CJ. Morgan,
Are you a comic, or just someone who wants to throw things and kill.

Mercurious,
I have also investigated a number of public schools, such as the public school that called its Shakespeare course “The Literary Canon :- Just dead White Males”. That school was a highly feminist school that did not want males, and there was continuous devaluing of the male gender within the school, and the boys were being pressured to leave the school early and get a trade job, while the girls were being pressured to go to Universities.

I have also made complaints to several Universities regards the syllabus of a number of their courses that maligned the male gender and never said anything positive regards the male gender. Those courses were total discrimination, and I believe a part of a system to remove males as much as possible from the education system

The spending of money on schools is totally meaningless unless it is clearly defined what the education system is trying to achieve. In fact the definition of education seems to be becoming more vague in time, and I have even heard teachers say that education should be an “experience”, rather that talk about whether or not the students actually learn anything.

If it not clearly defined what schools are supposed to be doing, then money spent on schools eventually becomes a waste of money, and it is also likely that that there will be people who will attempt to get into the education system so as to manipulate the minds of the young, and use the education system as a political tool (but a political tool for themselves and not for the common good).

In the mean time, parents should definitely shop around before enrolling their children in any school, whether it be a public or a private school. They should ask many questions of the principals and definitely ask what is being taught at the school, and also ask what the students actually learn (as there can be a difference).

That is definitely a part of the democratic process

Bunyip, & others invoking "democracy" in their posts

We are commenting on a review of Chris Bonnor and Jane Caro's book subtitled "are we trashing the education system that helped build Australian democracy?". We may disagree what the "essential purpose of the article" is. After all that purpose was in the mind of Mercurius, and who are we to discern it?

The essential purpose of my post was to let readers examine evidence relevant to the subtitle. Do you each think that evidence is relevant?

If so please say so & if not please post reasons. Thankyou.

Ah Mercurius I wondered when someone would come up with the arguments you posted.
Unfortunately the book is based on false economic premises - it has to be or there could be no book. The book has a political point to make.
Yes,it could be argued that the burden of cost would just shift - but shift a load too much and it can scatter across the highway, cause accidents and leave a mess to be cleared and, if people and animals are involved cause death and injury.
The cost burden of educating all children in the state system would be too high for the taxpayer to handle, unless of course you are prepared to lower standards. (Look at what happened to the 'mainstreaming' of children with special needs...governments around the country were delighted by this demand...it saves them a packet and the standards of care for this group continue to go still lower.)

Communicat - can you provide figures to back your claim that the cost of educating all of Australia's children would be too great?

Quite frankly, I'm skeptical.

I've always considered education to be among the prime responsibilities of government - it's all about priorities. Other nations have managed, why can't we?
We are after all, supposedly in a time of an economic boom...

Besides - as it stands, we still give an enormous amount of subsidy to the private sector. Wouldn't it then make more sense to make those who send their children to private schools get less funding? If the cost is indeed as you have indicated, then a pretty persuasive argument could be mounted that more is therefore needed for the public education sector...

HRS, your exhortation to check out different public and private schools is commendable. If only all parents were so diligent.

Since you see it as an essential building-block of democracy to have parents involved in the process of choosing the school, may I ask whether your definition of "democracy" extends to the children? And does the community around a school have any democratic say in whether they want a large congregation of a particular group of kids plonked in their midst? After all, private schools can open pretty much wherever they like and enrol their own selection of children...should the neighbours get a "look-in", so to speak?

Everyone has their own appetite for democracy - but in everybody's definition, there's always some people who somehow get excluded from the "demos". Hmmmmm.

In addition, what effect do you think it has on a diverse democratic society like Australia, for large numbers of our children to be educated in little cocoons of like-mindedness – where they rarely have contact with anybody who doesn't share their religious, cultural, linguistic or socioeconomic background?

Turn Right Turn Left, I regret to say that you're wasting your time.

As I noted in the review, the book most likely won't change people's preconceptions on this issue, and Communicat has proved me right.

Perhaps it will be for future generations to examine how Australia lost the value of a free, secular and tolerant education system, because we were too busy counting the cost.