"History will be kind to us, because we will write it"
With the news that high school education is now majority provided by the private sector perhaps it is time to re-evaluate what public education is trying to achieve.
For decades public educators have tried to convince well off parents that the public system offers a better alternative to the private one.
As a rule the harder they try the more parents they drive away.
We have now reached, or are very close, to the point where all the children in public high schools fall into three categories:
1) Their parents don’t care about their future,
2) Their parents can’t afford to act to safeguard their future,
3) Their parents are willing to sacrifice their future on the altar of ideology.
So we’re looking at an education system wherein all the students are profoundly disadvantaged.
Some might say that this is not the place to be organising whizzy programs for accelerated university placements.
In fact the whole obsession with university linkups appears to be a massive vote of no confidence in itself by the ACT education system. Why force them out the door sooner? Have you nothing more to teach?
Rather than devoting large amounts of energy and money trying to entice the non-disadvantaged some might wonder what could be done for those that remain if the focus was to be more precisely aligned to their needs?
Is it time to throw in the towel on egalitarian public education and admit it’s the preserve of the less well off?
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Or 4) Their parents believe a good education can be achieved at a public school, and without the religious baggage.
There’s nothing on earth that will convince me to have my child brainwashed by religious people. My kids’ school is excellent. The principal is awesome. He’s genuinely interested allowing the kids room to move and therefore achieve the most from their education. He’s tough on people (teachers and pupils) who don’t fit in with the culture he’s trying to achieve – ie inclusion, acceptance yada yada yada. The school is public, and exceeding capacity. More like him would bring the public system back into repute, I reckon!
90% of the problems in public schools could be fixed with a decent approach to discipline and maintaining order.
Narrabundah college ranked second out of all the colleges last year in terms of ATAR scores. I laugh at all those parents spending $100,000+ for a “better education”.
Yeah, I don’t agree with this at all. Your categorising is a little on the offensive side, and you have over-simplified this in a massive way.
I also think it might be worth contemplating that the fact there seem to be so many unruly, naughty kids in public schools is not necessarily the fault of the public schools.
You’ve highlighted that low income earners and the under-privileged will obviously be sending their kids to public rather than private, so plainly there are going to be a lot of kids in public education from some pretty rough circumstances. The school can focus on discipline as much as they like but they can’t fix a kid’s home life.
I don’t think the private schools are doing a better job at controlling their pupils – I think they have a completely different demographic.
The last thing we want in society is public schools being considered only for the disadvantaged…
Classified said :
Agreed… Give teachers the ability to sort out problems, fire teachers who puts their head in the sand when it comes to discipline \ bullying problems…
Also I almost feel that 100% of the education budget should go to public schools… If a parent wishes to sent their child to a private school, then it’s their choice, they should have to pay the bill 100%. If they complain that “it’s their tax dollars too” well the answer is simple, send you child to a public school, they do have that option…
I’ve noticed that Canberra schools tend to be big on streaming anyway, so bright kids are challenged and less motivated ones can receive remedial support or whatever. It would be interesting to set up a selective school but only if the location didn’t disadvantage anyone too much.
@classified – it’d be a start, but there’s more.
Where’s the incentive to learn? If you buckle down and study, you end up even more bored for the rest of the year as teachers pander to the lazy/stupid. Forcing stuidents to repeat classes if they can’t be bothered learning the material would give the lazy a swift kick up the pants.
What function, exactly, to teachers serve? Teenagers don’t learn spelling or grammar – but can message on their phones at touchtyping speeds. They don’t learn foreign languages, but pick them up fluently in a few months overseas. Students master computers when their parents can’t. Teenage girls muck up in class – and after school get paid to babysit..doing a good job! It’s time to get rid of teachers, and have classes run by the students a couple of years ahead. You don’t really understand something until you’ve taught it, so teaching a subject to another after learning it should be required.
@beejay76 – your “4)” is just a spin on “3)”.
And lastly, separating our high schools into what is effectively one for rich kids and one for poor kids is not right – it’s not how the real world is.
harvyk1 said :
+ eleventyseventy (in spite of understanding the historical and political reasons why it would never happen).
And, JB, I know my education was largely back in the third-world ways north of the Rio Tweed in the days of steam radio, but I was failed by that system (and I wasn’t alone) by the inability to be challenged by it. I would hope that my boy — if in the future he shows any sort of potential or capability for ‘advanced’ learning — is directed to the teriary sector as soon as he is able to handle it. I also have a 22 year old nephew who, I know, wishes also that he had just such an opportunity.
Education vouchers – give people a choice.
Calamity said :
Sorry, but that’s how the real world does work. It shouldn’t but that’s how it is.
alaninoz said :
Okay. In that case, don’t you think perhaps we should try not to pass that attitude on to the next generation?
Calamity said :
+1
3) Their parents are willing to sacrifice their future on the altar of ideology.
Sad, but true.
Cheap said :
It astounds me that people still tout this furphy whenever this topic is raised.At least one privae school in ACT (the most expensive) is not ranked against the rest of ACT, choosing instead to participate in the NSW system. However, if it helps you feel justified..
If an ATAR score is what a parent wants, then send your kid to the cheapest school possible, and fork out for tutors. If you want a broad range of educational opportunities, well find the school that suits what you are seeking, be it public or private.
Johnboy – you have over-simplified the situation here. Most of the kids in our Public Schools don’t fall into any of the three categories you provided. It’s just that those categories (particularly #1) are the kids we teachers (in Public Schools) spend most of our useful class time trying to contain. We are powerless in the classroom; rarely (if at all) receiving parental support and there simply aren’t support mechanisms to help change the situation for them.
And whilst (I hope) it isn’t universal; there are Principals that are reluctant to damage their stats by suspending students – so they go without serious consequences. This, in the long term, will bite them in the arse – but by then they will have been promoted on…
I still think the argument is based on a false premise.
The numbers indicate that 50.3% of high school students in the ACT attend 53% of the high schools in the ACT. Descriptive statistics are not a measure of quality.
(Incidentally, if 100% of the students attended public schools, each school would have over 1100 students. That might have an impact on quality.)
Further, if parents can base their decision to send a child to public school on uninformed, subjective preference or ideology, then they can decide on private school similarly. Preference is also not a measure of quality.
You also appear to be making a moral judgement regarding parents whose children are in public schools, and I don’t think that’s appropriate.
You’re treading on dangerous ground with the phrase, ‘… more precisely aligned to their needs’; it’s at best patronising and at worst elitist. What, exactly, are the educational needs of the economically disadvantaged, and how do they differ from those of higher income families?
What does re-focussing public education to the disadvantaged entail?
whitelaughter said :
Glorified child minding?
I’m wondering if it might be useful to assess whether the absence of a uniform policy in Canberra high schools and colleges is a factor in many families’ decisions to send children to private schools? Perhaps a comparison could be done against other jurisdictions who have a stronger uniform policy, as to whether it is relevant in school enrolments? Appearances count- sloppy half uniforms (ie a faded school T shirt and whatever else goes) make public school kids look poor, even when they aren’t. People tend to think that public schools provide a lesser quality education, values, boundaries and discipline because the kids look sloppy. My family was quite poor during the recession. We could not have afforded enough private clothes for my four siblings and I to wear five days a week- uniforms are the great equaliser. I wore a full school uniform including blazer (all second hand) to my catholic high school and looked the same as everyone else- people actually thought we were well off. I fitted in when representing the school, the debating team etc. Friends talk about how hard it was wearing the same clothes every day to Canberra schools and being judged as being poor and therefore not cool. Also it was tough at inter-school events against the private schools in their nice uniforms. For the record, we are sending our kids to public primary but will probably send them to private high schools- this will be a factor in our decision.
Anyone who thinks that Narrabundah, Alfred Deakin, Telopea or Lyneham are typical government schools needs to get his head read.
Likewise, anyone who thinks that there aren’t “rich” public schools and “poor” public schools should get real. Lyneham High and Caroline Chisholm are like chalk and cheese. The PEA system ensures that it is measurably easier for kids from the wealthy surrounding suburbs to get in to schools like Lyneham and Telopea, and harder for poorer out-of-area kids to get in.
PEAs also guarantee incompetent principals funding, as they mean that kids basically have no choice but to attend their local govvy high school, no matter how unsafe it is or how low the teaching standards fall. Parents shouldn’t need to spend $5000 per year to send their child to a gang and knife-free high school.
The solution? Institute a voucher system and abolish the PEAs so that kids from anywhere can apply to go to any school. Then, principals would actually have to compete by offering parents what they want. Further, principals should be subject to oversight by superintendents.
(Ditching the politically-correct horseshit and trendy theories that pervade govvy schools, in favour of old-fashioned discipline and expecting kids to actually do a little work would also help)
Jane Proxy said :
+1
I found that categorisation also rather offensive. And I also don’t believe those just under 50% of parents in Canberra would all fit in those.
I am happy with my child’s public school too. And I support their social inclusion policy, something sadly lacking from the private sector. But I do wish they would spend more of their budget on support for those kids with ‘special’ needs (and a larger budget is always welcome of course, but not always possible).
I am not a proponent of privatising all education for “kids without special needs” (whatever that may mean!). I am however a proponent of the nationalisation of private schools!
Wily_Bear said :
Canberra Grammar School only uses the HSC system because, since the HSC is compulsory, they are able to EXPEL their students if they don’t score high enough. Radford College and Canberra Girls’ Grammar School don’t allow them to study the tertiary package and are encouraged to start apprenticeships.
Narrabundah gets a large amount of students from the private system, which might be one of the reasons that their ATAR marks are so high, and since it’s a public school, everyone is allowed to study the tertiary package, which means that almost 90% of students end up studying it.
Most parents do not, however, send their kids to Radford/CGS/CGGS. They send them to St Francis or Burgmann, or Marist/Eddies/Clares/Merici if they want single sex.
somewhere_between_bundah_and_goulburn said :
Kids who don’t get As in advanced maths at those schools actually get taken out the back and shot.
They also expel kids without hyphenated surnames who don’t play violin and do horse riding.
Anyone else got more AEU/SOS/lefty urban legends about private education they want to share?
gemini7507 said :
It is my understanding that there is now a uniform policy in all ACT Public Schools (though it may be at the School’s board’s discretion). Having fought with “colour code” for many years, the School I am at enforced Uniform from the start of last year – and it has made a HUGE (and immediate) positive difference in the general attitude and behaviour of most students; especially those in the middle of the behaviour spectrum who could go either way. Uniform is cheaper than trendy clothing – and can be subsidised by the Principal’s discretionary funding (although those that need it, are amongst the least likely to pursue it).
They also don’t stand up for people on the bus apparently.
public highschool student here, i think alot of the problems come from lack of discipline and lack of motivation from the teachers
I know alot of students who were well behaved got good grades and had no other problems in primary school who within the first few weeks of highschool were getting into fights taking drugs smoking and stealing.
90% of the time the school knew that drugs were being taken and cigarettes smoked on school property but never did anything.
the school has also tried to cover up a few major fights (actualy they were more like bashings) that required stays in hospital for the students involved.
I know of students being severely bullied and teachers and principals doing nothing about it. the only reasons I can think of is they are either too lazy dont care or they are trying to stop the reputation of the school being damaged
and on the academic side I dont think my class has done any work for the last year that hasnt been printed out work sheets (often the teachers dont even know the answers to the work sheets and have to google them to find the answers)
my class hasnt done any experiments in science for 2 years and nobody seems to care (I know its not that important but it just shows that all we are doing is printed out work sheets)
I know most people think this post is just a typical complaining teenage who hates school but all highlighted in this post is the truth
I didn’t read the title properly (no, I didn’t go to a public school myself). My girl’s only in public, so I can only comment on the quality of public high schools from what my friends with older kids say. The ones with kids in public (intelligent people and by no means poor or brainwashed/-ing) have been satisfied and claim their kids were better prepared for tertiary because they weren’t spoonfed.
If I accept the categorisation, I’d fall into category 2. But your conclusion that “So we’re looking at an education system wherein all the students are profoundly disadvantaged.” I find offensive. Why would kids whose parents can’t or won’t pay for private automatically be disadvantaged? Is it because a higher income produces a better type of child?
Watson said :
I really cannot write, bloody catholic education! I meant “My girl is only in primary”…
JB, I’m surprised at the ignorance of this. We pulled our children out of a private school and put them into a public school because the private school wasn’t able to provide adequate IT facilities, and the class sizes were smaller.
I’m all for choice, and actually think the public school system should be privatised to eliminate the reverse elitism rampant in the public system (California has started doing this with some success), but I fundamentally disagree with your underlying premise that lower SES children universally need a different kind of education from higher SES children. Current pedagogical theory says that there are three basic learning styles, and that these bear little relationship to socio-economic status. In my opinion the necessary change to education is to categorise and stream students according to their basic learning styles, not socio-economic status as you’re suggesting.