Page 193 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 13 February 1991
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
and a bureaucratic system that is probably more bureaucratic than the traditional systems in other States which have been trying to move more and more towards a parental system.
What did this paper, "A Vision of Service", suggest? In the initial paragraphs it talked about being one of the best public school systems, but it went on to say:
Why then is this reality not always reflected in what is said about us? Why is it that our protestations in defence of what we do are not always heard by parents and politicians?
Well, part of the reason why they have not been heard since this was written is the bloody-minded attitude of the Alliance Government, the bloody-minded attitude of the people quietly sitting there opposite me. The author of the paper asks, "What are we on about?". He continues:
... what we're on about is optimising the educational experiences of our students and keeping our system the best public education system in Australia at a time of decreasing resources and increasing criticism of the public education sector in general.
That is what we are trying to do. He pre-empts that statement by asking:
Why should we do better?
You have not done better; you have failed. You have failed miserably on the standards set by your own ministry. That Ministry of Education has failed miserably, and the responsibility for that lies fairly and squarely on the shoulders of the Minister, who failed to pull it into line.
A great deal of the change in attitude is illustrated on page 2 of that paper where it says:
So who are our customers? In essence we have four levels of customers, some of whom are also partners in the educative process. Whilst freely acknowledging that parents and students are active partners, and that in a sense this makes them different kinds of customers ...
What sort of gobbledegook and doubletalk is that? That is an attempt to move away from our partners to a position of power in dealing with our customers. We provide them with service, but it is a patronising attitude. It is an attitude that says, "We are dealing with our customers". We had an education system where people worked together to get the best possible result; now we have an absolute disaster where people are reluctant even to talk about basic issues in education. At Maribyrnong Primary School, where there is a start at some consultation process, a week
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .