' Many of the posh schools are really business aimed at pushing 'their' kids ahead of the rest'

thanks to the dumbing down by secularist Waverely that is not very hard.

I seriously disagree with some of your ideas there Joe. Teachers are university graduates, so by definition are perceived to be 'middle class'. But I have not met one who doesn't believe that working or welfare class kids can't make it. Most are working hard to try and make sure they do. What you are perceiving to be some sort of 'keep them down' mentality is more likely to be a resignation in the fact that many are difficult to motivate for academic success. Motivation is a very tricky beast indeed. If students have a good vision of the future, they will often try to succeed to get there, but there are many factors at play there including peers, society and family influences. If they perceive that their future is crappy no matter what they do, as all their jobs are being automated and their parents are out of work and they can't afford to go to university etc. Well, then that becomes difficult doesn't it?

You say that these kids probably need higher levels of education than their parents did- absolutely they do. But then we get back to the subject of motivation. Students generally feel unmotivated to do anything they perceive as irrelevant to their lives. How do you convince a kid from these areas that poetry or calculus is relevant to them getting a job (even if it is)? You think that teachers and teaching methods should be built into teachers and schools 'methods of coping' (whatever THAT is) with a lack of parental involvement. How do you do that so it removes the parental factor or even other societal influences from making a difference to their child's education?

Please do tell us and the Education Dept in your home state what you suggest would be universally accepted and I am sure it will be advocated.

I had a spare half hour waiting for someone in a cafe and thus read Sydney's Daily Terror.

From cover to cover it was full of attacks on lefties, lefty teachers, and many other kinds of teachers. Especially those conducting a propaganda campaign about releasing asylum seekers.
Frankly I think it's a mistake for teachers to take up their agenda in the classroom, unless it's for humanity and a better society. They are making themselves vulnerable to attack from the jackals of the press. Who of course have usually opposed any form of industrial stoppage or action. As they did in 1968 in NSW

Hi Bugsy,

You put your finger on it: as well as getting across a very solid grounding in the basics, a teacher's job is to motivate all of their kids, regardless of their home backgrounds. Easier said than done, I'll admit, but surely kids can't cop out and say, there's no point - and no teacher should allow that, if at all possible.

As well as university, there are the trades, of course, new ones all the time. In fact, I recall that some of the Indigenous students who I worked with, already had some trade qualifications, a mason, a surveyor's mate, for example. So people can go from one to the other, there should be no perceived barrier to that.

Cheers,

Joe

"Easier said than done."

Never a truer word written. Yes, it is the teachers job to motivate, and there are many methods and techniques they use to do that, but they aren't superhuman. Children are individuals and there are a myriad of factors at play.

Maybe if we put into the curriculum or legislation that all teachers in lower socio-economic areas must motivate their students at all times? Would that would work?

Once you start getting into the details about what should be in schools 'methods of coping' with various factors, you find that they are doing what they can, and generally doing it pretty well. But they have hundreds or thousands of individuals to deal with on a daily basis.

Personal attention and encouragement is highly motivating, and is sometimes given by teachers but there are only so many minutes in the day. Parental involvement and care is helpful, but sometimes not.

I am all for encouraging kids to do trades. The major problem I have seen these days is that trades are not considered attractive enough for kids that have good academic ability and can get university placements. So they attract the kids of lower ability.

This then leads to Hasbeen's syndrome of thinking that the schools are crap and not producing graduates that can do math etc. for jobs like electrical apprenticeships. When in fact, they are, but they aren't the ones applying for said apprenticeships.

Well some Gender Equity Taskforce wants more men in teaching:

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/the-workforce-gender-equality-agency-more-men-to-be-recruited-as-teachers-and-nurses/news-story/959ff2a3f227bdf8a30d84b8fbaf3061

Worth discussing, at least.....