Page 3117 - Week 07 - Thursday, 30 June 2011
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promises to address bullying in schools, how many more promises to give autonomy to school principals?
The minister’s latest show of arrogance, his “tough luck” dismissal last week of 1,568 teachers’ concerns over additional paperwork and process highlights with unambiguous clarity his crash through “take it or leave it” approach to policy development and delivery. Public school teachers are angry and is it any wonder? They feel let down. They feel their concerns have been trivialised, that their work has been devalued by the very minister who should be their champion.
We have a trend, fairly consistent for a decade now, of parents moving their children out of the public school system, particularly for their high school years. We, uniquely in Canberra, have over 51 per cent of high school students enrolled in non-government schools. The minister tries to dismiss this as no big deal, but it underlines some serious issues. This is the first time in Australian history any jurisdiction has recorded such a majority.
We are building more public high schools. They are magnificent buildings. Gungahlin college is a great example, but will new buildings be enough to stop the drift? And if the drift continues, will high schools then start to be shut down again? Across all school levels, the percentage of students attending Catholic and independent schools is higher than in most states.
Forty-one per cent are in the independent and Catholic school sector in Canberra, and that is a significant figure. The non-government sector in the ACT is doing well, as NAPLAN results demonstrate. But this is no thanks to any effort on behalf of the ACT government which contributes less than 18 per cent to the education of an ACT student in a non-government school. This is amongst the least of any of the other state jurisdictions.
When you consider that the federal government also provides less to ACT non-government schools than to non-government schools in other jurisdictions, one appreciates the inequities faced by non-government schools here in the ACT. The February 2011 census indicated that there are over 27,000 students in ACT non-government schools, and this was a 1.1 per cent increase on the previous year.
As I understand it, there are still substantial waiting lists in many non-government schools, which should also start to ring alarm bells in Mr Barr’s mind as to just what a healthy state our education system is in. It is a large segment of the student population, and the ACT government should give it more than just lip-service.
Daryl Smeaton, chair of the ACT Catholic Education Commission, said in response to the budget, “It is clear the minister for education is not interested in the educational outcomes of close to half the school age population within his portfolio.”
Mr Barr made quite a comment this afternoon about members of the opposition attending some of the BER school openings. One of the things that is becoming very, very clear is that while opposition members attend even government school openings, the minister goes to very, very few in the non-government sector. In fact, I have yet to see him at more than one or two over the last couple of years.
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