Bunyip,

I was actually quoting from the PISA results that you provided. You should read further into the report than the simple bottom line. There are caveats that indicate that while the conclusion is true over the sum of all cultures there are conditions where the results differ.

Such as if you used similar education models to Aus such as Canada and the UK your results would be significantly different.

An example stated in the PISA report is that higher level private schools in having students from a higher socio economic background provides a better learning environment and the same pupil going to that school would get better results.

To quote The LSAY study by Acer:

"On average, students attending independent schools have higher ENTER scores than students attending Catholic schools, who in turn have higher mean ENTER scores than students attending government schools."

The relationship between students’ socioeconomic background and tertiary entrance performance does not differ "substantially" between government, independent and Catholic schools.

When taking into account the social and academic mix of students (i.e. their socioeconomic background and earlier literacy and numeracy levels), students from independent schools still show higher ENTER scores, although the gap is halved.

The gap in tertiary entrance performance between government and Catholic school students, was only marginally reduced when taking into account the social and academic mix of students.."

The devil is in the detail. The difference in scores is not substantial but it is there, and will often mean the difference between a university place or not.

Considering that independent schools offer significantly more than just the curriculum including public debating, arts, music, sports etc on a very professional level, the students come out with more life skills than just an enter score.

Another diamond in the PISA report was that independent schools provided a good benefit for cost for goverments.

I am sorry that I didn't accept your summation, but preferred to actually read the report.

Shadow – you need to separate statements of the obvious from what seem to be your claims about private education.

It is highly likely that “higher level private schools” can create an advantaged learning environment. If it wasn’t the case, those lining up for such schools would wonder about the wisdom of their investment.

But are you claiming that it is the PRIVATE, as distinct from the PUBLIC, ownership of the school that creates this advantage? Government selective schools achieve the same result. Would you attribute this to the fact that they are PUBLIC rather than private schools? I would be surprised if you did.

Your quote from LSAY doesn’t change my point: no significant private advantage. If it was significant it would be trumpeted across the country. As it is, resource differences between the schools were apparently not taken into account.

I agree that some schools, by a combination of means, are better able to maximize a student’s chance of getting to university. So what credence do you place on research that shows students from such schools dropping out of first year uni at a rate higher than those from public and comprehensive schools? While the margin is not huge it isn’t a great advertisement for schools which pride (and sell) themselves on “results”.

If their students are deriving a benefit from the wider experience you claim their schools provide, it doesn’t seem to give them an edge in that vital first year of uni. Maybe such experience is worth up to $20 000 – that is a lot of debating, arts, music and footy….all of which are found in larger schools of any type.

My point is that you cannot conclude that it is the private or public ownership of a school which creates significant differences in student achievement. The extent to which people (or even some researchers) conclude one way or the other seems to hinge on what factors, other than raw achievement scores, they take into account.

Bunyip,

The devil is in the detail, the LSAY report said the difference was not substantial. In my brief sojourn with statistics, a significant difference implies beyond statistical error margins (say >2 sigma or 95% certainty) and substantial implies a value greater than significant such that it can affect decisions or policy. When they talk about the gap narrowing the significance of the difference is implied.

Based on the LSAY report, a publicly run school in Australia changing to private management could expect a small improvement in results without changing anything else.

The other factor that the PSIA report made crystal clear is that the socio economic environment of the school is a stronger factor even than that of the socio economic back ground of the pupils. This means that a child from Macquarie fields in a Vaucluse public school can be expected to perform massively better. As the funding is the same per child, the difference can only be the other children and teachers.

As the child in Macquarie fields is not zoned for Vaucluse this option is not available, however, the option of independent schooling is, where the results will almost always exceed those of the local public school.

The choice is either to move to a better suburb or pay for an independent schooling. I live in a middle class suburb and send my kids to excellent schools in one of the best suburbs. The improvements in results I see are massive. The debating, music and breadth of curriculum is the icing on top. This is my choice, as I cannot afford to live in the “better” suburb.

Government selective schools take the top 5% of the students in the state, and while the best do extremely well some are still beaten by the top non selective private schools.

With regards the marginally higher number of independent school kids that drop out of Uni, this pales into insignificance when compared to the % of school leavers that complete Uni from independent schools vs. public schools.

Hello again Shadow.

You are placing a considerable store on research which is at odds with PISA and the NAEP research and which also didn’t include school resources as one of the variables to be taken into account. Claiming even a small a private ownership advantage on LSAY is more than a bit thin.

Yes, for quite some time PISA has been pointing to the stronger socio-economic influence of the school. It is hardly surprising that a (let’s assume motivated) child from Macquarie Fields might gain a benefit in Vaucluse. Our schooling framework over the last 30 years has trumpeted this benefit as the result of ‘choice’.

In the process we have allowed fee-charging schools to accumulate a middle class enrolment; the flip-side of “choice” in the world of schools. Inevitably this has exacerbated the existing socio-economic differences between schools and communities. Amongst other people the Catholic Bishops certainly know this.

But of course PISA also shows the negative impact on other Macquarie Fields kids when their schools are stripped of their achieving peers.
So should schooling create additional advantages for those already advantaged when there is a cost to others? Should any benefits to individuals be balanced against the needs of the greater number of those left behind? We have to ask why it is that so many countries, when funding ‘private’ schooling, insisted that the schools must not charge fees? They must have understood something that this great egalitarian country forgot!

I am surprised that you imply that the choice of “independent” schooling is widely available: the mechanism of ever-increasing fees ensures otherwise. Steps to make such schools ‘affordable’ seem to be regarded with contempt when the schools increase their fees at rates exceeding CPI.

Finally Shadow, don’t compare the number of kids from different types of schools who get to uni – having acknowledged the complexities of research you are just falling into comparisons which you must know don’t tell the whole story.

Now I’m in trouble: this is my second post today. You’ll reply….. and I’ll have to wait 24 hours!

I think people focus too much on marks and University. The trick is to ask the students whether they are happy or not. I can tell you that two of mine that are in the Catholic school have been much happier than the two that are not. Not because they get higher marks but because of the pastoral care and the concern the school has for their wellbeing. This is something that is missing in some public schools where their only focus is to show your child where they don't measure up and to deny them opportunities on the basis of their marks. Marks that are totally dependant on the quality of the teacher!

Bunyip,

I am really enjoying our banter as your arguments are cogent and informed. HOWEVER:

The two sets of data I was using was from PSIA (OECD)and LSAY (Australia) which you offered up.

The two issues I had with the PISA comparison were:
Australia was somehow ommitted and,
The results were averaged over many different cultures and schooling systems.

What I did was to strip out the results from similar schooling systems from PISA and then to use the LSAY results from Australia.

This information showed that in AUSTRALIA there is a small but measureable advantage in privately managed schools given the same area and student intake. The difference in resources is not measured, and may be a major factor in this.

Your comment that stripping out the high achievers might benefit the high achievers, but disadvantage the remainder is spot on. This borders on the philosophical, do the needs of the many out weight the rights of the few.

The answer is to look at the public selective schools and public extension classes. The country does not benefit by clipping the wings of the eagles. By extension independent schools are in the public interest (supported by the PSIA report).

I did not intend to imply that independent schools were widely available as I found in moving to Sydney, the waiting lists were prohibitive.

It would appear that many councils are actively blocking new independent schools and the extension of existing schools, so the lack of choice is more to do with the socialist leanings of the councils.

I would agree that if the independent schools were fully funded by the state the state could insist on free entrance, but as the state is not willing to do either, this is a moot point.

My point on uni was that if you could invest in your child with a good school the chances of completing uni are dramatically increased the marginal increase in drop outs included. This fact has been picked up by the immigrants who either send their kids to independent schools or move to areas with good schools.