Peter Doherty, Barry McGaw and Brendan O'Loghlin: Level the learning field
April 30, 2004
FIFTY years ago, we were among the first students at Indooroopilly State High School, in an inner western suburb of Brisbane. This was the first expansion of the Queensland secondary system after World WarII. Students came from as far away as Inala, the "struggle town" that Pauline Hanson made famous. Some were recently arrived immigrants, and many were the children of parents with little education.
In some ways, Indooroopilly High was a tough school, but we look back with gratitude to excellent teachers and an outstanding academic experience. Now, half a century later, we worry that it is much more difficult for public schools to provide comparable opportunities.
In Australia, more than 30 per cent of students now attend private schools. The figure in the Netherlands is much higher, with 77 per cent in private schools. But public and private schools in the Netherlands are all publicly funded on the same basis and private schools may not charge fees. They differentiate themselves by their value orientation, religious affiliation or pedagogy, not by resource levels.
In Canada, Catholic schools are part of the public system and are publicly funded. Only 5 per cent of students attend private schools differentiated from the public sector by resource levels, and fewer than half of these students are in private schools that obtain any public support. The Governor-General of Canada, commenting in a recent BBC report on Canadian society, observed that the country has never had a prime minister who attended a private school.
By contrast, Australia is unique in the extent to which non-government schools are able to combine private resources with government funding to achieve a substantial advantage over the public system.
We do not wish to see Australian private schools compromised, nor do we believe that it is possible to turn back the clock to an earlier era. However, resources in public schools need to be raised. We are dismayed to see the original 1960s buildings at Indooroopilly High still in use. That is not true of the private schools that existed in the '50s. They have been transformed with wonderful capital developments. These growing differences among Australian schools matter.
Australia's educational performance is less equitable than that in Canada, Finland, Ireland, Japan, South Korea and Sweden. According to the OECD's Programme for International Student Assessment, social background makes more difference to student achievement in Australia than it does in these other countries. The gap between high and low-performing students is also wider here.
On average, Australia's schools produce high-quality results. Among 28 OECD countries in PISA, Australia's 15-year-olds tied in second place behind Finland in reading literacy, tied in third place behind Japan and South Korea in mathematical literacy, and tied in fourth place behind South Korea, Japan and Finland in scientific literacy.
Canada, Finland, Ireland, Japan, South Korea and Sweden had high-quality performances, showing that quality and equity can be achieved at the same time.
Australian school education is high-quality but low-equity. The UK and New Zealand are the same. The UK has a similar funding arrangement and enrolment pattern to Australia, with 65 per cent of students in government schools and 31 per cent in private schools that receive government support in addition to fee income. The wealthiest British private schools are generally in the 4 per cent that receive no government support. New Zealand has 94 per cent of students in government schools but has an equity problem due to the low performance of its Maori and Pacific Islander populations.
There are many countries with a lower average quality of schooling than Australia. Germany's results -- low in quality as well as equity -- have provoked an intense national debate about educational policy. Australia's results should provoke a serious examination of how Australia might achieve much more equitable results while preserving its high quality.
There are no grounds for the typical Australian fear that any attempt to achieve greater equity in education will lead to dumbing down. Levelling up can be achieved, as Canada, Finland and other countries have shown. That is what we want to see in Australia.
There are very good public schools in Australia and outstanding students in public schools. That is evident in the results of public assessment at the end of Year12. There is, however, a real risk that the present funding arrangements for the private and public sectors are driving down the relative position of the public sector.
Australia has the basic wealth to make certain this does not happen. With the demands of the knowledge economy and concerns about the falling birthrate, Australia has an enormous need at every level for highly skilled and innovative people. We must ensure that the majority who are served by public schools are not handicapped by an under-resourced system.
Peter Doherty, winner of the 1996 Nobel Prize in Medicine, is professor of medicine at the University of Melbourne. Barry McGaw is director for education at the OECD in Paris. Air Vice-Marshal Brendan O'Loghlin was director-general of military strategy and concepts and later principal of the Australian Defence College. All three will be in Brisbane this weekend for the 50th anniversary celebrations of Indooroopilly High School. Doherty was in the first intake in 1954, McGaw in the second and O'Loghlin started in 1958.
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