results. It quotes research from the OECD and other researchers that publicly reporting student and school results, and giving schools greater autonomy, has "significant positive impacts on student performance".

      "OECD research finds that students in schools that publicly release their performance results performed substantially better than students in schools that did not, even after accounting for the demographic and socioeconomic background of students and schools," the statement says.

      "The Government is spending $17.2 million over four years to establish a National Schools Assessment and Data Centre to improve the collection, reporting and analysis of data relating to schools performance and student achievement of educational goals.

      "The budget statement accords with the commitment given in the election campaign by Kevin Rudd and then education spokesman Stephen Smith."

      From The Australian at link
      
      See related story in The West Australian
      
      
      
    • A trio of funds to rebuild a nation
      
      Australia will consolidate and expand a series of sovereign funds, creating a $51billion pool to be used to break economic bottlenecks, combat the rapid ageing of the nation's road, rail, ports and communications infrastructure, lift the delivery of health and education services and provide confidence for future business investment.
      
      
      
    • Instant boost for higher learning
      
      Higher and further education will receive a $5billion injection for capital expenditure and maintenance, with an immediate allocation of $500 million over the next two months.
      
      
      
    • Editorial
      Swan-lite effort comes up short
      
      The budget is responsible but not extraordinary, lacking courage on reform and in deep cuts to spending
      
      
      • Op Ed: Trade-off will make or break Labor [Paul Kelly]
        
        
      • Op Ed: Pressure will remain on monetary policy [Alan Wood]
        
        
      • Op Ed: Spending slayer more a prodder [Jennifer Hewett]
        
        
        
        
    • Op Ed
      Cash alone can't transform unis
      
      According to Julia Gillard, the Government will "transform" universities and training with the budget announcement of an $11 billion investment fund.

      No, it won't.
      
      

    • Op Ed
      Buying time, not a revolution
      
      Despite the Government's rhetoric, this is not an education revolution.

      But it is a first step towards the real reform universities have been awaiting for a decade.

      
      

    • Parents to lose pay if kids miss school
      
      Parents who do not enrol their children or send them to school will have their welfare payments stopped under a plan to be tested in eight communities across the country.
      
      
      
    • National standard for early childcare
      
      The Government will overhaul early childhood services, imposing national standards for childcare centres and for what children should learn, and boosting the educational standards of the workforce as part of its strategy to reorganise the system to provide early education rather than care.
      
      
      
  • Op Ed
    Children destined to fail without the basics of learning
    by Kevin Donnelly
    
    "The usual suspects are arguing that this week's national literacy and numeracy tests are educationally unsound and counter-productive.

    "Australian Education Union federal president Angelo Gavrielatos claims British and American research proves national testing fails to raise standards. Futhermore, he claims it "compromises overall education outcomes because it narrows curriculum by forcing teachers to 'teach to the test"'.

    "Groups such as the Australian Association for the Teachers of English and the Australian Curriculum Studies Association also oppose standardised testing; they argue that telling children they have failed is bad for their self-esteem and such tests focus too much on the basics.

    "Reality check. Most children already know there are winners and losers, and while giving them an honest appraisal of their strengths and weaknesses might upset some, it certainly beats promoting them through school with a false sense of achievement.

    "The basics are the foundation of learning, without which children are destined to failure. Spelling, grammar and punctuation, addition, subtraction, and division, all of which are being tested this week, are prerequisites for further learning, especially for children who come from disadvantaged backgrounds.

    "The next time you catch a plane or drive a car, remember that teaching to the test has its benefits. It's good if pilots and drivers have been taught to such a degree that flying and driving, in many respects, becomes automatic.

    "Research into how children best learn also concludes that memorisation, rote learning and mental arithmetic are essential.

    "While testing, by itself, is not a magic bullet, overseas research shows that those foreign students who perform better than Australians in mathematics and science regularly sit tests and face consequences for failure.

    "Since the introduction in the US of the No Child Left Behind legislation - which forces schools to regularly test students - standards have improved. In Britain, where schools are ranked, under-performing schools are given additional resources.

    "Telling parents how schools perform means the pressure is on to raise standards.

    "Notwithstanding these pluses, the Rudd Government's implementation of the national tests is open to attack. By refusing to make individual school results public, parents are being kept in the dark."

    Kevin Donnelly is the director of Education Strategies, based in Melbourne

    From The Australian at link
    
    
    
  • School students put brains to the test
    
    Thousands of school students across Australia sat down nervously in exam rooms yesterday as they completed national literacy and numeracy tests for the first time in history.
    
    
    
    
• Business Day Budget Page
  
  
  
  
• Full text of Federal Budget [+ related details: Commonwealth Government website]
  
  
  
  
• The West Australian
  
  
  • Alston cartoon
    
    
    
  • Gillard dodges questions on national tests (page 5)
    by Bethany Hiatt

    "More than 114,000 WA students sat the first part of new national reading, writing and maths tests yesterday as the Federal Government continued to dodge questions about whether each school would be ranked in national league tables.

    "Students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 sat the writing and language conventions sections of the national tests, which have replaced similar State-based tests. Each section took about 40 minutes.

    "Tuart Hill Primary School principal Leah Vogler said the children had done practice tests to familiarise themselves with the format of the new National Assessment Plan Literacy and Numeracy exams.

    "It is in a different format to what we tend to do in our day-to-day teaching," she said. "They handled it well, there were no apparent stresses."

    "Potential disruption of the tests by the State School Teachers Union was averted late last week when the WA industrial Relations Commission ordered the union to lift its boycott.

    "Today, students will do reading tests and tomorrow they will take maths tests. Reports to parents will show students' achievement across 10 bands and compare their performance with the national average and the middle 60 per cent of students.

    "But parents in WA may be unable to compare the results of their child's school with those across the nation, even though the WA Department of Education and Training has pledged to publish results online.

    "Federal Education Minister Julia Gillard this week appeared to back away from a Labor commitment to publish individual school results.

    "Asked on radio if parents would be able to compare school results when deciding where to send their children, she said: "At this stage, what parents are going to get is their own report card."

    "Yesterday, a spokeswoman for Ms Gillard said discussions were still continuing with States and Territories on how to deliver the election commitment in full "This is not about league tables," she said.

    "WA Education Minister Mark McGowan also dodged the issue.

    "Asked if it was unfair that WA parents may not be able to compare their school with those in other States, he said be backed the way the Federal Government was conducting the tests." [True to form, McGowan doesn't answer the question... just like Parliament. Web]

    From the West Australian
    
    
    

  • Boost for computers in schools but States lose out on rollout (page 9)
    by Kim McDonald

    "The Federal Government boosted its commitment to the digital education revolution to $1.2 billion in the Budget but failed to include any extra money to help schools set up and use the computers.

    "Premier Alan Carpenter had recently complained to program could lead to "boxes of computers which no one can afford to use"….

    "Peter Collier said the failure to budget for the rollout yesterday would seriously hamper the program…."

    Full story in The West Australian
    
    
    

  • 'No school no service' for truants (page 53)
    Darwin

    "A "no school, no service" policy pioneered by stores in a remote Aboriginal community should be considered for other trouble spots in the Northern Territory, the Country Liberal Party says.

    "Two stores in the central Australian community of Hermannsburg,120 km west of Alice Springs, have introduced bans on serving children during school hours.

    "The policy is designed to cut down on truancy, petrol sniffing and youth crime.

    "Opposition business spokeswoman Jodeen Carney yesterday welcomed the initiative, introduced following a community meeting last month..."

    "It's appalling that thousands of kids across the Territory are missing out on an education," she said.

    "The Labor Government repeatedly shies away from taking tough decisions about the Territory's shocking truancy rates." ...

    Full story in The West Australian
    
    
    

  • 5-Minute Guide Budget 08 (page 11)

    Education

    • $11 billion to go into new education Investment Fund to fund future capital works in tertiary and technical education.
      
    • $4.4 billion over four years on new education tax refunds under which parents can claim 50 percent tax rebate on eligible education expenses for their children up to $375 for primary students and $750 for secondary students.
      
    • $1.2 billion over five years to deliver computers to all students in Years 9-12.
      
    • $2.5 billion over ten years for trade training centres in schools."

  From The West Australian

  
  

  • Letter to the Editor (page 22)
    

    • In short
      

      "I can understand that the drift away from public to private education in WA (Rush for places at elite schools, 10/5) causes concern for the Department of Education and Training and probably the Minister for Education. It is a fact, however, that private school growth actually saves the Government money because it does not have to fund the capital or the bulk of the operating costs of these schools. The State Government should be supporting and encouraging these schools and then using the savings it is making from each student in a private school to boost public schools and offer what parents are seeking for their students in public education."

      Ron Peckitt, Duncraig
      

Thursday 15 May

• The West Australian
  
  
  • Secret talks reveal too many pupils in classes (page 5)
    by Bethany Hiatt

    "Secret negotiations over teachers' pay and conditions had revealed that WA State schools were packing too many students into classrooms, the teachers' union claimed yesterday.

    "The State School Teachers Union said information provided by the Department of Education and Training during negotiations in the WA Industrial Relations Commission showed that a significant number of classes had too many students.

    "SSTU president Anne Gisborne said the department had only agreed to provide the information on the condition it remained confidential.

    "The only thing I can say is that it was a surprise and that there are a significant number of schools with too many classes that are running over the maximum," she said.

    "Education Minister Mark McGowan and the department refused to comment, but WA Primary Principals Association president Stephen Breen confirmed that "a number of schools" would be over the recommended class sizes.

    "The union is urging members to complain if they are teaching classes that are too big. The 2006 enterprise bargaining agreement states the limit for Years 1 - 3 is 24 students and that Years 4 - 10 should not exceed 32.

    "Oversized classes are a workload issue," Ms Gisborne said. "We're calling on members to examine the situation, and if they don't have class sizes complying, then seek to move their class sizes to the right size.

    "She said the department claimed it staffed schools in line with the agreement. "As we understand it, there is a capacity in schools to run class sizes as they should be," she said. "It depends how they deploy the staff." Asked how many classes were oversized and by how many students, a department spokesman said: "No comment will be made by the DET on confidential discussions."

    "Mr Breen said while all schools complied with class guidelines, there could be cases in which teachers agreed to take a few extra students. "All of those decisions would be based on negotiations with teachers and with trade-offs," he said.

    "If children joined a class after the school year started and pushed it over the limit, a principal had a choice between reorganising the school or negotiating with the teacher to accept the extra numbers.

    "There would be a number of schools that are over but that would be based on school-based negotiations and that was in the last agreement, there was scope for that," he said.

    "I think it's a storm in a teacup, it's basically an agreement between the teachers and the principal."

    From The West Australian

    
    

  • Premier lines up school computer fight (page 10)
    by Chris Johnson and Bethany Hiatt

    "Alan Carpenter is set to take on Canberra over the rollout of computers for upper high school students, after Kevin Rudd's refusal to rule out forcing the State to cover additional costs of implementing his election promise.

    "The Federal Budget confirmed Labor's election commitment to provide $1 billion to ensure every student in Years 9 to 12 has a computer to work with.

    "But State governments were given no assurances that they will not be asked to pay to get those computers up and running.

    "The Premier has already told the Prime Minister that WA will not be paying for a Federal Labor election promise.

    "But yesterday, Mr Rudd refused to guarantee that the States would not have to pay for cables, installation, power points, maintenance, security and higher electricity bills associated with the computer rollout.

    "What State governments do to assist and partner with us in that program ... is of course being resolved as a matter of detail in each State through the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Education (Julia Gillard)," he said.

    "Now what individual schools do for fundraising, well ... that's a matter for them."

    Shadow Federal education minister Tony Smith said the Budget had confirmed that schools would be left to pick up part of the tab.

    "Labor MPs are going to turn up to schools, dump the computers in boxes on the doorstep, smile for the photo opportunity and then leave schools and parents to pay for the extra costs," he said.

    "Kevin Rudd thinks it's fine to leave parents to pay higher school fees or run lamington drives and fetes to pay for his election promises."

    Education Minister Mark McGowan said the State Government was still in talks with the Commonwealth about how the computers would be rolled out.

    "But Mr Carpenter had already told Mr Rudd at the Council of Australian Governments meeting in March that WA was not prepared to meet the extra costs of installing and operating the computers.

    "He said for every dollar Canberra was planning to spend, it would cost the States three to four dollars for the extras.

    "He recently complained the program could lead to "boxes of computers which no one can afford to use".

    The State School Teachers Union said yesterday that the Federal Government should pay the full costs of the computers to schools rather than requiring the State or individual schools to pick up the tab.

    "This is a Federal Government initiative so at the very least we think if you're going to be putting forward something positive and constructive, and it can't operate, then it's fairly useless," SSTU president Anne Gisborne said.

    "People can construe this as positive and generous from the Federal Government's perspective but what it does is it brings with it unplanned - for expenditure or demands on resources."

    "Ms Gisborne said parents would be concerned that some school programs could close down to divert money to the computer program.

    "WA Secondary Executives Association president Rob Nairn said schools would not have the capacity to pay their own set-up costs. More machines were of no use without the infrastructure to make computers into an effective teaching tool.

    "WA Council of State School Organisations president Rob Fry said he was not aware of any schools starting fundraising drives to help pay for the computer extras."

    From The West Australian
    

    
    
    
• ABC News
  
  
  • 11 Students suspended over school violence
    
    The Education Department has played down a series of violent incidents at secondary schools in Geraldton, which left a student with concussion and another 11 students suspended.

    On Friday, a 15-year-old student was repeatedly punched in the head by fellow students at Geraldton Senior College.

    Eleven students have been suspended from Geraldton's John Willcock College following six separate incidents since Monday.

    The Mid West Director of Schools Jenny Kuhn concedes the violence is unusual.

    "There's a whole range of issues that parents are concerned about and I guess the concept of ensuring the schools are a safe place to learn are an issues that people in Geraldton seem to have concerns about," he said.

    "The incidents that happened in the last couple of days, it's very unusual to have such a large number of incidents in the school in the one period of time."

    From ABC News at link
    
    
    
    
• The Australian
  
  
  • Primary schools 'biggest losers' in budget
    by Justine Ferrari, Education writer
    
    "The only specific funding for primary schools is contained in the health budget, not the education budget, and provides money for pupils to grow vegetables.

    "As part of an initiative to counter childhood obesity, the federal Government is providing $12.8 million over the next four years to fund a kitchen garden program in 190 primary schools.

    "The pilot program is aimed at tackling childhood obesity by giving children hands-on experience in healthy eating," the budget papers say.

    "The program will help teach children in Years 3 to 6 how to grow, harvest and cook produce as part of the school curriculum."

    "While primary school students will benefit from broader education programs, mainly the literacy and numeracy action plan, principals were hopeful for more.

    "Australian Primary Principals Association president Leonie Trimer said she was "bitterly disappointed" that the budget failed to allocate additional resources for primary schools. She said the $12.8 million for vegetable gardens failed to recognise primary schools faced far more serious problems.

    "It is a prime example of the way in which the primary curriculum is being cluttered with good intentions and pet projects," Ms Trimper said. "Primary schools around the nation are hurting, with a great number facing very severe resourcing problems."

    "The APPA has argued that the primary school curriculum is cluttered and should be pared back to focus on the essentials: chiefly literacy and numeracy.

    "Opposition education spokesman Tony Smith said primary schools were the biggest losers of the budget.

    "I don't see how a few veggie gardens are going to fix literacy and numeracy problems or crumbling classrooms and other issues in primary schools," Mr Smith said. "Parents and teachers at primary schools have a right to feel cheated by Labor; all of the big glossy election promises have been directed at secondary schools."

    "Education Minister Julia Gillard has said primary school funding will be boosted in the next four-year agreement with the states and territories, which starts next year.

    "Australian Education Union federal president Angelo Gavrielatos said the Government had to explore the full funding arrangements and not isolate primary school needs to the negotiation of the funding agreement. He said the Government, during the election campaign, had described a glaring need for extra funding for primary education.

    "The Rudd Government is conspicuous by its silence with respect to the budget and the resourcing needs of primary schools," Mr Gavrielatos said.

    "He also called on the Government to fulfil its promise to increase public schools funding. Analysis by the union says funding for private schools will rise 21per cent between 2007-08 and 2011-12, compared with a 13 per cent increase for government schools.

    "Independent Education Union federal secretary Chris Watt, representing private school teachers, welcomed the budget allocation of $42 billion for school funding over the four years from 2009.

    "Mr Watt said the funding should be distributed according to the need of the school and the real cost of educating students, rather than the arbitrary measure used at present, which is based on how much state governments spend rather than how much schools cost."

    From The Australian at link
    
    
    
  • Comment
    Education paper fails to deliver
    by Kevin Donnelly
    
    Like a curate's egg, when it comes to education and this week's federal budget, there is both good and bad.

    "On reading statement four in Budget Paper No 1, it is good that the authors have listened to debates across the country and in these pages about the best way to raise standards, improve curriculums and strengthen teacher training.

    "The budget paper stresses the importance of effectively teaching the basics of literacy and numeracy, improving the quality of those entering the profession and forcing schools to be more accountable by making performance data public.

    "Reflecting overseas research about the characteristics of stronger-performing education systems, the budget paper also concedes that school autonomy and opening education to what is described as "demand-side pressure" leads to higher standards.

    "Implying that much of education is driven by ideology and fads - Australia's adoption of outcomes-based education is the most recent example - and that any proposed innovations or changes must be evidenced-based should also be commended. [emphasis added]

    "Unfortunately, after reading Budget Paper No 2, where the Rudd Government outlines its spending plans for 2008-09, such optimism soon dissipates. Once again, while the rhetoric is sound, when it comes to implementation, the Rudd Government fails to deliver.

    "Under the heading of "Early Childhood Revolution", the Rudd Government promises to roll out universal access to early learning for all four-year-olds. Those who have followed debates in Britain, where the Labour Government funded a similar program, will know that the evidence warns against such a policy. In practice, funding pre-school centres became a new form of middle-class welfare as those best placed to make use of the system were already advantaged.

    "There is also an increasing body of evidence that children benefit from being raised in the home and that so-called creche kids suffer as a result of their experience.

    "Calling for more Asian-language teaching in schools and a greater emphasis on vocational education and trade, similar to the then Opposition's election pledge to give every senior school student a laptop, while sounding good, demonstrates ignorance of how schools work.

    "Language teachers, like those teaching mathematics and science, are short on the ground. Worse still, much of the curriculum in languages has been so dumbed down - students spend their time reading recipes, travel guides and celebrating cultures - that many finish secondary school largely illiterate in their chosen language.

    "Spending millions establishing bodies such as the National Curriculum Board, the Public Policy Institute and Skilling Australia - all representative bodies or composed of the usual suspects - also demonstrates that Rudd's education revolution is more about spin than substance. [emphasis added]

    "A real revolution, instead of increased bureaucracy and government control, would be to support parents and schools better. Across the nation, some 30 per cent of parents send their children to non-government schools - the figure rises to 40 per cent at Years 11 and 12.

    "Non-government schools, especially those in the Catholic system, are the losers in this week's budget."

    Kevin Donnelly is the director of Education Strategies, based in Melbourne

    From The Australian at link
    
    
    
    
  • PC plan for pupils closer to launch
    by Sid Marris and Nicola Berkovic
    
    "A plan to give every senior school student a computer has moved closer to implementation after the Rudd Government boosted funding.

    "States have questioned the additional costs of the $1 billion plan, a centrepiece of Kevin Rudd's election launch last year, which would require public and private schools to meet additional costs such as support, maintenance and cabling.

    "But it is understood the decision to add another $200 million to the program, in five years, has eased their reluctance.

    "The effective life of a computer is four years, and the willingness to start funding for replacements in the future has been welcomed by the states..."
    
    "Opposition education spokesman Tony Smith said that for every $1 the Rudd Government spent on computers, an extra $3 would be needed for costs such as installation, maintenance, new classrooms, power points and higher electricity bills.

    "But the Rudd Government says state governments will be able to secure significant discounts on bulk computer purchases - potentially a cost of $600 for each $1000 allocated on the policy - and any difference will go to the states for other costs.

    "The states have agreed to support the first $100 million of the program. This will initially lift the ratio of senior students to computers to 2 to 1 in 937 of the neediest schools."

    Full story in The Australian at link
    
    
    

  • The war of independents
    
    Militant West Australian unionist Kevin Reynolds plans to continue his war on Premier Alan Carpenter using the resources of the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union to help a handful of independents run against Labor candidates at the next state election.
    
    
    

  • Student body forbids 'anti-abortion' poster
    
    A Catholic students group at the University of Queensland has been gagged and threatened with disaffiliation from the students union for taking a perceived anti-abortion stance.
    
    
    
    
• The Age
  
  
  • Brightest students muddy school test
    by Farrah Tomazin
    
    "Schools are allowing smart year 10 students to take a national literacy and numeracy test designed for year 9, prompting concerns about the validity of the government program.

    "More than a million students in years 3, 5, 7 and 9 will complete the three-day test today.

    "It is designed to show parents how their children fare in reading, writing and maths.

    "But some schools are allowing students from select-entry accelerated learning classes to take the test with their year 9 peers, sparking claims they are trying to boost their results.

    "Victoria has about 38 government schools offering accelerated learning programs.

    "One parent whose child is in year 10 at Brighton Secondary College said her child did not believe it was appropriate to be taking part in the program. "My child was indignant and just felt it was really unethical," she said.

    "But acting principal Pat Gargano defended the college's decision. He said year 10 accelerated learning students were "chronologically" at the same level as those in year 9 because they started high school at the same time.

    "The testing is to do with the age of the kids, not their year level," he said. "It's got nothing to do with skewing results — all schools do it." [emphasis added]

    "Education Department officials did not know about the situation, but spokeswoman Anna Malbon later said it was acceptable if the students were technically year 9 students doing year 10 level work.

    "Principals were divided. The president of the Victorian Association of State Secondary Principals, Brian Burgess, said it was appropriate, while University High principal Rob Newton, whose school also runs accelerated learning programs, disagreed. "Regardless of your age, the test should be about what year level you're operating at," Mr Newton said. "If you're operating at year 10 levels, you shouldn't be doing a test designed for year 9."

    "The national assessment program is the first time students have sat the same literacy and numeracy test at the same time. As outlined in Tuesday's federal budget, it will be used to inform governments where to target resources for struggling students.

    "Achievement will be measured across 10 bands, and parents will eventually get a report card showing how their children measure against national benchmarks and whether their child is high-achieving or low-achieving.

    "The test has been controversial, with education experts questioning its value and teacher unions in some states boycotting it. Australian Education Union state branch president Mary Bluett said: "The notion of a single test giving a child a ranking in relation to a national benchmark is professionally insulting and misleading to parents."

    "Students at Kambrya College in Berwick yesterday discovered that one of the answers to a practice section of the test was incorrect, casting further doubt on the program."

    From The Age at link
    
    
    
    
  • Size 'doesn't matter' in class numbers
    by David Rood
    
    "Class sizes for students in years 3 to 6 in Victorian schools have been dumped from the state budget because the Brumby Government believes they don't measure the quality of education offered to children.

    "As recently as December, Education Minister Bronwyn Pike told Parliament that as a result of the Government's education policy, Victoria has the smallest class sizes on record.

    "But the budget papers show the average 3 to 6 class sizes, along with student to staff ratios at primary and secondary schools, will no longer be reported because: "This measure is no longer relevant because the indicator is not a measure of education performance."

    "The state budget reports the prep to year 2 average class sizes — expected to be 21 in 2008-09 — explaining this data is "designed to improve the quality of student learning".

    "The Coalition, teachers' union and primary principals slammed the Government for dropping the class size data, accusing it of having something to hide.

    "Opposition education spokesman Martin Dixon said the Government was hypocritical in arguing that if class sizes are good they are worthwhile reporting but not publishing the data if it isn't positive.

    "You can't have it both ways," he said.

    "The pillar of the Brumby Government's educational argument has been class sizes … they should continue to make them public."

    "The Australian Education Union said a wealth of research showed class size had an impact on the quality of learning. "Lower class sizes in prep to year 2 have been achieved only on the basis of increasing year 3 to 6 class sizes," Victorian branch president Mary Bluett said. "To remove the reporting of classes appears like the Government has something to hide."

    "The Victorian Principals Association, which mainly represents primary schools, said parents expected full disclosure of important information such as class sizes."

    From The Age at link
    
    
    
    
  • Education: Budget could include schools
    by Jewel Topsfield
    
    "The $11 billion set aside in the federal budget to finance capital works at universities and TAFEs could be expanded to include schools. And Victorian universities will receive $124.7 million of the $500 million in the next two months for desperately needed infrastructure.

    "Education Minister Julia Gillard yesterday said the $11 billion Education Investment Fund, which replaces the $5 billion fund set up by the former government, could be extended to schools in the future if additional funds were provided. Ms Gillard denied the $11 billion could be used as a pork-barrelling slush fund, saying a "robust advisory structure" headed by the chairman of the former fund, Phil Clarke, would advise the cabinet on spending decisions.

    "Opposition education spokesman Tony Smith said he was very concerned about the plans to spend the capital and earning from this fund. But Ms Gillard said the former scheme had been limited, with universities suffering if interest earned was not high."

    From The Age at link
    
    
    
    
• The Washington Post
  
  
  • Teachers, Students Test a Scoring Tool
    
    Fairmont Heights High School students in Tumisha Alao's 11th-grade Advanced Placement English class know instantly if they aced or failed a quiz, which questions they missed and which they got right.

    Alao's classroom recently began using the eInstruction Classroom Performance System, which enables students to take quizzes and complete lessons by pressing a button rather than writing answers on paper. The teacher receives instant feedback on a laptop about how the students performed, and students learn scores and grades the moment they finish assessments.

Friday 16 May

• The West Australian
  
  
  • Teachers consider two-day strike as pay campaign hits stalemate (page 19)
    by Bethany Hiatt
    
    "State schools could close for up to two days if teachers back the most extreme form of industrial action being canvassed by their union.
    
    "The State School Teachers Union is surveying teachers to gauge support for strike action as the next step in their pay dispute with the State Government. Teachers have been asked to choose between striking for between half a day and two days or taking part in rolling half or full-day strikes in the survey sent to schools yesterday. They have until May 30 to respond.
    
    "Pay talks appear to have reached a stalemate after more than five months of negotiations, with the union conceding yesterday that it was almost inevitable the dispute would go to arbitration in the WA Industrial Relations Commission.
    
    “We believe in a matter of weeks it is highly likely we will be in arbitration,” SSTU president Anne Gisborne said in a podcast to members.
    
    "The Department of Education and Training applied for an end to the bargaining period five weeks ago because it believed there was no prospect of the parties reaching agreement.
    
    "Commissioner Jennifer Harrison will consider whether the dispute should go to arbitration on May 28.
    
    "Union general secretary David Kelly said teachers would not rule out industrial action if the matter went to arbitration, even though it might be frowned on by the commission.
    
    “Nothing stipulates that you don’t have industrial action,” he said. “The union will keep everything on the table and all its options open — industrial and political action regardless of where the matter is, until it’s finished.”
    
    "The union wants pay rises of more than 20 per cent over three years. The Government says that under the offer the union rejected in December, teachers would have received between 13 and 22 per cent, depending on experience and location."
    
    From The West Australian at link
    
    
    
  • Letter to the Editor (page 22)
    
    
    • In short
      
      "So now our accidental Premier, a former investigative journalist, is blocking the report on Aboriginal jobs (report, 14/5)

      "First the Twomey Report on teacher shortages is kept secret, now the report on Aboriginal jobs. Is there anything this Government will allow us to know?"

      Patrick F Whalen, Yokine
      

      
      
      
• ABC News
  
  
  • Survey could determine whether teachers strike
    
    "The State School Teachers Union is surveying teachers on whether they should go on strike over their pay dispute with the State Government.

    "The union's secretary, David Kelly, says there is little progress in discussions so all options are being considered.

    "Teachers are asking for a 20 per cent pay rise over 3 years which the government has rejected.

    "Mr Kelly says even if the matter goes to arbitration, a strike may still be possible depending on the results of the survey."

    From ABC News at link
    
    
    
  • Violent Geraldton students have been punished: McGowan
    
    "The Education Minister Mark McGowan says students involved in a string of violent incidents at Geraldton's two public schools have been handed tough penalties.

    "On Friday a 15-year-old boy was beaten at Geraldton Senior College and on Tuesday 11 students were suspended from John Wilcock College.

    "Yesterday, a video was removed from the internet site Youtube, which showed a Geraldton student being pushed to the ground and punched.

    "Mr McGowan says the Government has good policies in place, to deal with violent behaviour in schools.

    "There's often from time to time problems in certain areas or certain schools that need to be dealt with and they need to be dealt with severely and it was obviously a problem in Geraldton and it's being dealt with severely," he said."

    From ABC News at link
    
    
    
  • School vandalised in racist attack
    
    "Police are investigating racist graffiti at an independent school in Ferndale.

    "The incident happened at DAMLA College in Latham Street overnight or early this morning.

    "Racist graffiti was sprayed on school property including a bus.

    "It is the fourth time vandals have targeted the school, on Sunday two buses were burnt, with a molotov cocktail thrown into one."

    From ABC News at link
    
    
    
    
• The Australian
  
  
  • Brendan Nelson fuels budget brawl in budget-in-reply speech
    
    Brendan Nelson has vowed a Coalition government would slash fuel excise by 5c a litre and lift education standards by raising "embarrassingly low" entry requirements for teacher training courses... He attacked university teacher training departments as mediocre, promising to lift qualification scores for teacher training, boost teacher pay levels and require universities to appoint proven high-performing teachers as tutors. "All trainee teachers will be taught how to teach children using proven techniques including phonic-based instruction," Dr Nelson said. "They must also be taught and assessed in basic sciences, mathematics, English and history. [Funny... I don't recall 13 years of Coalition Government doing anything to "boost teacher pay levels" or to meet any of those other goals...  Web]
    
    
    • From The Australian's Editorial: "On education, Mr Nelson called for higher university entrance scores for education degrees and a return to core values and the introduction of merit-based pay."
      
      
    • The full speech: Brendan Nelson's Budget in Reply
      
      
    • The Sydney Morning Herald
      Nelson: I'm blocking the budget
      
      
      
      
  • Editorial
    Publish test results
    

    Labor's election promise is looking as clear as mud
    
    "The pre-election commitment was sound policy, good politics and crystal clear: "A Rudd Labor government will publish the annual results of individual primary and secondary schools on national reading, writing and numeracy assessments for students in grades 3, 5, 7 and 9." The budget papers reinforced it, quoting OECD and other research showing that public reporting of student and school results has "significant positive impacts on student performance", even after accounting for demographic and socioeconomic backgrounds.

    "Given this, Kevin Rudd and his deputy, Julia Gillard, must not cave in to state education bureaucracies, the captives of teachers' unions, and back down. If they do, the education revolution will be stymied before it starts. Such weakness would signal that the Rudd Government could also go to water on national curriculum rigour and other issues.

    "Inevitably, such data would reveal surprises, with some schools in poorer and country areas exceeding expectations and others, including some charging high fees in elite areas, falling short. Critics claim that publication is unfair to lower socio-economic schools, but this is an invalid argument against the public's right to know. All parents, including those in areas that are struggling, have the right to compare schools and see if results in their children's schools are improving over time. Common sense dictates that the data is not about crude comparisons of rich and poor, but comparing trends. There is no reason for secrecy.

    "The waters are already muddy about the Government's intentions. As The Australian reported on Tuesday, Ms Gillard, the Education Minister, refused to endorse the commitment about publishing results, when questioned on ABC radio. She said parents would get "their own report card" and that she would "talk to state and territory governments about the best use of this information". Later, her spokeswoman said broad agreement had been reached with states for the commonwealth to receive results school by school and "we will be working ... to deliver our election commitment in full".

    "Fair enough. But at least three states - NSW, Queensland and South Australia - staunchly oppose publication. Queensland and NSW have agreed to provide school-by-school results to the federal Government on condition they are not used in league tables. NSW Education Minister John Della Bosca says tables are a "silly idea" and Queensland Minister Rod Welford says the results are "not representative of anything in relation to the school". He insists they will not be published in the first year.

    "By Wednesday, the mire had thickened. Ms Gillard's spokeswoman claimed the minister had repeatedly stated they would "not be pursuing league tables". But all election commitments would be fulfilled.

    "League tables" rank schools, but published raw data need not take that form. It could be alphabetical or geographic. But in a nation that respects free speech, if someone recollated the data to rank schools, it would be their prerogative.

    "One of the best cases in favour of publication says: "Comparing the performance of schools allows us to judge how well our education system is performing. There is no better or more transparent way to make the case for additional support for those schools which are falling behind than making the performance of all schools public. We cannot pretend that all schools are succeeding when it is clear that some do better than others." It is in the ALP policy platform."
    
    From The Australian at link
    
    
    

• The Sydney Morning Herald
  
  
  • Countdown to political storm with results of numeracy tests
    by Anna Patty
    
    "... The tests have stirred a political storm, with the Federal Government threatening to starve the NSW Government of its share of funding for disadvantaged schools because it is refusing to release individual schools' results from the national literacy and numeracy tests.

    "The State Government fears the results will open the way for creation of league tables and has accused the Federal Government of taking a simplistic approach to working out which schools were in the areas of greatest need.

    "The Minister for Education, Julia Gillard, said students will be graded using a series of 10 bands instead of the A to E system. The bands will identify high achievers suited to accelerated programs and poor performers suited to remedial teaching.

    "The NSW Minister for Education, John Della Bosca, says the tests were too blunt to guide funding decisions."

    Full story in The Sydney Morning Herald at link

Saturday – Sunday, 17 – 18 May

• The West Australian
  
  
  • Op Ed
    Ticking off the teacher fails sound policy test (page 20)
    by Zoltan Kovacs, Opinion Editor
    
    "It would be interesting to know whether it has occurred to the top Education Department bureaucrats that their sometimes anachronistically authoritarian management style could contribute to the evidently worsening teacher shortage. In other words, do they ever ask themselves with brutal honesty whether they're the sort of bosses people would want to work for?
    
    "It is a question that may well have been taken up in last year's review, chaired by Lance Twomey, of the teacher shortage. We don't know whether it was because the Government hasn't released his report while its protracted battle with the teacher's union over pay and conditions continues.
    
    "However, anyone who took a serious look at the department as an employer of teachers would discover a paradox: the department likes to extol the professionalism of its teachers, but routinely contradicts this with an insistence on exerting it centralised authority over them and treating them with indifference, if not downright hostility.
    
    "For instance, it decided that it was necessary to issue an edict on pay docking for teachers who refused to administer this week's national reading, writing and maths tests, rather than leaving it to schools to allow duty swaps among teachers so that those who objected to the tests could do other work while colleagues who were prepared to oversee the tests would do so. It took a visit to the WA Industrial Relations Commission by the department and the union to come up with what, in essence, was that eminently practical solution.
    
    "The heavy-handed, threatening, authoritarian stuff from head office wasn't necessary, though worryingly revealing of its mindset. (The motives of teachers for wanting to obstruct testing are not necessarily pure, either, but that is another matter.)
    
    "Ironically, it is more than likely that many of them also wanted to protest against the Howard government's proposed industrial relations changes three years ago. They weren't hassled then by the department with having their pays docked for attending a big political rally, because the State Government supported the protest and decided public servants could take part in it without losing pay. It would not be surprising if many teachers concluded that they had a servant-master relationship with their bosses: agree with the official line and you would be fine but express dissent and the heavy hand of authority would be raised. There has been probably no more disturbing example of this than the threatened issue two years ago by the former education director-general Paul Albert to teachers who opposed the outcomes-based education system.
    
    "He warned them that those who criticised OBE during professional development sessions would be disciplined: so much for respect by the employer for the professionalism of teachers. The ultimate disciplinary measure available was the sack. One of the most deplorable characteristics of the drive to introduce OBE elements then was the attempt to bulldoze dissenting teachers into capitulation, or at least silence.
    
    "Teachers, who were to be responsible for putting the misbegotten OBE into practice, had good reason for their opposition - as all the changes that have been made to it have shown. (It would be interesting to know how much money has been squandered on this tortuous and largely futile exercise over the years.)
    
    "Then last year the department issued a threat, in effect, to sack teachers who failed to pay compulsory registration fees by a deadline. Again, this was an unnecessarily harsh way for the education bureaucrats to deal with teachers, but consistent with an evident head-office mindset of superior wisdom and authority on all matters.
    
    "Teachers who serve the community conscientiously and well - probably nearly all of those who survive the exacting test of classroom work over years - earn the right to be respected as professionals, not only by the wider community but also by their bosses.
    
    "If the department wants to attract and retain teachers, it could do worse than have a think about what sort of boss it is and why so many teachers have a low opinion of it."

    From The West Australian
    
    
    

  • Primary school classes overflow (page 3)
    EXCLUSIVE by Bethany Hiatt
    
    "More than half of WA's State primary schools have classes with too many students, leaked documents from the Department of Education and Training have revealed.
    
    "The figures show a staggering 1004 classes at 320 schools have more students than allowed under the terms of the teachers' enterprise bargaining agreement. But they do not reveal the extent of the overcrowding in individual classrooms and the department refused to disclose this information.
    
    "The overcrowding was revealed by the department to union officials during pay negotiations on the grounds they remain "strictly confidential."
    
    "The union asked for the figures to support its argument that teachers were overworked. As part of their negotiations for a new EBA, teachers are pushing for a cut in class sizes.
    
    "But Education Minister Mark McGowan argues that smaller classes would require more teachers, exacerbating the teacher shortage.
    
    "The summary of class sizes by education district, a copy of which has been obtained by The West Australian, shows that 311 of WA's 507 primary schools had crammed too many students into classrooms. Nine high schools had classes which exceeded recommended limits.
    
    "The West Coast district, which extends from Mosman Park to Lancelin, was the most overcrowded, with 228 classes in 68 schools exceeding the limit. The Fremantle-Peel district had 209 classes across 69 schools with more students than allowed.
    
    "WA Council of State School Organisations president Rob Fry said the figures were horrendous and he urged the department to reduce class sizes. He was concerned that primary schools were the worst offenders.
    
    "Primary education is the foundation education where kids need more personal attention," he said. "Primary-aged children need the teacher there, they need the ongoing support and if you've got a crowded classroom it effectively means that children could be being ignored and issues in their development could be overlooked."
    
    "Mr. Fry said students' education was at risk even if classes were over the limit by only one or two children. Department guidelines say classes should not exceed 24 students in Years 1-3 and 32 students in Years 4-10. Under its 2006 agreement with the union, schools can vary class sizes, provided that teachers given over-crowded classes can object and that implementation is "within physical and human resources".
    
    "The agreement also states that where resources are available, schools should cut some classes back even further, to 30 in Years 4-7 and 29 in Years 8-10. WACSSO says classes should be even smaller with no more than 25 pupils in classes from Years 1-10.
    
    "But Edith Cowan University education head Greg Robson said research showed the quality of teaching had more influence on students' learning than general reduction of class sizes. "Reducing class size on its own is not a magic bullet for good outcomes," he said. However, teachers' views that students were more manageable in smaller groups also had to be taken into account."
    
    From The West Australian
    
    
    

  • Sarkozy's school ambition (page 46)
    Paris
    
    "French President Nicolas Sarkozy, facing nationwide walkouts by public servants over government job cuts, says he wants schools to take in pupils even when teachers are on strike.
    
    "Schools were shut around France on Thursday as teachers, postal workers and other government workers staged a one-day strike…"
    
    "Mr. Sarkozy insisted that French workers' freedom to strike remained "fundamental", but added that strikes in public service "pose insurmountable difficulties for many families, especially the more modest ones"…
    
    Full story in The West Australian
    
    
    

• The Sunday Age
  
  
  • Teacher wage rise 'slap in face'
    by Seamus Bradley
    
    "Victorian public school teachers who were told they would become "the best paid in Australia" in a new pay deal are vowing to reject the offer after discovering that many would still get $13,000 less than their NSW counterparts.

    "Details of the pay deal, initially greeted as a triumph for teachers, were published on the website of the Australian Education Union's Victorian branch late Wednesday, sparking new fears that mid-career teachers would leave the profession and setting off a campaign to oust union president Mary Bluett.

    "A comparison shows that only graduate teachers and teachers at the top of the scale would be better off in Victoria.

    "University High School teacher Naomi Schwartz will be one of hundreds of Victorian teachers who lose out next year compared with teachers in NSW.

    "Now in her eighth year of teaching, Ms Schwartz is head of a school department, holds two degrees and next year her pay is set to rise to $62,311. A NSW teacher with similar experience would earn $75,352.

    "I feel it's a slap in the face," she said.

    "In all the public meetings, the AEU had stressed that the union was fighting for pay parity with NSW teachers. Ms Schwartz said many colleagues felt very betrayed by their union and the State Government.

    "University High School teacher Paul Beekman said that if the AEU was proud of the deal, details would be on the union website's front page.

    "Instead teachers searching for the information "had to wade through pages of text to find a 'dead link' that wasn't clickable. When you finally cut and paste it into a browser you ended up with a PDF document. If they're so proud of this agreement, why are they hiding it?" he said.

    "Mr Beekman said the new pay deal would cause division in teacher ranks. "People in the middle are languishing for a decade or more with no incentive to stay," he said. [emphasis added]

    "AEU Victorian president Mary Bluett said she was aware of a campaign to oust her and said there was also a campaign against the agreement.

    "But Victorian teachers at the bottom and top of the scale were winners, she said.

    "Before the current deal, Victorian teachers trailed their NSW counterparts by $114,000 in total earnings by the time they got to the top pay level, she said. The current deal cuts that disparity to just $29,000.

    "Ms Bluett said the deal, which teachers will vote on from June 2, was the best that could be achieved. Future teachers would spend only 11 years getting to the top pay rate, down from 12 years. She said the public would not support a new pay claim by teachers.

    "Education Minister Bronwyn Pike said: "Victoria's teachers are able to earn up to $75,000, making them the best-paid teachers in the country."

    How teacher pay compares: Victoria – NSW Gap

    1st year teacher $51,184 $50,522 +$662

    2nd 51,584 53,121 -1537

    3rd 51,584* 55,726 -4142

    4th 52,643* 58,331 -5688

    5th 55,686* 60,933 -5247

    6th 57,273* 63,536 -6263

    7th 58,906 * 66,137 -7231

    8th 60,585* 68,744 -8159

    9th 62,312* 75,352 -13,040

    10th 64,554 75,352 -10798

    11th 66,556 75,352 -8796

    12th 68,619* 75,352 -6733

    13th 75,500* 75,352 +148

    * Does not include $1000 one-off bonus

    Sources: AEU Victorian Branch, NSW Education Department
    
    From The Sunday Age at link
    
    
    

• The Sunday Times
  
  
  • Letter to the Editor (page 93)
    
    
    • WA can afford to pay its teachers more
      
      "I retired from teaching at age 56 because of the bureaucratic bungle that has become education in WA. We have had a series of incompetent ministers leading a team of incompetent personnel in Silver City. The result is a system in chaos.
      
      "The victims are the teachers and their students, and through them, Australia's standing in the international community.
      
      "Nobody in power is willing to admit to the declining standards throughout the system, from primary school to university.
      
      "It is unbelievable that the minister can point to test results as an indication that all is well when teachers can tell you this is just not true.
      
      "I suppose any system that self-administers and analyses its own performance is open to self- congratulation.
      "Part of this mess has been caused by so-called experts, whose only criteria was to keep themselves in cushy positions. It must be easy to sell stupid ideas to ministers.
      
      "The present situation over teachers' pay claims is contributing to an even greater decline in staff morale and the standing of the profession.
      
      "Clearly, teachers need more pay, both as a reward for the difficult job they do and to encourage more people to take up teaching as a career.
      
      "The minister, in refusing to pay teachers what they are worth, is further undermining teaching and education as a valuable asset to the state.
      
      "Given WA's present financial position, there could not be a better time to return the salary of teachers to parity with other professions. Education is the foundation of our society; we debase it at our peril."
      
      Terry Stanner, Bunbury
      
      
      
      
• The Times
  
  
  • To test or not to test – the big question
    
    Robin Alexander, who is leading an inquiry into primary schooling, tells why he believes that parents are right to voice concerns about national tests, but that there are no easy solutions to the problem
    
    
    
    
• The Sydney Morning Herald
  
  
  • Happy school
    
    As children learn to get in touch with their feelings some educators believe it could lead to depression, reports Anna Patty.

    "School children no longer stop at asking friends to take sides in a playground argument. In Europe, the United States and Australia they are now being taught to analyse what caused their relationships to break down.

    "They're also being shown how to express their feelings instead of simply turning their backs on someone who has offended them. And an "E" on their report cards no longer indicates failure in a traditional school subject but rates the level of empathy they show their fellow students.

    "At best, say educationists, the positive psychology movement that is sweeping through schools may develop more emotionally literate teenagers. At worst, they say it may create a generation of fragile, self-obsessed and depressed children.

    "Geelong Grammar in Victoria has appointed an American happiness guru, Professor Martin Seligman, to train teachers and staff so they can help students become more resilient. The school is also pouring $16 million into a Wellbeing Centre that will house medical and sporting facilities to promote yoga, Pilates and counselling..."
    
    "Carol Craig, chief executive of the Centre for Confidence and Well-being in Glasgow, has pointed out the potential dangers of a systematic, explicit approach to teaching social and emotional skills.

    "The Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning (SEAL) program, a important plank of government education policy in parts of Britain, and taking root in Australia, may unwittingly drive some students to depression, she says.

    "What concerns the centre is that policy-makers and some enthusiastic educators are attempting to bring about this revolution on the basis of inadequate supporting evidence or credible intellectual rationale," Craig says. "We have no idea whether this will be beneficial or not."
    [Sounds a bit like OBE in that respect...  Web]

    "Craig's research team presents psychological reasons why calming techniques could encourage children to be more "anxious. A strong focus on the self and feelings could also encourage narcissism and self obsession..."
    
    "All this sits against a backdrop of rising concern that some parents are abdicating responsibility for their children's behaviour.

    "Is it not unwise to encourage parents to believe that schools are responsible for the development of young people's social and emotional skills?" Craig asks..."
    
    "Parents aside, the emphasis on schools stepping into the breach is strong. In the public school system, the Federal Government has introduced a primary schools' mental health program called Kids Matter, in partnership with Beyondblue, the Australian Psychological Society, Rotary and school principal organisations. Now in its second year, it is being trialled in 100 primary schools and is yet to be evaluated. In secondary schools, a teachers' resource called Mind Matters aims to encourage better mental health in students..."
    
    "Kids Matter gives schools resources to develop their own programs according to a framework endorsed by the international Collaborative for Academic Social and Emotional Learning, whose mission is to "establish social and emotional learning as an essential part of education"...
    
    Full story in The Sydney Morning Herald at link
    
    
    

  • Letters to the Editor
    

    • Schools league tables will test common sense
      
      "The possible use of results from recent literacy and numeracy tests in schools may prove to be an increasingly interesting journey ("Countdown to political storm with results of numeracy tests", May 16). The possibility of league tables, it seems, is real.

      "The experience of the English education system has shown us that the creation of these tables from school exam results is a dangerous practice. It does not improve results and can prove harmful not only for the reputation of the school and its pupils, but for the self-esteem of many within the school. That damage can last a lifetime.

      "Far from being a positive step, ranking schools on their results, which the media are encouraged to report, is insidious. Schools feel compelled to teach solely for the results, no matter what the needs of the children may be.

      "Students are forced into an increasingly stressful situation in which teaching staff and parents exert pressure to perform well for the school figures. Children and their needs are relegated to a subsidiary position against the school's public tally points.

      "A narrowing of the curriculum can develop as schools focus on areas that are easy to examine, at the expense of more hands-on or creative subjects, where a child's imagination may flourish.

      "Schools in NSW offer a wide curriculum, often focusing on local needs. National testing, like that which was offered this week, may prove to offer additional insights into our children's needs, but I will not be putting too much confidence in a test in which even a few of the sample questions were inaccurate.

      "Children and their test results deserve to be treated with the same confidentiality that we would expect as adults at work or in higher learning facilities."

      Janice Creenaune, Austinmer
      
      

    • It's not rocket science

      "In the same budget that attempts to attract students to science by reducing their HECS costs, the Government cut funding for the CSIRO. By doing so, the Government shows it is not serious about "building Australia's future" in science. It is almost incredible that a Government whose rhetoric is focused on the future could be so shortsighted in this regard.

      "Those considering a scientific career must seriously wonder about their career prospects in this country. They now know that the new, relatively future-oriented Government does not consider scientific research important enough even to maintain funding of one of our pre-eminent research institutions."

      Carl Zimmermann, Kambah (ACT)
      
      
      

• The Age [Saturday]
  
  
  • Letters to the Editor
    
    
    • Better schools for all
      
      "As a former biomedical research scientist currently undertaking a diploma of education, I heard with interest Dr Nelson's comments on teacher training. Entry requirements for teaching courses may be "embarrassingly low", but this simply reflects the low demand for places and does not directly translate into the quality of people actually enrolling in the courses, which in my experience is high.

      "My university instructors include classroom teachers and a former principal. Dr Nelson's denigration of university education faculties as the preserve of social engineers is of the same ilk as his former leader's claims that government schools do not teach values, and his current deputy's claim that their staff rooms are hotbeds of Maoism. What precisely is the Maoist approach to algebra?

      "I am now on teaching rounds at an elite private school and have also been to government schools and the real differences are in the quality of the facilities, not the teachers.

      "If Dr Nelson really wants to improve teaching and lift the demand-driven entrance scores, he and his colleagues should stop denigrating the profession and join with state governments in ensuring that all students, regardless of parents' ability or willingness to pay, have access to high-quality classrooms and facilities."

      Philip Shehan, Brunswick
      
      

    • Crying poor
      
      "Re Sheryl Gardner's letter ("Teachers lose, again", 15/5): As a leading teacher who is one of the biggest winners out of the agreement, I am surprised that she thinks she has lost. The facts are that she will move from a salary of $72,314 to $78,019, effective May 11, 2008. This represents an immediate salary increase of 7.89%. Over the three years of the agreement her salary moves to $89,423 — an increase of 23.68%. I wonder how many Age readers would consider this a loss."

      Mary Bluett, Australian Education Union Victorian Branch President
      

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This page last updated 11 August, 2008 11:48 PM