"But the AEU tells us that the current teachers ... are absolutely fine, none need to be fired, and in fact they deserve a 30% bump in wages... if that's the case, why would quality go up, when the current system has apparently produced the best teachers?"

Because their argument is that too many of these teachers are leaving the profession long before they should. They are being produced - it's just that they leave the profession very quickly.

Which should put paid to the other arguments being launched here - if teacher salaries are so good, why are too many good teachers leaving the profession for more lucrative opportunities outside of teaching?

Maybe it has got something to do with the rights of students.
The teachers don't have rights, they are there to teach.
Whatever the students dish out the teachers have to wear it.
It could be put down to frustration, lack of satisfaction in the job.
One person against 20 or 30 students is bad odds.

That doesn't make sense. They make the least money when they first enter, and the most when they stay. The argument that awesome teachers are signing up for less money, then leaving for more, is incredibly disingenuous. What are they moving to? They just wanted to get 5 years of teaching in before they pursued their career as a corporate lawyer? Please.

This thread pretty much encapsulates the main arguments against private education in that there are none at all. Most of it has been spent talking about 'disadvantage' as though this were a new phenomenon and then about salaries as though that is a new thought!

What virtually no one has done or dared to comment on it the 'value-for-dollar' argument because it is emphatically undeniable that private schools offer both government and parents excellent value for money and significantly superior to that offered by public schools. And because that is undeniable the argument shifts to the murkier shadows of disadvantage and other areas to try and avoid the undeniable facts.

Many parents are going without or working two jobs to send their kids to private schools while some bogan parents make headlines by refusing to pay $200 to stick their 7 children through a public school. Why do they do that? Maybe the truth to this entire argument is that parents are voting with their feet and despite having to pay a lot of money they are choosing the expensive option over the cheap one because private schools offer so much more than state schools.

So suck it up people. Subsidised private school education is here to stay because any government that removed it or significantly reduced it would get massacred at an election and they know it. It was controversial when it was introduced and even more so when it was increased. Opponents claimed the world would end and just like with the GST, they were wrong and now it is considered a good policy and an indispensible way of running government. The same applies to private schools.

What is school choice anyway - as private schools will not take any student - many parents have no choice - I personally know of a Catholic school that refused to accept an autistic child into Kindergarten (so much for Christian charity anyway)....
Posted by Johnj, Friday, 4 February 2011 9:26:25 PM

JohnJ - to what degree is their child autistic? There are varying degrees in autism. Public schools also recommend the Special Schools in capital cities for some children who display significant autistic characteristics that have been assessed and recommended to a special school environment as opposed to the public arena vulnerable to playground bullies and problems. A friend of mine teaches children who are autistic.

While we are on the subject, families desperately need funds for autism relating to research, education and more importantly, support and respite. I give to this organisation when fundraisers present themselves, yet I would like to assist in other ways.

Petal,

I try, but there are too many people who just pass on what someone has told them. If I give evidence for what I say, it is not accepted. More evidence is demanded, and this demand comes from those who do not supply any of their own.

Longweekend58,

I have quoted precise figures on teacher pay, so if my figures are wrong, perhaps you can do some research to give different figures.

Private schools do not attract “vastly better outcomes”. Private schools perform no better than public schools once socio-economic factors are taken into account. I have provided a long extract from the OECD findings on this matter at:
http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/maralynparker/index.php/dailytelegraph/comments/trounced_by_china_and_on_the_way_down/

Research by John Hattie and the Tennessee STAR study shows that you are completely wrong to say that “smaller class sizes…have already been proven to not affect academic outcomes”. I have provided an explanation as to why small classes make a difference at the above link. Warning : it contains specific facts!

Small classes are not the only thing that more money would give schools. It could give them better-paid teachers, better equipment, better-stocked libraries, etc. It is fashionable to say that money does not make a difference. That is why it is also often described as being “thrown” at education. For years, I have been awaiting the outcry from the Institute of Public Affairs and its fellow travellers about “provider capture” and “throwing money at the problem” about private school fees. After all, it and others on the right decried expenditure of around a third of that amount on government school children in the early 1990s as “extensive over-staffing of teachers, inefficient work practices and ‘union’ capture of education expenditure” (IPA, Schooling Victorians, 1992) in order to soften up Victorians for the coming “slash and burn” Liberal Government. It remains silent now because it knows money does make a difference.

Riddler,

I don’t teach at any school. I left teaching four years ago.