Monday 11 June

Tuesday 12 June

Wednesday 13 June

Thursday 14 June

Friday 15 June

Saturday – Sunday, 16 – 17 June

 

Monday 11 June

• ABC News
  
  
  • Call for regions to get resource sector schools

    "The Chamber of Minerals and Energy wants to set up resource sector schools throughout the metropolitan and regional areas of Western Australia.

    "The chamber has been working with the Department of Education and Training to establish about five schools.

    "It wants the schools to be similar to other specialist schools such as the state's agriculture schools or performing arts schools.

    "The chamber helped establish a technical college in the Pilbara this year.

    "Chamber director Reg Howard-Smith believes development of the high schools can begin as early as next year.

    "I think it can happen very quickly. The Australian technical college in the Pilbara will be commencing later this year, that took about nine months of very hard work to get up and operating and it's a big exercise, but I think if discussions start today it is not inconceivable to see some developments in 2008," he said."
    

    From ABC News at link
    
    
    
    
• The West Australian
  
  
  • Op Ed
    PowerPoint Losing its power to make point
    by Bettina Arndt
    
    "John Sweller had no idea that his little communication experiment would strike such a nerve. The University of NSW education professor published the research three years ago but recently presented the findings at a conference where it was picked up by a Sydney journalist and bam! He was making headlines across the world.

    "PowerPoint is pointless!" ran the headlines and columnists everywhere used Professor Sweller's research to vent their spleen about the tedium of PowerPoint presentations. Professor Sweller's cognitive load theory proposes there are limits to the brain's capacity to process and retain information in short-term memory. He found that presenting written information at the same time as it is being presented verbally puts too much load in the brain and reduces understanding of what is being presented. "The way PowerPoint is often used is a disaster," he concluded.

    "He's still dealing with the flood of emails often from people who are keen for evidence to support their irritation at PowerPoint. The is palpable in the hundreds of blogs which have appeared commenting on his findings, celebrating the possibility that the proliferation of PowerPoint presentations might somehow be curbed, railing against this presentation tool which turns presenters into bores and degrades the quality and credibility of communication. "if we could convert PowerPoint slides into pills, insomnia, like smallpox, would be eradicated from the earth," comments one blogger.

    "These are comforting words to someone who, for over 30 years, has appeared before innumerable audiences armed with only raunchy stories about sex and gripping tales of marital adventures, not a slide or piece of clipart in sight. I'm often daunted by my fellow presenters, usually men, who strut around with their remotes, flashing their technology. But it is reassuring to watch audience's eyes glaze over as the slide show slithers by.

    "Of course, there are many who leap to the defence of this new technology, pointing out it is how it is used that makes the difference. The problem is that while PowerPoint started off as a boytoy, it is now ubiquitous. Writing in New Yorker, Ian Parker expressed horror that there are now great tracts of corporate America where to appear at a meeting without PowerPoint "would be unwelcome and vaguely pretentious, like wearing no shoes". In universities, at conferences, in meetings everywhere, this is how people are communicating: the world condensed into a few upbeat slides, with seven or so words on a line, seven or so lines on a slide, says Parker.

    "It's crazy stuff, all based on Princeton psychologist George Miller's 1956 notion of the magical number seven: that most people have only the capacity to remember approximately seven unrelated pieces of data. But as Edward Tufte, professor emeritus at Yale, points out, this doesn't apply when information is placed in a context which extends the range of memory beyond tiny clumps of data. That's what the great speakers do - present complex, interesting ideas in a manner which makes them challenging, exciting and memorable.
    
    "Professor Tufte, dubbed by the New York Times as the "Leonardo da Vinci of data", published a brilliant critique two years ago, The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint, where he rails about what this technology has done to normal discourse. PowerPoint routinely disrupts, dominates, and trivialises content, he says, leading to presentations which "too often resemble a school play …. very loud, very slow and very simple". Serious analysis is replaced with chartjunk, overproduced layouts, cheerleader logotypes, branding and corny clipart - what he calls "PowerPointPhluff". The foreshortening of evidence and thought can have serious consequences, he says, arguing that the need to cram complex facts into PowerPoint's limited format may have contributed to NASA's poor decisions in the Columbia tragedy.

    "That's serious stuff but what has triggered the worldwide applause for John Sweller's work is simple - people hate PowerPoint because it bores them witless. Because instead of engaging with an audience, presenters insist on reading out simplistic bullet points. Because while it helps lousy speakers organise their thoughts, it disconnects good ones from their audiences. Yes, used properly it can be brilliant for presenting data and adding some visual magic. Good speakers don't fall into the trap of requiring audiences to read as they listen, so the Sweller finding doesn't apply, but they are vastly outnumbered by the inept. Death by PowerPoint, sadly, seems here to stay."
    

    From The West Australian
  
  
  
  
  
• The Australian
  
  
  • 'Anarchist' school facing state inquiry
    
    A Melourne private school criticised for its no-rules culture is under investigation by the Bracks Government.
    
    
    
  • Kids hit by confidence crisis
    
    Many Australian children are suffering a crisis of confidence, with nearly one in 10 on an early trajectory towards serious social difficulties.
    
    
    
  • Editorial
    Reality bites the psychotic Left
    
    By refusing to face modern realities, the Australian Left has dealt itself out of the national debate
    
    

Tuesday 12 June

• The West Australian
  
  
  • Bishop threat on teacher pay (page 5)
    by Rhianna King, Canberra
    
    "The States must introduce performance-based teacher pay by 2009 or lose $42 billion in Federal funding, Education Minister Julie Bishop warned yesterday.

    "Fed up with the States’ reluctance to implement her plan for teachers to be paid on performance rather than years in the job, Ms Bishop will override them by hiring “experts” to develop models to be tested next year.

    "The experts would examine ways to assess and reward teachers and estimate the likely costs of any performance-pay plan.

    "Ms Bishop warned that from 2009, Federal funding would be tied directly to the merit-based pay reforms.

    "The announcement places Ms Bishop on a collision course with the States, which unanimously rejected her plan in April. The States instead agreed to pursue their own meritbased pay models, which in WA allows teachers to use three pay levels by getting additional qualifications.

    "A level-three teacher can earn as much as $77,744 while a senior teacher can earn up to $72,844. The starting salary for a teacher in WA is $45,733.

    "Education Minister Mark McGowan was reluctant to support Ms Bishop last night, saying WA’s system was sensible, straight-forward and measurable. “Any test which attempts to measure student performance is always going to be flawed because there are many factors affecting the student’s performance, not just the standard of the teacher,” he said.

    “Julie Bishop’s ideas for performance pay are wacky and strange and will not work in the real world.” His focus was on appropriately paying teachers willing to work in the country and difficult to staff areas.

    "Ms Bishop said the State-based pay system was a relic of a bygone era. “They provide little or no financial incentive for teachers to increase their skills and pursue excellence . . . they are impacting on the attractiveness of teaching as a career and retention of quality teachers,” she said.

    "State School Teachers Union president Mike Keely said the State model could be improved but Ms Bishop had failed to provide an alternative.

    “She’s been saying this for a very, very long time . . . either she doesn’t know what people are doing right across Australia or she doesn’t want to know and would rather keep on parroting on about a completely unspecific plan,” he said.

    "WA Council of State School Organisations president Rob Fry said the proposal would require substantially more Government funding."

    From The West Australian at link
    
    See below for similar stories from ABC News, The Australian, The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald
    
    
    
  • Editorial
    All power to Bishop's arm on teacher pay (page 16)
    
    "Federal Education Minister Julie Bishop is showing a welcome degree of resolve in pursuing her plan for performance-based pay for teachers. Despite conflict with the States and teacher unions, Ms Bishop announced yesterday that she would hire a consultant to devise the means of carrying out her plan in schools.

    "One of the conclusions to be drawn from this, in an election year, is that the Federal Government is confident that there is significant public support for the move.

    "And so it should be. It is straightforward common sense for people generally, and parents in particular, to accept that teachers should be paid on their merits, as is the rule in other professions. Indeed, a report issued this year by a national group representing parents of children at public schools supported the idea on the grounds that it would improve classroom standards across Australia and help stop growing numbers of teachers going to private schools.

    "However, there are potentially two major obstacles to the introduction of the Bishop plan. One is presented by Labor States, in cahoots with teacher unions. The opposition here is mainly ideological and based on the flawed union proposition that all teachers should be treated as if there were no differences in their abilities.

    "Thus the Labor education ministers in April rejected Ms Bishop's plan and decided to continue with their own pay schemes, which don't excite hostility from unions but don't amount to classroom performance pay in the way intended by Ms Bishop, either.

    "The battle at this level can be expected to continue, though the resolve of the States may be tested by the knowledge that they don't have public opinion on their side, particularly if their intransigence threatens some Federal Government grants for public schools.

    "The other potential obstacle is practical: finding a way of judging teachers for performance pay that is reliable and fair. Teachers work in a wide variety of circumstances and with children across the whole range of abilities. A measure of performance would need to be devised to take account of these differences.

    "This may seem to be a serious problem, but it is by no means insurmountable. It has been solved in private enterprise, in which comparisons of the performance of people in differing jobs are routinely made for pay purposes.

    "Ms Bishop will get a consultant to find a solution for schools. Whatever system is established, the guiding principle must be that teachers who excel at their job must be paid accordingly.

    "That would help encourage teachers to strive for excellence, reinforce the public perception of the importance of what they do and improve their standing."
    

    From The West Australian
    
    
    
    
  • Transportable classroom glut tied to poor (page 5)
    by Bethany Hiatt
    
    "Some WA public schools are so overcrowded they have more temporary classrooms than permanent rooms, prompting parents and teachers' groups to call for better planning.

    "Six schools in high-growth areas use more transportables than conventional classrooms. They are Atwell, one of the biggest State primary schools with more than 940 pupils, Currambine (838 students), Landsdale (768) and Middle Swan (654) primary schools, as well as Dongara and Mt Magnet district high schools.

    "The Department of Education and Training had more than 2600 transportables in its schools in February, including general classrooms, science laboratories, pre-primary and kindergarten classes and toilets. This year's State Budget included $5.6 million to buy more transportables.

    "WA Council of State School Organisations president Rob Fry said overuse of transportable school buildings indicated an "unacceptable" lack of long-term planning by the State Government and the department.

    "While parents could accept one or two in a school to deal with fluctuating numbers, they should not make up more than half a school's buildings.

    "If they're needed that much, the planning has not been there," he said.

    "State School Teachers Union vice-president Anne Gisborne said heavy use of temporary classrooms indicated the school system was straining at the seams and in need of a better long-term building and maintenance programme. Transportables took up playground space and were isolated.

    "But Atwell Primary School's principal Phil Mort said the school's 15 transportables were as attractive as its 12 normal classrooms.

    "The school had almost trebled in numbers since opening with 345 students nine years ago, but the pressure was likely to ease when a new high school took Year 7s from next year.

    "It's a new suburb, the average family is in their 30s and they've got their children going through this phase of their education and there's lots of them," he said.

    "Education Department acting executive director of infrastructure Mal Part said transportable classrooms let the department respond to enrolment fluctuations in 800 schools with suitable accommodation. The department had built, planned or announced 38 new schools since 2005 and allocated $600 million to maintain and upgrade existing schools."
    

    From The West Australian
    
    
    
    
• ABC News
  
  
  • State Opposition welcomes performance pay for teachers

    "The State Opposition says a plan to trial performance-based pay in W-A schools could be the only option to attract people into the profession.

    "The Federal Education Minister will appoint a range of experts to conduct the trial.

    "The Opposition's Education Spokesman Peter Collier says financial incentives are needed in education, but warns the way it is implemented must not destroy the collegiate nature of the industry.

    "He says the Commonwealth must not withhold funding to schools that refuse to implement their policies.

    "I've got a real philosophical problem with using cash as a bargaining tool in education," he said.

    "But at the same time if we're going to attract students to the profession, we're going to improve education standards within our classrooms, well, this may be a way to go and perhaps we need to look at it."
    

    From ABC News at link
    
    
    
    
• The Australian
  
  
  • Schools in merit pay trial
    by Justine Ferrari, Education writer
    
    "Schools will receive cash to trial schemes paying teachers based on their performance, under a controversial plan that will reignite a political row between the Howard Government, unions and the states over education funding.

    "Federal Education Minister Julie Bishop is pushing ahead with plans to introduce performance-based pay for teachers in the face of almost universal opposition from state Labor governments, which rejected the plan in April, and teacher unions, which ideologically oppose the concept.

    "Even Peter Costello has ruled out any federally funded scheme of performance pay for teachers, saying he supports the idea in principle but that it is the responsibility of the states.

    "But yesterday Ms Bishop announced a select tender for expert consultants to develop pay models that reward teachers for the gains of their students, their leadership and mentoring, and for taking on additional responsibilities and roles. Under the current system, teachers are paid according to their length of service rather than their performance.

    "Ms Bishop has held informal discussions with experts involved in developing performance pay models in other professions such as accounting, law and management.

    "The Government will hire a consultant to devise an Australian model of performance pay. It will draw on schemes adopted by other professions and in other countries such as Britain, the US and Singapore. The consultant will be asked to examine mechanisms for assessing and rewarding teachers, advise on the likely costs and develop models suitable for Australian schools.

    "The Government would then ask for expressions of interest from schools to trial the models, and it is envisaged it would provide incentive payments for the schools.

    "The federal Government will link its schools funding to the introduction of performance-based pay for teachers from 2009, when the next four-year funding agreement starts.

    "But state governments rejected the plan for a pilot study of performance pay at the meeting of education ministers in April.

    "This means it is likely the trial schools will come from the independent sector. The introduction of performance pay for teachers in independent schools would put enormous pressure on the states to match the scheme, because they compete with private schools in recruiting quality teachers.

    "The NSW Independent Schools last year introduced a new pay scale that recognises professional achievement and requires the attainment of set standards, rather than pay rising with years of service. Ms Bishop said the consultant would work with teachers and the wider school community, including parents, to refine the model.

    "Teaching should be treated as a profession and, like other professionals, deserve recognition and reward for effort," she said.

    "In other professions, performance-based pay schemes are proven to work and are accepted as an effective way to enhance career structures."

    "Calling for the teaching profession to embrace performance-based pay, Ms Bishop pointed to a report released recently by the Centre for Teaching Quality, a US research organisation that commissioned 18 expert teachers to propose a new framework for paying teachers.

    "The report, touted as the first of its kind, proposes a base pay scheme tied to levels of experience, such as novice, professional and expert.

    "But within each level, teachers can earn more based on student progress, professional improvement, school and community leadership and collaborative work.

    "The proposed model would pay extra to teachers who help students make "significant academic gains" measured over time, with teachers rewarded as individual or small groups.

    "Like the dusty blackboards still found in some school classrooms, the single-salary schedule has served its purpose and outlived its usefulness," the report says.

    "The teachers call on their professional colleagues to "accept ownership" of the debate over teachers pay, and to start making themselves heard.

    "We must either move forward and take more control of our own destiny or continue to fight a rearguard action while others who have little understanding of our unique work determine not only how we will be compensated but how our quality and our worth will be measured," they say.
    The Australian Education Union, representing public school teachers, has strongly rejected the notion of performance pay, in particular a proposal linking it to academic gains by students.

    "The AEU favours paying more to teachers as a whole and linking their pay to professional standards.

    "The Independent Education Union, representing teachers in Catholic and independent schools, also rejects paying teachers based on student outcomes. It proposes a framework based on standards and rewarding professional learning, active engagement in school life and a commitment to providing learning opportunities to students.

    "The CTQ report sets out 10 key elements its experts believe are essential for any performance-pay scheme to succeed, and 10 pitfalls to avoid.

    "The CTQ framework has a system of base salaries, supplemented by performance payments for different aspects of teaching such as student learning, teachers improving their knowledge and skills, the needs of the market such as working in disadvantaged schools or subjects like maths and science that have a shortage of expert teachers, leadership and mentoring.

    "The report says the performance payments must be open to all teachers at all levels in all subjects.

    "It says incentives should be offered to teachers in low-performing schools "only if they're qualified", to teachers attaining additional degrees and qualifications "but only if the training is relevant", and to reward leadership, not seniority.

    "The report says key elements to avoid include placing a limit on the number of teachers eligible for performance incentives, rewarding only specialist teachers such as in maths and science, and linking pay exclusively to student test scores."
    
    From The Australian at link
    
    Similar stories in The Melbourne Age and The Sydney Morning Herald
    
    
    
    

• The Melbourne Age
  
  
  • Union cries foul on cyber report card ['ratemyteachers.com' is back in the news]
    
    A website designed for students to rate their teachers' performance has been slammed by the teachers' union as scurrilous and defamatory, but authorities are powerless to shut it down or take legal action because the site is based in the United States.
    
    http://www.ratemyteachers.com
    
    
    
    
  • Editorial
    Engineering a skilful solution
    
    The billion-dollar program to re-equip and maintain the ADF is under serious threat from a critical shortage of skilled tradesmen and engineers.
    
    
    
    
  • Catholic chiefs push for family friendlier schools
    
    Melbourne's Catholic education chiefs are being urged to make schools more family friendly, with teachers wanting extra paternity leave and breastfeeding rooms for new mothers who have returned to the classroom.
    
    
    
    
  • Northern schools fail test
    
    The State Government is under pressure to overhaul underperforming schools in Melbourne's north as figures reveal about half the secondary schools in the region are in the bottom 20 per cent of the state when it comes to VCE achievement.
    
    
    
    
• The Sydney Morning Herald
  
  
  • Letter to the Editor
    
    
    • Top of my honours list are many inspirational teachers

      "Your article "Among public servants many are called, but few are chosen" (June 11) raises a valid point about the selection process for recognition of Australian citizens with honours and awards. I have been a secondary school teacher since 1984 and I am proud to say I have worked with several highly committed people whose dedication to the education of young Australians has been inspirational. Their commitment to youth has always gone beyond the classroom and the teaching of maths, English, history or geography. Their achievements are no different to many of those recognised in the honours list each year.

      "They have introduced young people to Amnesty International and inspired care for the environment, youth involvement in Parliament and the preservation of our country's history.

      "The one difference between these people and those who received recognition yesterday is, as John Warhurst, a professor of political science at the Australian National University states, they are not in high office. They are in humble classrooms each day encouraging young people to take a chance and engage in human endeavours that will one day allow some of them to appear in the honours lists of the Herald. Sadly, these lists do not include those who are so courageous as to take up one of the richest occupations of all - teaching.

      "It saddens me most of all to see professionals such as entertainers and politicians being recognised when, at the end of the day, they are doing nothing more than serving themselves. So many others are deserving.

      "Most assuredly it is time that the criteria for these honours were reviewed. At the very least we should include another category that would favour recognition of everyday Australians."

      Cheryl Chenery, Mount Pleasant
      
      
      
      

Wednesday 13 June

• The West Australian
  
  
  • Editorial
    O'Neill faces challenge of bureaucratic culture change (page 18)
    
    "At the relatively young age of 41, Sharyn O'Neill should be able to generate much-needed energy and enterprise as WA's newly appointed top education bureaucrat. The office she occupies at the head of the State education system could do with fresh thinking and renewed commitment to quality in public education.

    "Ms O'Neill was formally made director-general of the Department of Education and Training yesterday, after acting in the job since October. Now that the constraints of uncertainty imposed by being in an acting position have been removed from her, Ms O'Neill should be ready to carry out a long overdue agenda of reform in the education bureaucracy. It has fallen to her to try to restore public confidence in State schools, which has been badly shaken by a sorry record of bureaucratic ineptitude.

    "Ms O'Neill's appointment is an opportunity for the department to make a fresh start, a break from the self-sustaining bureaucratic indulgences of the past. She must let it be known from the start that the prime guiding principle for the department is that its reason for being is to serve schools under its administration and, through them, the wider community.

    "The department has a reputation among teachers of being authoritarian, heedless of their concerns and unwilling to provide genuine support where it is needed. It has the public image of being a massive, impenetrable bureaucracy, given to adopting fanciful educational theories which it seeks to impose on schools.

    "These are not merely matters of perception. Certainly, the bureaucracy needs to change the way in which it deals with school and speaks to the public. However, Ms O'Neill would be gravely mistaken if she thought this was only a matter of public relations and style, though overt respect for and understanding of teachers and the everyday classroom problems they confront in their classrooms would be a significant improvement.

    "The critical problem she faces is one of substance. In essence, it is that the department is simply not doing its job anywhere near well enough. Its failures over the years and its ventures into faddish policy have been well documented, as his its willing embrace of the social-engineering madness of outcomes-based education.

    "Nevertheless, if an example of dysfunction is need to make the point, there is no need to look beyond the chaos that accompanied the beginning of the school year. The department was left scrambling to fill teaching positions because of a shortfall of 264 teachers. If it can't fulfil its basic function of putting a teacher in each classroom, then it is not surprising that it is widely regarded as terminally incompetent.

    "Furthermore, it appears that it either didn't realise until the last moment that it faced such a big shortfall or failed to give Education Minister Mark McGowan a timely warning of the embarrassing scale of the looming problem. In either case, the department was revealed then (as on other occasions) as a self-absorbed bureaucracy with little sense of its public obligations as a supposed service provider.

    "Ms O'Neill's challenge is to change this culture. The department doesn't need more bureaucrats, but a culture of genuine public service in which individuals are held accountable, incompetence isn't tolerated and efficiency is rewarded."
    

    From The West Australian
    
    
    
    
  • New education head sets priorities (page 15)
    by Bethany Hiatt
    
    "Improving literacy and numeracy, dealing with the teacher shortage and managing unruly students were priorities for the Education Department, new director-general Sharyn O'Neill said yesterday. The former country primary school teacher, who became the youngest education director-general yesterday, said she had no plans to switch the department's directions.

    "I don't intend in the first instance to swing the department into some newfangled fashion, we need to bed down what we have in front of us," she said, indicating that no further changes would be made to the outcomes-based education system. "We've got some work to do to implement the initiatives we already have on our platter. I think teachers and the community have gone through a fair amount of change in education." [emphasis added]

    "Ms O'Neill, 41, who has been acting director-general since October, will earn more than $300,000 a year as she takes charge of nearly 800 schools and more than 35,000 staff.

    "Asked if she needed to rebuild confidence in the government system, she said: "I think that parents are very clear about what they want. I think over time we have over-cooked some things. I think we need to simplify and get back to what parents and students want from their learning."

    "Some aspects, such as the number of application forms new teachers had to fill in, were overly complex and more bureaucratic than they needed to be. Ms O'Neill said some changes were made to OBE this year after the department listened to teachers' complaints.

    "What impresses me most are the strategies that teachers use that will make the most difference to student learning so I'll take a sensible approach to that," she said. "I'm a teacher myself, so I'll have a look at what teachers are doing, what strategies they're using and we'll make decisions based on what's best for students."

    "Education Minister Mark McGowan said he had been "incredibly impressed" by Ms O'Neill's performance in the acting role."

    From The West Australian
    
    
    

  • Current teacher pay scheme "reasonable": New D-G [late update of 12 June: online only]
    by Bethany Hiatt
    
    "WA’s new director-general of the Department of Education and Training cautiously weighed in to the debate over performance-based pay for teachers today, saying the current system already had a capacity to reward teachers on experience, merit and skill.

    "The former country primary school teacher, who today became the youngest ever director-general of the Department, said the current approach was working but she was open to change.

    "I think the system already has a reasonable strategy in place," she said.
    
    "We recognise experience, we recognise merit and skill and we also recognise teachers who teach in more challenging locations so I think we’ve got overall a reasonable approach to performance pay."

    "I’m always willing to look at other options, but I’d want to see rigour in those options and a good rationale for how it’s going to benefit the students and the system."
    
    "She said that was not evident yet in the proposals put forward by Julie Bishop.

    "Ms O’Neill, 41, who has been acting director-general since October last year, will earn more than $300,000 a year and take charge of more than 750 schools and more than 35,000 staff.

    "Education Minister Mark McGowan said the appointment was formally approved by Governor Ken Michael this morning.

    "He said today: "In the time she’s been acting in the role I’ve been incredibly impressed by her performance."

    "O’Neill said she would focus on improving standards in literacy and numeracy, dealing with the staff shortage and managing the behaviour of unruly students.

    "Asked if she had to rebuild confidence in the government system, she said: "I think that parents are very clear about what they want."

    "I think over time we have over-cooked some things, I think we need to simplify and get back to what parents and students want from their learning."

    "Ms O’Neill is the youngest person and only the third woman to head the largest public sector agency in WA.

    "She was a student at Scarborough Senior High School, graduated from Edith Cowan University with a Bachelor of Education and a Masters in Education Policy and Administration before teaching in WA country and city schools.

    "Ms O’Neill, the former deputy director-general of schools, stepped into the top job when former director-general Paul Albert was ousted from his position after a damning Corruption and Crime Commission report into the Education Department’s handling of sexual misconduct cases."

    From The West Australian online at link
    
    
    
    
  • O’Neill becomes youngest ever education chief [late update of 12 June: online only]
    by Bethany Hiatt
    
    "A former country primary school teacher has become the youngest director-general of the Department of Education and Training.

    "Sharyn O’Neill, 41, who has been acting director-general since October last year, will earn more than $300,000 a year and take charge of more than 750 schools and more than 35,000 staff.

    "Education Minister Mark McGowan said the appointment was formally approved by Governor Ken Michael this morning.

    "Ms O’Neill is the youngest person and only the third woman to head the largest public sector agency in WA.

    "She was a student at Scarborough Senior High School, graduated from Edith Cowan University with a Bachelor of Education and a Masters in Education Policy and Administration before teaching in WA country and city schools.

    "Ms O’Neill, the former deputy director-general of schools, stepped into the top job when former director-general Paul Albert was ousted from his position after a damning Corruption and Crime Commission report into the Education Department’s handling of sexual misconduct cases."

    From The West Australian online at link
    
    Similar story in The Sunday Times Online
    
    
    
    
  • Op Ed
    Education vouchers the way of the future (page 19)
    by Tony Rutherford
    
    Australia's current schools system angers parents, employers and universities
    
    "The Leader of the Opposition in Britain, David Cameron, has been almost as lucky in his political adventures so far as has our own Kevin Rudd.
    
    "Some of his more heart-on-sleeve pronouncements have provoked a certain amount of mild controversy, but it has been on the whole fairly plain sailing. A few weeks ago, however, he and his shadow education minister, David Willetts, triggered a real storm by including in their draft education policy a pledge to cease supporting grammar schools — perhaps best described as selective government secondary schools, with entry by competitive testing (much like the old Perth Modern School, for those old enough to remember it).
    
    "Like many such issues in British politics, this one comes weighed down by generations of deep-seated — often class-based — attitudes. The traditional Tory defence is that grammar schools offered a means for working-class children to break out of their class background.

    "Given that such social mobility has been declining since the move away from grammar schools towards comprehensive education, this is a fairly hot issue over there. Against that, the whole notion of selecting and streaming has always repelled some, many of whom claim that failure to make the grade was a deeply damaging experience for the unsuccessful children.
    
    "But the controversy has somewhat overshadowed the real merit of Mr Willetts’ policy outline, which has a very strong emphasis on both school autonomy and parental choice.
    
    "The debate in Australia is on the surface a different debate, although we have in common a growing tendency to measure outcomes by the introduction of standard testing. But much of the sting of class warfare has been removed by the support given by successive Commonwealth governments to private schools, which are not, as they were in the fifties and sixties, the preserve of wealthy elites (or, alternatively Catholic ghettoes).
    
    "There is a strong element of concern here about the content of the curriculum, including the problems of dumbing down; and there is a surprisingly healthy debate about teaching methods — as the OBE debate in WA shows. And the funding of the private sector has also removed much of the pressure for parental choice, over a wide range of socio-economic backgrounds.
    
    "And yet dissatisfaction with the system is widespread, among parents, employers and universities. One survey, reported in The West Australian the other day, showed that about 60 per cent of parents did not think that their children’s education was much good. Surprisingly, this was up since the last such survey four years ago.
    
    "The characteristic response to this situation was summed up in another story, which showed a quite remarkable increase in the number of bureaucrats in the State’s education offices. That is a characteristic bureaucratic response, of course, and one which will achieve nothing much at all.
    
    "But there are signs that change for the good may not be too far away.
    
    "The “G8”, as it is known, the group of Australia’s eight high-prestige universities, has proposed a radical change to the way universities are funded. Under the G8 plan, entrance would be based on national competition; but the funding would be attached to the student, who could opt for any participating institution.
    
    "Those institutions would be able to charge up to the full cost of the course chosen, with loans available for the shortfall. Call it a scholarship, if you will, but this is, in anyone’s language, a voucher, and it would come with all the appropriate virtues of choice and competition.
    
    "It follows an increasing use of vouchers for educational purposes by the Commonwealth. A fortnight ago, it increased the number of vouchers available for adults, most of them unemployed, who want to improve their literacy and numeracy skills.

    "The program for helping children who don’t make the grade in the national testing is effectively funded by vouchers; and the new Skills for the Future apprenticeship scheme involves offering straight-out vouchers worth $500 to students going to TAFE colleges or other registered providers.
    
    "The real puzzle is why this kind of method for funding access to services has taken so long to penetrate the world of education. Governments these days do not, after all, give food parcels and tents to the unemployed; they give them benefits and let them make the choices themselves.

    "And, if you think about it, Medicare is not much more than a voucher scheme, too: instead of providing services directly, the Government gives cardholders the ability to go to the GP of their choice, with a commitment to fund each service up to a given level.
    
    "The Federal Government doesn’t now seem to take much convincing that, in an increasing number of areas, vouchers are the way to go. It probably has the financial dominance necessary to force the States to implement such a system for all their schools. And it has shown that it doesn’t give two hoots about associated matters of principle (such as federalism) when it comes to issues like this.
    
    "The more interesting question is whether the Federal Opposition has the courage to do something similar. It’s not short of bright policy advocates of just such a scheme within its own ranks. The education unions would fight it to the death, of course, but that might well be something of a political advantage in the present climate.
    
    "What is unlikely, however, is that any State would unilaterally choose to move to a voucher system for its schools. That is, after all, the problem with bureaucrats: sooner or later, by dead weight, they can effectively veto any good policy. But then, most of them have the money to make their own choices for their children."

    From The West Australian at link
    
    
    
    
  • Danger seen in uni links to oil, gas firms
    
    See similar story in today's Melbourne Age
    
    
    
    
    
• The Australian
  
  
  • Independent schools willing to test merit pay
    by Justine Ferrari, Education writer
    
    "Paying teachers on their performance is inevitable and the debate now centres on how it will be measured.

    "At issue is whether teachers should be rewarded for the performance of their students, themselves or their work outside the classroom.

    "The Independent Schools Council of Australia said its members in more than 1000 schools nationwide would be interested in trialling models of performance pay, as outlined by the federal Government at the weekend.

    "ISCA executive director Bill Daniels said the core issue for the independent school sector was the impact any model of performance pay had on student results and that any trial should also test the effect on student outcomes.

    "If performance pay has a role in keeping the most able teachers in the classroom, the scheme is worth pursuing," he said.

    "Both the Government and the Opposition are interested in the issue although they don't agree on a model.

    "I think it's something that in five years' time, looking back, we'll wonder what the debate was about."

    "Education Minister Julie Bishop outlined plans on Monday to commission experts who had developed similar pay schemes in other professions to devise a framework to trial in Australian schools. At present, teachers are paid according to their length of service and reach the top salary band within eight or nine years.

    "But teachers unions yesterday rejected the plan, with the Australian Education Union accusing the Government of blackmail.

    "AEU federal president Pat Byrne invoked the spectre of the Coalition's industrial relations laws, saying performance pay was a "desperate attempt to force AWAs into schools" and that linking funding to the introduction of performance pay was holding schools to ransom. "There is no question that teachers are underpaid and it is getting harder to keep our most experienced ones in the classroom," she said.

    "But treating them like car salesmen is the wrong approach. What we need to keep our teachers in the classroom is to increase pay rates and put in place a scheme that rewards all experienced teachers who reach professional standards in teaching."

    "Opposition education spokesman Stephen Smith said teachers should be rewarded for developing specialist skills and accreditations, not for the results their students achieve. "We've got to start respecting the profession more; we've got to start rewarding them better; we've got to start paying them more. That requires a comprehensive, an across-the-board program to reward quality teaching," he said.

    "Reward them for the ongoing professional development that they do. Reward young teachers in their early years for engaging in induction programs. Reward experienced teachers for the mentoring that they do and reward teachers for the accreditation and skills that they have, and start rewarding them for who and where they are teaching."

    From The Australian at link
    
    
    
  • Editorial
    Merit pay is coming
    
    Schools should trial a new teacher salary system
    
    "In the face of near hysterical opposition from teacher unions and state Labor governments, the federal Education Minister Julie Bishop is pushing ahead with a plan to introduce merit-based pay for teachers, and so she should.

    "As The Australian reported yesterday, Ms Bishop has asked teams of expert consultants to develop different models for merit-based pay. It may be that good teachers get a cash bonus for lifting the grades of an entire class; or that the principal recommends a pay rise for a particularly outstanding individual; or that parents and students push for a rise for a teacher who has tamed a particularly unruly bunch of students. With some luck, there will be a host of schools jostling to sign up to trial the new models before the system can be rolled out across the nation.

    "Merit-based pay is obviously good for teachers, but there is evidence it is good for students, too. In the US, where teachers can get a cash bonus if they lift their student's scores, literacy and numeracy has improved. Australian teacher unions say they would rather use any extra money to hire more teachers and reduce class sizes. But there is no evidence that smaller class sizes automatically or even necessarily lead to better results.

    "Unions are likewise wary of competition among staff, complaining that it could erode the pleasant, collegial atmosphere of a school. The argument does not make sense. In most workplaces, there are talented high flyers and flat-footed time-wasters. There are juniors, seniors, big bosses and trainees. They get paid on merit, and they are required to work towards common goals. They don't kill each other over the fact that some earn more than others. Also, it is standard practice in most professions that if you work hard, you can ask for a pay rise. If you don't get one, you can take your labour to a different workplace that will give your pay packet a boost.

    "Recent reports have proved beyond doubt that teaching no longer attracts as many bright students as it did in the 1980s, in part because women, who make up the bulk of teachers, have more career options. But the problem with teacher pay obviously has an impact. In NSW, a teacher reaches the peak salary after nine years, which usually means, by the age of 31 or 32, they are earning as much as they will ever earn. By the age of 50, their morale must be completely shot.

    "It is often said that nobody goes into teaching for the money. Some go in for the short days and the generous holidays, for a love of children, or to perform public service. But greater financial rewards will make teaching a more attractive profession for smart people, who might otherwise drift to economics, medicine or the law, or indeed any job where their performance is recognised with one thing we all need, money."

    From The Australian at link [scroll down to second editorial]
    
    
    
  • Op Ed
    Teachers deserve a fairer pay scale
    by Kevin Donnelly
    
    Incentive is crucial for the future of learning
    
    "The argument that more effective teachers deserve to be better rewarded is hard to deny. Research carried out by Ken Rowe at the Australian Council for Educational Research proves that the impact of the classroom teacher is a crucial factor in how well students learn.

    "Andrew Leigh, an academic at the Australian National University, in his paper, Estimating Teacher Effectiveness From Two-Year Changes in Students' Test Scores, argues that some teachers are twice as effective as their colleagues in achieving high standards as measured by literacy and numeracy tests.

    "Overseas research, especially in the US, shows that even though millions have been spent on reducing class sizes, on the assumption that more teachers and smaller classes will lead to better results, standards have not improved and that it is teacher quality that must be addressed. It is also the case in Australia that approximately 20 to 30 per cent of beginning teachers leave teaching after four to five years as pay scales quickly flatten out and there is little incentive or reward for those hard-working and dedicated teachers who achieve the best results.

    "Some, such as the Australian Education Union, argue that performance-based pay is impossible to implement and conceptually flawed. Teaching, the argument goes, is a collaborative affair and, as it is impossible to quantify the extent to which individual teachers contribute to improved learning, all teachers should be paid more.

    "As stated in the union's media release published in response to the federal Government's plan to investigate models of performance-based pay for teachers: "What we need to keep our teachers in the classroom is to increase pay rates and put in place a scheme that rewards all experienced teachers who reach professional standards in teaching."

    "Ignored is the reality that the existing system of rewarding teachers based on how well they address so-called professional standards - for example, establishing high expectations of students, mentoring other teachers and gaining additional qualifications - does not guarantee improved learning outcomes and, to be promoted, teachers have to move outside the classroom.

    "The AEU ignores overseas experience demonstrating that it is possible to identify and reward those teachers, and schools, who achieve better results as measured by improved student learning. In the US states of Colorado and Tennessee, a number of merit-based pay schemes have been introduced to reward teachers on performance instead of seniority or time served.

    "As noted by the US educationalist, Gaynor McCown, executive director of the Teaching Commission, "Programs in a number of cities, such as New York, Dallas and Denver, show that this (merit-pay) can work in education. Indeed, last month, 59 per cent of Denver public school teachers approved a pay system linked to students' performance on standardised tests."

    "Central to such schemes is the need to fairly measure the impact of the teacher on how well students learn. It makes little sense measuring how well teachers perform in a selective high school, which controls its intake, against teachers in disadvantaged schools where greater numbers of students are educationally at risk.

    "It is also important not to evaluate teacher effectiveness simply by looking at the results of a one-off test; far better to measure how effective teachers are in value-adding to student learning by looking at improvements over time.

    "Simply put, value-adding involves testing students over a number of months or years, establishing their levels of achievement, based on earlier tests, and identifying how successful teachers are in getting students to achieve at a level of performance that might otherwise not be expected.

    "While there is much to recommend about performance-based pay, there are a number of caveats associated with Education Minister Julie Bishop's announcement about designing a system for Australian schools. Forcing states to adopt performance-based pay by linking them to federal funding adds to a growing list of educational initiatives being forced on states and territories.

    "Such an approach flies in the face of Australia's federal system of government, it represents an overly centralised and bureaucratic approach to public policy and a precedent is being set that might not always be palatable - given that governments of different political persuasions come and go.

    "It is also important that a one-size-fits-all model is not forced on schools and that the approach adopted recognises the complexity of the issue. Simply identifying and paying better teachers more, by itself, is not enough.

    "As noted in the US report, Performance-Pay for Teachers, it is important that all teachers are properly paid; there should be flexibility to decide how any system is implemented; those successful teachers who choose to teach in disadvantaged schools should be rewarded; and practising teachers must be involved in the design of the preferred model."

    Kevin Donnelly is director of Melbourne-based Education Strategies and author of Dumbing Down.

    From The Australian at link
    
    
    
    
  • Private schools fear ALP's funding plan
    by Imre Salusinszky and Justine Ferrari
    
    "In a potential replay of Mark Latham's politically bruising fracas with the independent education sector in 2004, private schools have complained that Labor's stand on school funding could "take us back to the dark old days when parents were penalised for their financial contribution to their children's education".

    "In an internal circular, leaked to The Australian, Independent Schools Council of Australia chief Bill Daniels says he has written to Opposition education spokesman Stephen Smith to express the organisation's concern that promises on funding by Mr Smith and Kevin Rudd are "inconsistent with some of the statements in the ALP national platform".

    "Mr Daniels claims a clause in the platform that says "income from private sources" will be taken into account when deciding how much money a school will receive is at odds with promises by the Opposition Leader and Mr Smith that no private school will be worse off under Labor and that Mr Latham's "hit list" of well-off private schools is dead.

    "Mr Smith last night committed a federal Labor government to maintaining funding levels and existing indexation arrangements for all schools.

    "This latest problem for Mr Rudd on the policy front follows weeks of controversy over Labor's "back to the future" workplace policies, which business groups claim would force them to bargain collectively with unions and impose a centralised umpire on the wages system.

    "Under the Howard Government, independent schools have been funded under a formula based on the socio-economic status of a school's parent cohort. There is no reduction in funding for schools that charge high fees or engage in active fundraising - a situation private schools fear could change if the Labor platform is implemented under a Rudd government.

    "The current funding arrangements do not take into account resources, including income from private sources, that are available to any school, government or non-government," Mr Daniels says in his letter to Mr Smith. "While the Australian Government's socio-economic status funding model is a measure of the capacity of parents to contribute to their child's education, it does not limit that contribution."

    "In his circular, which will be published in the ISCA newsletter today, Mr Daniels complains that "what we see injected into the schools funding debate is the idea that it is morally wrong for governments to fund non-government schools".

    "Worse is the notion that parents can spend their hard-earned money on anything they like except on the education of their children - and that once they do that they must be punished, in a funding sense," he writes.

    "The 'hit list' may be gone but (Labor's) policy, if implemented, would take us back to the dark old days when parents were penalised for their financial contribution to their children's education. No matter what ideologies drive the education debate, it must be acknowledged that many parents are making significant sacrifices for their children's education.

    "As (Labor federal president) Warren Mundine said, 'congratulate and support, not punish and denigrate'."

    From The Australian at link
    
    
    
    
  • Students face charges after taking guns on school camp
    
    Two Year 9 students are facing possible firearms charges after they took a sawn-off shotgun, a rifle and 17 rounds of ammunition to a school camp.
    
    Similar story in The Melbourne Age
    
    
    
    
  • The Higher Education Supplement has 15 articles today, including:
    
    
    
    • Go8 plan triggers fears for non-elite
      by Dorothy Illing and Milanda Rout
      
      "The Group of Eight's bold plan for a deregulated higher education sector has reignited divisions, with some non-Go8 universities warning that the plan would have "grave consequences".

      A greater concentration of resources in elite institutions, unexpected falls in enrolments and possible increases in student debt were among the dangers flagged by universities after the Go8 released its policy blueprint last week.

      "At the end of the day it is a prescription to make richer and powerful institutions even richer and more powerful, with very grave consequences for the sector as a whole," said Curtin University of Technology deputy vice-chancellor Greg Craven.

      "Eight universities are big winners and 30 universities are big, big losers."

      But the discussion paper, Seizing the Opportunities, drew strong support from some quarters, with several vice-chancellors saying it was time to take radical action.

      "It's inevitable," said University of Technology Sydney boss Ross Milbourne who, in a rousing address in Melbourne in April, called for an urgent overhaul of the system and more deregulation. "Because I don't think otherwise we will be able to be internationally competitive." ...
      
      Full story in The Australian's Higher Education Supplement at link
      
      
      

    • Don't search for essays
      
      Google, the biggest search engine, is to ban advertisements for essay-writing services, amid claims that it is undermining the integrity of university degrees.
      
      
      
    • Labor to jettison research impact
      
      Labor would ditch any attempt to measure research impact as part of a national assessment of publicly funded research, federal Opposition research spokesman Kim Carr said.
      
      
      
      
      
• The Melbourne Age
  
  
  • Report hits school 'lies'
    by Jewel Topsfield with David Rood
    
    "The Howard Government has lied about school results, unfairly attacked the quality of teaching and disparaged curriculums to impose federal control over education and increase the privatisation of schooling, a report says.

    "The report, to be released by the Australian Education Union today, comes after Victorian Premier Steve Bracks dismissed Canberra's latest move to commission experts to develop a performance pay model for teachers as "naked" politicking.

    "In the report, former Productivity Commission economist Trevor Cobbold says the Howard Government has transformed education into a market-based privatised system, aided by "the perpetration of three great frauds on the Australian public".

    "These include the "myth" that there is a crisis in schools, that increased choice and competition in schools will improve student achievement, and the Government's funding for private schools will help low-income families.

    "The report, The Great School Fraud, prepared for the Australian Education Union, says the Government continues to assert that more than 30 per cent of students are failing to meet adequate literacy standards.

    "Mr Cobbold says this is refuted by international and national data, including national literacy benchmark results in 2005, which show only about 10 per cent of year 7 students did not achieve the reading benchmark and 8 per cent did not achieve the writing benchmark..."
    
    Full story in The Melbourne Age at link
    
    
    

  • Uni links put doubt on free research
    
    Independent research at universities is being compromised because of close financial ties with the multimillion-dollar fossil fuel industry, according to a paper to be released today.
    
    Similar story in The Sydney Morning Herald and The West Australian
    
    
    
    
  • Letters to the Editor
    
    
    • Market rules
      
      "As Ingvarson and Rowley point out (Education, 4/6), many merit-based pay schemes have been tried over the past 100 years. Contrary to what Ms Bishop would have us believe, teachers and the unions that represent them would welcome a scheme that truly recognised the contribution of individual teachers. The problem is how to find a measure of teacher performance that takes into account everything a teacher does. How do you value the contribution of a teacher who leads students to take on leadership roles in protecting the environment? Or the teacher who develops a curriculum initiative that others use?

      "While I have a great deal of time for the professional standards approach, I propose an alternative: let the market decide. Allow teachers to negotiate their salaries directly with their schools. Hard-to-staff schools could offer higher salaries and teachers who could demonstrate performance to their peers could bargain for higher pay or go elsewhere. This would require significant additional resourcing for some schools, but that is another matter."

      Chris Curnow, Mordialloc
      
      

    • It's about funding
      
      "Teachers know that there are too many factors outside their control for any performance-based system to be fair. Surely Minister Julie Bishop knows that everywhere such schemes have been tried they have been abject failures.

      "If she is really serious about attracting teachers and improving standards, she should forget red herrings such as this and increase federal funding for government schools, so all teachers can be paid properly and school facilities improved to the standard of the private system."

      Grant Nichol, North Ringwood

      
      
      
• The Sydney Morning Herald
  
  
  • Teachers' pay plan labelled cash-for-grades
    by Anna Patty
    
    "The NSW Government and the national teachers union yesterday dismissed the Federal Government's plan for management consultants to devise a performance pay scheme for teachers.

    "The state Minister for Education, John Della Bosca, said: "The Commonwealth Treasurer [Peter Costello] has already ruled out providing any additional resources. So from the outset, the consultants will be drafting models that require some teachers to be paid less in order to reward others."

    "The Australian Education Union said performance pay had been universally opposed by state governments and teachers, yet the Government continued to persist with a "cash-for-grades proposal for teacher pay instead of properly funding public education".

    "Its president, Pat Byrne, said performance pay had failed overseas: "This is just a desperate attempt to get AWAs into schools and impose the Federal Government's IR laws on teachers."

    From The Sydney Morning Herald at link
    
    
    
    

Thursday 14 June

• The West Australian
  
  
  • Letters to the Editor (page 17)
    
    
    • Teachers have been taken for granted

      "People who have obviously never spent time in front of a class at school and yet use their privileged positions to pontificate on the structure of teachers' pay do society a massive disservice.

      "If one accepts, and why wouldn't you, that the primary aim of an educator is to engage children in the learning process, then one must also accept that attempting to quantify outcomes is a useful exercise only for the bean counters.

      "For example, in some classes in some schools a huge outcome for some students is to just turn up to class. It's a bonus if these students can sit through the lesson without disrupting others or being removed from the room. A true indication that there is a great teacher in the operation is when these students actually engage in the learning process, regardless of what boxes the teacher can tick at the end of the day to match up outcomes statements with the curriculum framework.

      "If we have a problem with teacher quality in this State, it is because they have been taken for granted, underpaid, undervalued and made the scapegoat for all of society's ailments. Paying the teachers who tick all the boxes more money than those who don't, won't or can't will not fix this."

      G Waideman, Greenwood
      
      

    • Obscene Push

      "As an ex-teacher (thanks, OBE), I find this Government's push for performance-based pay for teachers obscene. As if the task of finding enough people to do the job isn't overwhelming enough. If the Government truly believes that performance-based pay for teachers is better for the students, then surely performance-based pay for politicians would be better for Australia. How about the politicians leading by example? If it went to a referendum, I know who the public would rather see working under performance-based salaries."

      L Carville, St James
      
      
      

  • ALP forced to reassure on schools (page 40)

    "Labor has again been forced to promise that no Australian school would lose money under a Kevin Rudd government, after concerns that funding would be taken from private schools and directed into the public system.

    "WA Independent Schools Association deputy director Valerie Gould said there was some concern within the sector that the income of private schools would be taken into account by Labor when allocating funding. She wanted Labor to make its funding policy clear sooner rather than later.

    "Shadow education minister Stephen Smith said the schools "hit list" policy, a remnant of Mark Latham's leadership, was wrong and should never have been adopted by Labor.

    "He said funding and indexation arrangements would be the same under Labor."
    
    From The West Australian
    

     

• Media Statement: Education Minister Mark McGowan
  
  
• Teacher taskforce takes it to the people
  
  "The high level taskforce established to advise Government on the long-term issues affecting the teaching workforce, is asking for public submissions in response to a discussion paper recently released.

  "Education and Training Minister Mark McGowan said the Education Workforce Initiatives Taskforce, chaired by Professor Lance Twomey, would also hold a series of public forums around the State over the coming months as part of its consultation process.

  “People with an interest in the long-term issues affecting staffing at schools and TAFEWA colleges throughout the State should write in with their ideas, either individually or as part of a group by Friday, July 6 2007, “ Mr McGowan said.

  "The Minister said the taskforce would provide a preliminary report to him in October and submit a final report by the end of the year.

  “It is important that there is a long-term, strategic approach to dealing with teacher attraction and retention,” he said.

  “We need to be innovative and forward-thinking to ensure that we can continue to place teachers and lecturers where they are needed.”

  "Professor Twomey said the taskforce had established working groups to cover each of the key focus areas - attraction and retention, leadership and status, diversity of the workforce, and alternative delivery models.

  “Individuals or groups making submissions might comment on one or more of these focus areas,” Professor Twomey said.

  “They may wish to discuss issues generic to the education workforce as a whole, or to a particular sub-group, for example teachers, lecturers, teaching aides, administrators, clerical support, psychologists and others.

  “Other areas under consideration include teacher graduates, those new to the Western Australian education workforce, rural, remote or metropolitan issues and levels of remuneration.”

  "The discussion paper and information on providing written submissions are available on the taskforce website at http://www.educationworkforce.wa.gov.au ."
  
  
  
  

• The Sydney Morning Herald
  
  
  • Alarming slip in high school literacy levels
    by Anna Patty, Education Editor
    
    "NSW students are performing well in primary school but slipping behind the national average when they reach high school, official figures show.

    "The state's students score above national literacy and numeracy standards in years 3 and 5 but sink well below the average when they reach year 7.

    "Education experts who investigated the decline said that the national benchmarks had been set too high for year 7 students but this did not explain why NSW was ranked second last in numeracy, only ahead of the Northern Territory.

    "The Opposition's education spokesman, Andrew Stoner, seized on the figures as evidence of a need for an inquiry into mathematics standards in NSW public schools.

    "These results show that one in four NSW year 7 public school students are not meeting basic standards in numeracy," he said.

    "NSW public school students fall below the national average in both reading and numeracy in year 7, despite being above average in year 3. It's a concern that, the longer our children are within the Labor-run NSW public school system, the more their learning falls away."

    "And, despite promises of greater transparency from the federal and state governments, this year's new annual school reports have left blank spaces in place of percentages of students meeting the national benchmarks in 2005 and 2006."

    Full story in The Sydney Morning Herald at link
  
  
  
  
  
• The Australian
  
  
  • Op Ed
    Manual on how to stuff up
    by Matt Price
    
    "Two ripping issues in parliament yesterday - the leaking of the ACTU’s embarrassingly detailed blueprint for winning over swinging voters to Labor and John Howard’s misuse of Kirribilli House.

    "We’ve provided a link to the entire ACTU document. It’s oafish and unprofessional and probably doesn’t help Kevin Rudd who’s determinedly fighting the Coalition assault painting Labor as too close to unions..."
    
    "What’s utterly astounding is the, frankly, hilarious detail contained in the ACTU’s Federal Election 2007 Union Political Strategy Manual which, after yesterday’s question time, has a brand new title.
    
    “Dirty Tricks Manual,” wailed John Howard, Peter Costello and most other ministers, plainly wallowing in the details contained in the leaked 75-page opus..."
    
    "Anyone who imagines the Liberals don’t employ similarly elaborate campaign techniques might like to contact me later for an excellent deal on purchasing sections of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. But, so far at least, the Coalition backroom operators haven’t been so silly or sloppy as to allow their dastardly plans to see the light of day..."
    
    Full story in The Australian at link
    
    The Complete ACTU Strategy Manual [3.5 MB .pdf]
    
    Similar story in The Sydney Morning Herald

    
    
    
    
• The Washington Post
  
  
  • Higher Pay Urged to Fight Dearth of Math and Science Teachers
    
    Higher starting salaries, more rigorous teacher training programs and additional support for first year teachers are just a few of the incentives needed to deal with a projected shortfall of more than 280,000 math and science teachers across the country by 2015, according to a group of business, foundation and higher education leaders.
    
    So WA will recruit teachers from the US???  Web
    
    
    
    
  • Cheating Cheaters of the Chance
    
    Test Proctors Ban Water Bottles, iPods, Tying Shoes
    
    Bottled water is sometimes banned at students' desks -- maybe someone scrawled a formula on the inside of the wrapper? Tests with the same labels are passed out but with questions in a different order, a trick meant to trap would-be cheaters who steal glances at their neighbors. Sometimes even seemingly minor actions, such as tying a shoelace or looking at the ceiling, are forbidden.
    
    
    
    
• The Times
  
  
  • Stressed-out young need fewer exams, say teachers
    
    National examinations for children aged 7, 11 and 14 should be replaced by the random testing of a sample of pupils and a system of teacher assessments, according to the professional body for teachers.
    
    
    
  • Children who fall behind by age three
    
    Children from disadvantaged backgrounds are up to a year behind on educational development by the age of three, a study says.
    
    
    
    
• The Guardian
  
  
  • Watchdog reveals plans to scrap GCSE coursework
    
    Traditional GCSE coursework will be abolished in most subjects as the government's exams watchdog tries to clamp down on internet plagiarism and help from parents and teachers.
    
    
    
    
• The Independent
  
  
  • GCSE rival to gain state acceptance
    
    A rival to the GCSE designed along the lines of the traditional O-level may soon win backing from government exam watchdogs and find its way into hundreds of state schools.

 

Friday 15 June

• The West Australian
  
  
  • McGowan tells officers education is a mess (page 5)
    by Bethany Hiatt
    
    "Education Minister Mark McGowan has given senior education bureaucrats a stinging rebuke and ordered a wide-ranging review of the department.
    
    "He blamed them for “many multimillion-dollar problems” caused by poor planning and attacked them for ignoring his policies.
    
    "Mr McGowan said people “in the chain of command” distorted his instructions this year to simplify outcomes-based education assessments to suit their own vision of education so what happened in schools bore little resemblance to his intention. “This simply compounds dissatisfaction and reinforces the impression that the department doesn’t listen,” he said.
    
    "He warned them they would have to toe the ministerial line and that “fads, fancies or special projects” would not be funded. “Too often the department seems like a loose federation of independent states,” he said.
    
    "There were cases of divisions pursuing proposals without regard for the wider implications or priorities.
    
    "Mr McGowan delivered his attack when he met senior officers yesterday to tell them of a new flying squad to target schools where students consistently performed poorly in reading, writing and maths.
    
    "The squad would spend five days at each failing school, working with principals and teachers to develop strategies to improve the way the schools were run and would report directly to the director-general.
    
    "He said it was disturbing there had been no significant improvement in literacy and numeracy in the past 10 years, despite a massive injection of time and money.
    
    "The move undermines the roles of district directors, who regularly review schools, but will increase principals’ autonomy. Mr McGowan said the move was to reduce red tape and not add another compliance burden on well-performing schools.
    
    "He told executives they needed to heed clear feedback from three damning reports this year.
    
    "One found the curriculum improvement program over 10 years of outcomes-based education had dramatically added to teacher workloads and dissatisfaction with little gain for students. Also, “teacher juries” found two-thirds of OBE senior school courses were not ready to start next year and a review of teacher recruitment cited antiquated, impersonal and complex processes." [emphasis added]
    
    From The West Australian at link
    
    
    
  • Graduate teachers bale out (page 5)
    by Jessica Strutt
    
    "More than 22 per cent of new graduate teachers left the State education system in 2006 after lasting just one year, new figures reveal.
    
    "Independent MLA Liz Constable, who obtained the figures through questions in Budget estimates, released them as she criticised the Education Department for failing to plan adequately for the dire teacher shortage facing the State. She said it could not all be simply blamed on WA’s “boom times”.
    
    "She said the department’s figures showed that in 2001, 81 or 13.9 per cent of new graduate teachers in the State education system left after their first year and had not returned. Dr Constable said the numbers leaving had continued to rise. In 2006, 210 new graduates, or 22.4 per cent, of graduate teachers in public schools left after their first year.
    
    "She said by contrast, of the 2001 graduate teacher intake, a total of 230 or 39.4 per cent of the total taken on in the public school system had left after six years. Dr Constable questioned why the department did not track these sort of statistics to prepare for changes in the workforce.
    
    "The figures do not detail how many were primary or secondary school teachers. It is not known if the teachers left the profession or were poached by the private school system.
    
    “What on earth is the figure going to be this year?” Dr Constable said. “We can’t afford to lose our bright young graduates in this way.”
    
    "State School Teachers Union president Mike Keely accused the Education Department of having its head in the sand, saying it had consistently ignored concerns raised about the looming teacher shortage.
    
    "A department spokesman said the number of graduates entering the public school system had risen from 584 in 2001 to 939 in 2006 and some of those who left in 2006 would return to teach this year or in future.
    
    "Many teachers picked up fixedterm contracts for their first year in metropolitan schools and then did not take up positions if that same offer was not repeated."
    
    From The West Australian at link
    
    
    
  • Op Ed
    Asian language bounty withers on the branch (page 20)
    by David Hill
    

    "Australia’s educational policy on the teaching of non-English languages is in crisis. This is the disturbing conclusion of a hard-hitting report endorsed by the prestigious Australian Academy of the Humanities at a National Languages Summit in Canberra on Thursday last week.
    

    "Speakers as diverse as Major Michael Stone, of the Australian Defence Force, and Professor Michael Worton, provost of University College London, urged the summit to back the report entitled Languages in Crisis: A rescue plan for Australia.
    
    "The study by the Group of Eight universities directly challenges State and Federal governments. It urges them to invest in Australia’s linguistic expertise or risk losing a national asset.
    
    "English is now widespread in the global business community. But speaking only English is not enough. To get a winning edge, individuals and companies need additional language skills attuned to specific booming markets.
    
    "Australia is poised on the edge of the world’s economic powerhouse of Asia, yet our up-take of Asian languages across all levels of education is pitiful. In the 1960s nearly 40 per cent of Australian Year 12 students studied a second, mostly European, language. By 1992, Year 12 completion of any second language, increasingly an Asian tongue, had declined to 12.5 per cent.
    
    "Now barely six per cent study an Asian language in Year 12. Even in some major Perth high schools, numbers taking an Asian language in Year 12 are about 2 per cent.
    
    "With so few entering the job market trained to communicate directly with the region around us, we are severely disadvantaging ourselves.
    
    "Federal Education Minister Julie Bishop opened the Languages Education National Seminar last October declaring that “there will be many benefits — not only for the individual, but for our nation as a whole” if Australian students learn a language other than English.
    
    "Yet in 2002 the coalition Government had shut down one of the most successful language programs ever launched in Australia, the National Asian Languages and Studies in Australian Schools Strategy (NALSAS), which had encouraged several hundred thousand students to start learning an Asian language.
    
    "One of the instigators of that program was Kevin Rudd. As a Queensland public servant in 1994 he produced the report, Asian Languages and Australia’s Economic Future, that laid the basis for NALSAS.
    
    "With a degree in Asian Studies and years in China as a diplomat and business consultant, Mr Rudd is a fluent Mandarin speaker, and may just become the first Australian prime minister proficient in any Asian language.
    
    "In last month’s Budget Reply speech he committed Labor to reviving NALSAS, pledging $68.6 million over four years to encourage the priority languages of Japanese, Indonesian, Mandarin and Korean in high schools.
    
    "The Languages in Crisis report calls for more. More funding, more inter-governmental co-operation, more incentives to learn languages and help for students and teachers.
    
    "Why is language learning apparently seen as “too hard” by many Australians? Learning two or three languages is regarded by most communities around the world as entirely unremarkable. Research demonstrates it does not impede — and may enhance — progress in other areas.
    
    "What is the reason for our apparent lack of interest in language learning?
    
    "Instead of taking pride in linguistic diversity and achievement, all too often there is disapproval of those who converse in public in a language other than English.
    
    "The Languages report advocates a vigorous public campaign to expose the folly of the common assumption that English speakers do not need other languages because everyone will speak English!
    
    "It urges all governments in Australia to make language study mandatory from primary school to Year 10, adding funding must be invested to “boost the morale, the skills and the numbers of trained language teachers at all levels”.
    
    "This echoes the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s April 2007 policy paper, Skills for a Nation — A Blueprint for Improving Education and Training 2007 — 2017, which recommended “to effectively participate in a globalised world there should be the compulsory learning of a foreign language from seven years of age or earlier.”
    
    "As an incentive for school students, the Languages report urged universities to provide “a 10 per cent bonus on a student’s university entry score if he or she has successfully completed the study of a language other than English at Year 12”. [emphasis added]
    
    "This policy would have a profound impact. While individual universities may be hesitant to initiate such a bonus, once pioneered others would soon follow.
    
    "Universities could proudly promote their graduates’ linguistic achievements. Graduates entering the job market soon appreciate the benefits of bilingualism.
    
    "Can pressure from the Humanities’ Summit reverse what Professor Tim Lindsey, of Melbourne University’s Asian Law Centre, has described as the “complacent and risible” attitude of the Australian Government towards the decline in Asian languages and studies?
    
    "Reversing government failure to sustain and develop such language expertise will be a Herculean challenge. But Australia has a richly diverse ethnic population. There are those Australians who, by their birth, speak a bounty of the world’s languages.
    
    "In a robust education system, with the right encouragement, collaboration, wise planning and sufficient financial support, we have the potential to build upon such attributes, to become the linguistic powerhouse of our region."

    David T. Hill is Professor of South-East Asian Studies and Fellow of the Asia Research Centre at Murdoch University.
    
    From The West Australian at link
    
    
    

• ABC News
  
  
  • Teachers leaving profession in droves
    
    "New figures reveal almost a quarter of all new graduate teachers are leaving the state education system after just one year in the job.

    "The Independent MP Liz Constable, who released the figures, has criticised the Education Department for failing to plan adequately for people leaving the system.

    &