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The Forum > Article Comments > The 'State' of our schools > Comments

The 'State' of our schools : Comments

By Chris Bonnor, published 3/2/2012

The very schools that the education bureaucracies are supposed to champion are increasingly becoming a safety net for the children that no one else wants.

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Parents are to be reminded, schools are for learning and not rearing children.
579,
Well said.
I'd like to add that Teachers need to be reminded that schools are for teaching the young & not a benefit & Superannuation gravy train.
Posted by individual, Friday, 3 February 2012 5:18:38 PM
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Chris, you are kidding about Gillard and her pet drone Garrett having the courage to reset the machinery, aren't you?

Her record so far is abysmal.

His record? 4 dead, 100 houses burned to the ground and a few dozen broken and bankrupt companies.

Oh yes, I nearly forgot, he also changed the NSCP into the NSCSWP, an even more toxic brew of evangelical Christianity being pumped into public schools by our Baptist PM and fundie xtian DEEWR minister.

It's doubtful that Gonski will upset the comfy situation for any private school but if he did, Gillard lacks the balls to pick up on any of his suggestions to lift public schools from the mire she and every state-territory premier has pushed them in to over the last 20 or so years.

And the union, the AEU?

A toothless tabby cat with no idea how to politicise its own membership, who in turn deserve everything they cop in the form of criticism for the state of their workplaces, which sadly are also our children's schools.

The school principals are a mob of no-hopers, demanding the power to hire and fire but totally without any management skills to run these large and complex institutions. When Gillard grants these powers, introduces the vouchers Gonski will probably suggest, and introduces 'community schools', which will soon turn into pretend faith schools, the old idea of a free and secular egalitarian public school will have been wiped from our history.

Oh, nearly forgot the parents bodies. Apart from the NSW P&C Association, they all support chaplains, school fees, increased religion, and they all long for the 'freedom' of the UK style community schools.

In short, they failed to do their jobs, and they sold out to neo-liberal thinking and evangelical Christendom.
Posted by The Blue Cross, Friday, 3 February 2012 7:13:38 PM
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I've taught in both the state and Catholic systems here in Queensland. I currently teach in a Catholic school, and have no intention of returning to my old employer.

Interestingly, we sit somewhere between the public and private schools. We're not as selective as the private schools: our students are the next door neighbours, co-workers and football teammates of the students at my last school. They play together, work together and party together. While it is made clear at the beginning of each and every school year that our mission is not to raise good little 'soldiers of Christ' as it was in the old days, we do educate students in a value-laden environment and it shows. It's not the students we select who keep us coming back - it's what we do with those students.

We're also not as well-funded as the state schools - MySchool data shows a shortfall of about $700 per student when compared to the local state high school. We do, however, push our dollars further - perhaps in part because the red tape is much thinner and we aren't restricted to government providers when buying supplies and building new facilities.

It is, I think, these layers of bureaucracy that are slowly suffocating our state schools. There are so many people sitting in offices down in Brisbane trying desperately to justify their salary that 'new initiatives' (read: recycled and onerous procedures and paper trails) pop up left, right and centre. It's sad. Many - I'd even venture so far as to say most - of my former colleagues are bright, enthusiastic, well-trained and well-equipped to do their jobs. Unfortunately, they are shackled by hollow processes and demands.

Additionally, while some parents don't care about their kids' schooling, most do. They want their kids to learn, to do well, to grow and to prosper. I think at times the potential for a genuine partnership is muted by the edu-babble and uninviting nature that abound in too many schools.
Posted by Otokonoko, Saturday, 4 February 2012 12:45:12 AM
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Otokonoko, I'd support some of your statements.

The Mary Street brigade offer not one jot of improvement to schools. They are a dead weight, a cost beyond any utility that might drip from their 6 hour days and expensive and endless 'meetings' with each other.

Like so, the regional office staff offer absolutely not a single increase in the educational journey of our children.

Hang on, those drones who compute wages and pay bills are of value, all the rest have got jobs that really do not exist.

Why do I say this?

Because the endless policy Mary Street churns out is never read, never understood and never applied within schools. Its sole purpose is to provide Mary Street with a role in life, and high wages.

Hang on again. I know an EQ employee who teaches principals and staff who have, essentially, failed at their jobs, how to retrieve their dignity and do the job we pay them to do.

I regard that as important work, but I'd have to say that these people should not exist in the first place but they do because school principals have no, or too few, skills in managing staff and an organisation.

It shows a systemic failure of policy and practice, a failure of senior management at the top, all the way down to principal level.

As for Catholic schools, they barely contain Catholics any more. Their role is to provide the lazy non-Catholic parent with an ability to pretend their children are better served by attending a 'private school'.

If those parents were the least bit interested in education they would be down at the state school demanding the principal comes out of their bunker and does some work.

The state should not, and should have never, funded faith schools a single cracker and but for Whitlams grovelling to the DLP we would not be now.
Posted by The Blue Cross, Saturday, 4 February 2012 10:14:46 AM
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I recall the principal of a Cape York State School telling me in the 1980's that I should come back in 20 years time see how much progress will have been made in return for the substantial public funding that went into his college.
Thus far to my knowledge not a single tradesman or successful entrepreneur or other to the public beneficial individual has emerged from that college. I'd more than happy to be corrected. Not many things would please me more.
I'd dearly like to speak with that principal again & hear what he's got to say.
I know many of these former students & let me tell you some are very switched on but Qld Government policies made up on account of consultation with academic experts have pulled the fuse in the circuit of these peoples' aspirations. I point the finger at the silly curriculum & selection criteria gobledeegook. Also a major player is this silly notion of "you can't force them to do anything they don't want to do'. No wonder their attitudes towards responsibility are shot to pieces. Last but not least many teachers really shouldn't stand in front of a class. The mentality simply just isn't there in a 22 year old to positively influence someone only 6 years younger.
We can achieve that though via a much more effective education, a National Service. 19 years old into National Service & out at 21 as an adult then & only then into a class room.
I guarantee a positive result in just after two years.
Posted by individual, Saturday, 4 February 2012 11:04:24 AM
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Quite so individual, national service.

A BONZA IDEA.

But what about a little war to go with it?

You know, for a real sense of purpose to be developed, a national pride to be engendered, patriotism to be fostered.

A deep love of The Flag, and all.

It worked so well for all those lucky lads who went to Vitenam on behalf of the nation, didn't it?

And Korea, Malaysia, WW2, Gallipoli?

But, hang on, isn't national service a bit, well, collective, for someone called 'individual'?

A bit, dare I suggest this, a bit SOCIALIST, a little bit Stalinist, a tad Maoist?

But if you were serious about this, then you'd be promoting far longer than two years.

Take 'em up to age 25, when brain development allows car insurances to drop in price, surely a good pointer to having 'grown up' a little?
Posted by The Blue Cross, Saturday, 4 February 2012 11:18:21 AM
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