I should clarify (even though it'll eat up my 3rd post of the day).
1) The amounts of money you listed are very generous. They compare very well to the average salary.
2) Victoria is not where we were talking about, which is Australia as a whole (and Canberra specifically in my post), and the fact that classics courses "exist" is hardly an argument against the fact that both grammar and classics have been almost wholly phased out of schools.
3) Likewise, local selection is not a reality in most schools in Australia, and certainly not in Canberra, where Tom is from. I confess not to know of this scheme (your link doesn't work btw), but knowing how the Teacher's Union works I am very sceptical it in any way refutes what I've said, you can't refute a trend with an outlier.

Poriot,
I am quite aware of high functioning autism, and quite aware of the difficulties and frustrations for someone with that ailment. I am also very concerned when people start talking about having a two-tier system at public schools. It becomes easier and easier to place someone into the second tier and then forget about them, while all resources go to the students in the first tier.

In our extremely feminist system, I am left with absolutely no doubt that the vast majority of students placed into the second tier would be boy students. Many of these boy students might be having difficulties, but those difficulties are ignored and they are classified as trouble makers.

In fact I have never once heard a teacher in a public school make any positive comment regards boy students in general.

I have heard everything from boys are “lazy” to boys are “disruptive” to boys are “immature”. But I have never once heard a teacher in a public school make one positive comment about boy students.

I would be left with absolutely no doubt that teachers would immediately place boys into the second tier, whether the boys should be there or not.

Vanna,
A friend who is a teacher at a public boy's high school in Sydney, often praises his "boys". When I last saw this teacher friend, he told me about a wonderful, compassionate, intelligent prefect (a boy from a Sudanese refugee family). It's just not true that teachers put down boys all the time. However, teachers are also not blind to the age-related developmental differences between girls and boys - my teacher friend notes that my daughter with high functioning autism has a similar (lack of) organisational skills as his boys of the same age, whereas her girl's school demands a much higher level of organisational skills (which she of course struggles with). However, the boys catch up later anyway - boys are not permanently behind the girls. If they were, how come boys generally land better jobs than comparable girls after the school years?
On teacher salaries, I recently returned from a trip to the Phillipines - the average wage in the city I was in was about $1200 pesos a week (according to the taxi drivers). A Phillipino friend earns $2500 pesos a week as a high school teacher - this is more than double the average weekly wage.
They really value their teachers in the Phillipines, don't they? I think it's because they all know that education is the best route out of poverty.

Johnj
You can find a published article that has been written by a teacher in Australia that says something positive about boys as a group.
I have actually searched quite extensively, and I have found almost nothing.

I remember hearing a teacher at a P&C meeting condeming boys as being "lazy" when the whole school was built by males.

Teachers are taught to believe that boys are "immature" at teacher's training college, but I have actually searched quite extensively, and I have yet to find a scientific paper that says that boys are immature, or less mature than girls. It is myth only.

If someone has the money, they simply send their children to a private school.

There are far too many con artists and feminists in the public schools to risk your children by sending them to a public school.

crabsy,

John Hattie has done extensive research on the factors that improve learning. He does not rate class sizes as the most important, but he does say a smaller class will give a nine-month advantage over a larger class. It is in the interest of the IPA et al to argue the opposite because of their ideo-illogical attachment to small government, though the remain silent when private schools charge more than $20,000pa in fees – no cries of “provider capture” arise then.

Pelican,

The conditions of entry for medical students would be lowered if demand for medical places fell. It’s all automatic.

Riddler,

I backed up what I said. I’ll quote what I posted:

“The English courses of any school I taught in had grammar in them. The VCAA website, has Classics courses for VCE.”

“The new top level, which now takes ten years to reach, now pays $81,806 – a relative cut of $35,019 or 30 per cent.”

“Victoria phased local selection in from the mid-80s.”

The fall in teacher pay has been accompanied by a fall in entry scores for teacher training. (You can see Andrew Leigh’s work for details.) Reversing the pay decline would reverse the decline in entry scores and thus increase the average ability of people training to be teachers. That teacher pay is slightly above average rather than much above average, as it was three decades ago, is one reason that the ability of those becoming teachers has fallen.

The link was about education in Victoria, not teacher selection. It does not work because the name got added to the address. Try http://community.tes.co.uk/forums/t/462500.aspx.

Um, you haven't really answered anything, so I'm assuming you missed my add on posts (though I don't know how, they were right underneath)

1) Grammar and classics are now barely taught. Whether a classics course exists really doesn't tell us anything about how little they're taught does it? And I don't know what you mean by grammar being taught still, but it's simply untrue, actual grammar classes have been almost totally phased out. If you disagree, give me some evidence, even if it is only specific to Victoria.
2) Teachers are well paid, the fact that pay has fallen 30% (we'll just take the AEU figures at face value for the moment), really has no bearing on that point. I realise you're having trouble keeping up, so I'll spell it out.
a) The average wage of a teacher is high relative to the average wage of workers.
b) The face it used to be that high means teachers were wildly overpaid, because
c) Teachers are not special, the job they do is not more valid as a form of employment than being a plumber of carpenter or sewage worker,
d) The salaries are also too high because they ignore the basics of supply and demand. Only in union land would a profession who has become much less essential be asking to be paid more (because there has been a steady move to the private sector).
I explained these points above pretty clearly, I'm not sure which parts exactly you're not following.

[Last part over 350 words long, might have to wait until I can make a new post...]