The "Mettle", and why we are grasping it. Also, do we have too many schools?

Thumper, well he’s out of the country atm. That’s pretty much all I can say.

I hate that capitalism is more important than actually educating our young.

Then again, people will blame the teachers when schools close and children get lost a system that shouldn’t have been crippled.

The Comrade should forego his tax payer car etc as well as the other pollies. Then again, he should also not build the green house or light rail.

He must want people who have minimal job skills to work in them in the coming years.

South Canberra

78 – PS
124 – PS

Woden Valley

74 – PS
82 – PS

Weston Creek

71 – PS
88 – PS
119 – PS

Belconnen North

154 – PS
155 – PS
276 – HS
450 – C

Belconnen South

136 – PS

Tuggeranong North

131 – PS
142 – PS
149- PS
296 – HS
353 – HS

Gungahlin

156 – K-10 (new school)

Other ACT Areas

128 – PS
37 – PS
24 – PS

I deliberately picked PS with a student population of under 150 or slightly over (155), HS with a student population of under 350 or slightly higher (353) and a C population of 450 (the smallest C population in ACT).

These details are accessible to the public via the ACT Department of Education’s website.

Now that gives a clearer picture of schools who have small numbers – particularly PS.

I’m going to look at the ACT Govt schools census data and see which schools are “under” enrolled.

I’ll post them here later.

Another update is today’s CT: http://canberra.yourguide.com.au/detail.asp?class=news&subclass=local&story_id=475179&category=general%20news&m=4&y=2006

Andrew Barr reminds me of his former Federal counterpart….

Since they seem to eager to waste our tax dollar, why aren’t they considering light rail ?

At a government level I can already see the kickbacks rolling through:

1. We’ve got no money (overall) because the implementation of a light rail network is so expensive.
2. Keep voting for us because we are building stuff right across Canberra, and we don’t want to change the government half way through the project.

That’s not even mentioning all of their mates getting phat lucrative light-rail related contracts to do fuck all as well.

From Jon’s perspective though, why pay for something that the Feds and private enterprise seem to be doing pretty ok at anyway ?

Never mind that half the country can’t read or write anyway, Just remember it’s the children of tomorrow that will be in charge of interpreting the medication list in your old peoples home.

Wild times ahead.

We’ve squibbed the decisions on schools for 15 years. There’s been too many for ages. Now the comrades have stuffed the budget, they’re desperate for action and it will be rushed through instead of being done sensibly over the last 10 years or so.

However, my bet would be the noise over closures will be too much and comrades will back off.

To add to the list of education bungles in the ACT: Charnwood High closes in 1995, all students sent to Ginninderra High. ~10 years later Ginn. High is set to close in favour of a “super-dooper-McMega-school-warehouse” … for what students exactly?

Perhaps with all this disposable income Canberran’s are supposed to have (being the pompous public servant fat-cats that we _all_ are), we can all afford a private school education for our children and thus do not need more than a handful of public schools?

Oops. Should read Hackett, Watson and Downer PS. Watson High was separate.

He just wants to save some money. However, opening a large greenhouse – who wants it anyway, is obviously top priority.

According to the ACT Govt, ACT schooling is the best in Australia. Yes it will still be the best but have the smallest allocation of schools.

Smaller schools suit some children.

When looking at the impact on closing schools, you only have to look at what happened when Hackett Primary, Downer Primary and Watson High (yes for those more “new” to Canberra they did exist once) closed within 2-3 yrs of one another.

You now have Majura (amalgamation of Hackett, Watson and Downer)and North Ainslie with either full capacity or below capacity as well as Lyneham High bursting at the seams with Campbell High not too far behind it. Not to mention parents who sent their children to private schools because of it.

By all means close the schools, but you’ll have to build more infrastructure at the schools you will still have open. And, it might not stem the tide of students leaving the Govt system, it may well encourage them to do so.

He can’t have much confidence that people will come to live in Canberra then, if he wants to close some schools.