Page 1744 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 4 May 2011
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submission here this morning. But I can advise the Assembly that we have consulted deeply with the independent and Catholic school sectors and that there is a lot of common ground across the public and non-government school sectors that will be incorporated into the ACT government response.
However, given this government’s record of education investment, it would be very safe to say that we will continue to fight for our fair share of funding for all ACT schools, not simply the Catholic schools. Further, this government will continue to argue, as we always done, that the most important determinant of school funding should be student need and that any funding model should have that criterion as its highest consideration.
As I have mentioned earlier and on many occasions in my contributions on the education portfolio, it is clear—and I hope that there is agreement on this—that the ACT has a rich, collaborative culture between school sectors. As I have indicated, the Teacher Quality Institute is one of those important collaborations. The institute brings the teaching community together under one umbrella. The Teacher Quality Institute will ensure all our teachers in public, Catholic and independent schools meet the new national professional standards so that we as a community can continue to have confidence in the quality of teachers in ACT schools and in the quality of the teaching profession. The institute provides us with a means for ensuring that all teachers in the ACT are given the same opportunities to be their best. This in turn benefits all students.
Similarly, government and non-government schools are collaborating to implement the Australian curriculum. In March this year school leaders from across public, Catholic and independent schools joined together in a cross-sectoral leadership forum to discuss best practice in implementing the curriculum. Ensuring the best outcomes for students was the common goal, and ideas and best practice were shared and discussed.
The government continues to work in partnership with Catholic and independent sectors to ensure ACT students receive the best possible education through, as I have mentioned, the safe schools task force, the Non-government Schools Education Council and the COAG cross-sectoral education committee to improve teaching in literacy and numeracy, to develop innovative teacher education excellence in the territory and, importantly, to deliver the youth commitment which ensures that every young person is learning or earning until they complete year 12 or equivalent qualifications.
To drill drown to the classroom teacher level, there is a long history of cooperation between teachers from the three school sectors. This collaboration has been a critical part of the development of the years 11 and 12 ACT curriculum framework and its moderation processes in language teaching, gifted and talented education, vocational education and training, the arts and interschool and interdistrict sport.
In short, we have developed the Teacher Quality Institute together. We are delivering the ACT youth commitment to ensure all young people are learning or earning, and we are doing it together. We are implementing the Australian curriculum together. We
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