Postcode is not destiny

There's nothing new in Trevor Cobbold's just released research paper mistakenly arguing that the only reason Catholic and independent schools outperform government schools is because they enrol privileged students from wealthy backgrounds.

Cobbold, the Convenor of Save Our Schools, is also wrong to criticise Christopher Pyne, the Commonwealth Minister for Education, and his plans to give government schools greater autonomy in an effort to strengthen schools and raise standards.

As Melbourne-based Gary Marks details in Education, Social Background and Cognitive Ability, the belief among policy makers, academics and activists that "socioeconomic background largely determines educational and subsequent occupational and economic backgrounds" has long been accepted by the cultural-left as beyond doubt.

During the early to mid 70s the sociology of education movement gained ascendency in education faculties and teacher training both here and overseas with advocates arguing that education in Western capitalist societies, instead of providing a ladder of opportunity, perpetuated inequality and disadvantage.

Academic success, so the argument goes, has nothing to do with merit, ability, hard work or a disciplined classroom environment, high expectations, effective teachers and a rigorous curriculum – rather success or failure is determined by postcode.

In England, as argued by Peter Hitchens during his recent visit to Australia, the result of this levelling down, anti-elitist argument was the closure of Grammar Schools - the one avenue that had provided thousands of working class children the chance to achieve academic success.

In Victoria the socialist inspired education minister, Joan Kirner, closed the technical schools and reduced education to the lowest common denominator by arguing that diversity and choice in education exacerbated inequality and unfairly privileged non-government schools.

As detailed by Gary Marks in his recent book, in addition offering nothing new, the argument that socioeconomic background determines success or failure ignores the mounting research proving that other factors such as students' cognitive ability and school culture are equally, if not more, important.

Marks writes "arguments that the reproduction of socioeconomic inequalities across generations is strong and enduring and that cognitive ability is irrelevant are simply not true" and that "education policy should not be based on the premise that the bulk of inequalities in education can be attributed to socioeconomic background".

When explaining why Catholic and independent schools, compared to government schools, achieve stronger Year 12 results a 2013 analysis carried out by the National Centre for Vocational Education Research arrives at a similar conclusion.

The researchers write "the average socioeconomic status of students at a school does not emerge as a significant factor, after controlling for individual characteristics including academic achievement from the PISA test".

Not surprisingly, the researchers note that a school's culture and classroom environment are important factors and that as "academic school quality increases, individual socioeconomic background becomes less relevant in relation to the probability of completing Year 12".

Researchers analysing completion rates and contrary to what Cobbold argues also conclude that students attending Catholic and independent schools are more likely to stay on and complete Year 12.

While the margin between government and non-government schools is reduced after adjusting for students' background attributes, the researchers conclude "Respondents from Catholic or independent schools are more likely to complete Year 12 than those in government schools".

As detailed by Michael Hewitson in his account of over 40 years teaching and being the Principal of one of Australia's largest non-government schools, postcode is not destiny and it is possible for so-called disadvantaged children to achieve success.

Empowering local communities by reducing centralised, bureaucratic control and giving parents a greater say, allowing choice and diversity in education and enforcing a disciplined environment with high expectations is far more effective than promoting a victim mentality.

As argued in the 2010 OECD publication "PISA 2009 Results: Overcoming Social Background", “Many of the world’s best-performing education systems have moved from bureaucratic “command and control” environments towards school systems in which the people at the frontline have much more control of the way resources are used, people are deployed, the work is organised and the way in which the work gets done. They provide considerable discretion to school heads and school faculties in determining how resources are allocated, a factor which the report shows to be closely related to school performance when combined with effective accountability systems.”