School needs matter most

As the OECD Program for International Student Assessment has shown, overall standards of Australian schooling are higher. However, we are weak on the equity front with large gaps between the high and low-performing students. A continued drift in enrolments segregated on the basis of wealth and scholastic levels will surely make us weaker.

The current policy setting of many and possibly all state governments is to have their government schools out-compete the non-government schools for enrolment share, especially among the middle-class.

In going this way they have introduced more selective measures including selective entry schools and programs. Selection is zero sum and will only accelerate the social segregation.

The immediate policy challenge is twofold.

First there is a need to jettison old notions about public and private based on the school sectors. A public system is about using public funding to deliver to the public, irrespective of the ownership of the delivery agency.

Correspondingly, all schools in receipt of public funding, government and non-government should have both a moral and a contractual imperative of delivery for the public good. This principle should be the basis for new policy settings that are designed to encourage and reward schools in delivering quality education to an entire community and for all students, and for schools to work in partnership across the sectors. The most obvious focus for this would be a sub-region or municipality, as is the case in several European countries.

Second, there is a need to lessen the incentives for schools to engage in selective behaviours. In a market environment this cannot be achieved through regulation. Schools need to be rewarded for taking on the biggest challenges. This requires recognition of educational need, which provided the basis of the original Karmel report, which, sadly, has largely disappeared from education policy.