One form to launch a rocket into space.... amazing. But not in Oz. Historically Oz has had great innovators ... but they often need to go overseas for financing... suicidal.

From an article in The Conversation:

The proportion of top performers was higher for foreign-born (14%) and first-generation students (15%) than for Australian-born students (10%).

Students from Chinese, Korean and Sri Lankan backgrounds are the highest performers in the NSW HSC. The top performing selective secondary schools in NSW now have more than 80% of students coming from non-English speaking backgrounds.

https://theconversation.com/six-ways-australias-education-system-is-failing-our-kids-32958

These are exactly the kids being coached remorselessly so they will get into selective and private schools.
Is that fair to Aussie working class kids? I doubt it . But I don't expect things will change.

Waverley,

It's a cultural thing.

CM, my story is a variation but still on theme.
My success here in Aus was good, but not good enough, certainly not by my standards.
It took going overseas and setting up business from scratch, for me to get the 'leg up' I needed.
The paperwork was still there but NOWHERE near the rubbish this sh!thole demands of anyone wanting to get ahead or create, design, or promote anything new.
One of my experiences with this hicksville backward govt, was in fact a simple personallity issue, that one denied me the equivalent of several hundred thousand dollars, conservatively.
Another, also involving the govt indirectly, saw me get physically manhandled with the added bonus of being refused payment for the project of again approx, $300,000 plus.
Legal action was not an option, because, again, the legal system in this country favours the thieves and miscreants.
One meant taking the minister for transport to court, it was winnable, unfortunately the legal system and the judiciary are also complicit in these matters so therefore, advise saw better judgement to leave well enough alone and that one day I might see him walking and my car has brake failure.
The other was similar, the company involved had a reputation of being thieves and con-men.
They were trading insolvent, even though it is illegal to do so, but when your in bed with the govt, anything goes I guess.
Oh and as a matter of curiosity it was a labour govt involved with this company.
So yes if we don't get our sh!t together and fast, we are already waaaay behind the rest of the world.
What's going wrong with our boys?
They're getting the wrong messages, for starters.
Yesterdays Sunday Times, had a front page teaser about the schools introducing some moronic thing about year 3's and so on, cross dressing, teaching them to, f@ck knows what.
If you want to know what's going wrong with our boys, it's idiots and unrealistic halfwits who can't leave well enough alone.
We did just fine the past several hundred years, yet suddenly, 'experts' know better.

Continuing on from my previous posting, the last thing I touched on was an article in our Sunday paper announcing the govt's intention to introduce, something to do with cross-dressing from around year 3 or 4.
Who are these morons and why do they continually sabotage the system.
Instead of this absolute tripe and bile, why aren't those entrusted with the job of creating the curriculum, actually do their job, because if this is the best they can do, we have the answer to this topics question.
We live near a school and I am forever frustrated to see a daily routine and menu of bloody sports.
If you want further reasons what's wrong with our boys, well for starters, shove your sports, they can do that after and out of school.
Get the focus back on the three leading subjects, instead of bloody sports.
We can go on about cherry picking faults with everything Australian, you know what, the questions all lead back to one common denominator.
The Australian public.
Whilst you women go about dumping your children at school, but all the while in a hurry to get to your precious 'carriers', your kids are being 'groomed', forget pedophiles, this is far worse.
No one ended up being stupid because they were 'played' with when they were little, and too young to even know or care as to what was going on, but his education goes on for years and by the time these scumbags have finished 'grooming' your kids, it will be too late to reverse the process of induction and indoctrination of many years, their informative years at that.
Stop, take stock, regain control over your children and their emotional well being, for their sakes, if nothing else.
Tell the mongrels who are trying to introduce these socially undesirable and perverse curriculum to shove it and get back to teaching the basics, and you as parents, especially mothers, get back to being mothers and not selfish career mongering bitches who callously and coldly have abandoned your place in life in favour of some selfish, arrogant pursuit

ALTRAV- I hear your frustration mate. And share it.

Home schooling is the answer for our boys. Male teachers are not as common in schools now as I understand- not really representative of the population- wonder why that is?