Bravo, Ian – this is one of the best Donnelly critiques I have read. I know that such articles risk giving him oxygen but, what the heck!

Donnelly is wrong about so many things, especially about non-government schools being the most successful. Even the exhaustive ACER LSAY studies could find little difference and overseas studies can’t either.

He certainly uses selective evidence....‘evidence’ and ‘Donnelly’ is a rather oxymoronic combination. He is also adept at side-stepping equity issues. After all, equity is probably the least useful flag for any self-promoter to wave around. When PISA testing shows equity to be a big issue in Australia he turns around and blames the test…. Just like any precocious Year 8 student who doesn’t like the teacher’s mark.

You mention re-growth of public education in NSW. In NSW secondary schools the growth rate of private education is falling so significantly that it is about to meet the upwards growth rate of public schools. I wonder how Donnelly might explain this? How might he explain that more Catholic and Christian schools are declining than growing in NSW?

But there is hope – for a combination of reasons his star is falling. I think even Julie Bishop got sick of him in the end.

A few years ago I heard an examiner for the year 12 NSW English paper rank schools performance in the just completed exam marking thus

Government selective high schools
high fee private schools
government schools
catholic high schools
low fee private schools

I resented the way my high fee private school sucked up to the children of wealthy/influential parents leaving about 66% of the students feeling inadequate and second rate. I considered their academic streaming processes so unfair I would not send my children there, and neither did my classmates.

That said, I recognise that my school offered me wider subject choice than was available to me at the local high school so I was able to pursue my interests to the best of my abilities.

Like many families, my family send their children to fee-paying schools to get a better education than that available at government schools. Thus if government schools have low standards then the private schools can have low standards and still attract students. If government schools have high standards then private schools will have to raise their standards to attract students.

Correspondingly teachers in the catholic system have their pay lock-stepped into the government school pay scale so by freezing teachers pay, the government and the churches can save money. In Victoria teachers pay is so poor that casual and contract teachers forced to live on intermittent income are forced to find steady jobs in other fields.

ian wrote "The only valid way to measure whether one system is...carry out a longitudinal study that measures the social and intellectual attainments of individual students...they leave some years later"...wrong ian, that just prevents accountability to teachers who failed their basic job requirement to their students...

Just bring back the old method, exams...both broad base knowledge multiple choice and written exams on core fundamental knowledge at end of each term on the subjects of that term each part over three hours each...and same at year end but on all material learned during year...

the term exams set by each school, and end of year set as a common exam at federal level...and monitoring system that effectively picks out 'cheats'...like students answers grouped from schools and checked if they were pre-informed of questions...and the like...

sadly this is not only to assess the children and seniors anymore...but the teachers...for any school with the whole class/group doing poorly will be picked up quickly...and yes its the individual teachers failure...no excuses...cant allow a teacher who cant preform the basic job requirement but demanding payment and a raise...

after findings like some 50% and more in some schools were illiterate at year 12...Im not surprised a education revolution is needed...and please dont let the feminist dominate the outcome...or reasonably predict we will be having the same discussion in a few years time with little change or worse further deterioration in our eduction of our kids...

Sam

I have a new neighbor who has their son enrolled in the same school as one of mine. The history teacher had just told the class that it was Poland that had started WW2, and the new neighbors were thinking of complaining to the school about it.

My advice to them was that because it was a government school, there was basically nothing they could do, and if they wanted to complain to the school, they had best wait until their son had finished the year. In that way the teacher could not take it out on their son if they did make a complaint.

The public has minimal say in what goes on in public schools, and the teachers in the public schools know it. Hence the drain to private schools, even though many private schools have minimal resources compared to public schools. But at least the parents have some control over what is being told to their children.

Ian,

Well spoken! The public system needs defenders who keep reality before the public mind. The public system has serious problems. This cannot be denied. But ironically, many of the problems the Victorian public system has are a direct result of the attempt to make it copy the private system under the Kennett Government, a path which the NSW Government is now foolishly following. It’s as if you have to stuff something up really badly before it can be fixed.

HRS,

If your neighbours’ child has correctly heard the teacher, they should take it up with the school. Hitler pretended that Poland started the war by dressing Germans in Polish uniforms and pretending that they had attacked Germany, but any teacher of history that blames Poland is not a history teacher, and it is important that this be corrected. Of course, the child could simply have misunderstood. It wouldn’t be the first time.

Hear, hear, Ian Keese. Donnelly is a politically partisan opinion columnist and should never be confused with anyone whose priority is education.

He favours rhetoric over facts, rumour over evidence, and ideology over education. Still, every village needs its idiot I guess.

Chris C,
The teacher had said that Poland started WW2 because Poland had not cooperated with Germany, which eventually made Germany invade Poland. The same teacher had also said a number of other things that were quite sympathetic towards Germany.

Regardless - it is not wise to question a teacher in a public school, as that teacher can easily give the student a low mark. There is basically no one to stop them.

Lack of trust in the teachers in public schools does appear to be a major problem for the teachers in public schools.

One would expect Keese, being part of the elitist Educational Establishment of public education, to applaud it. But in the penultimate paragraph of his article he exposes the frivolity of his argument. He asserts by a fabrication of the facts that “the majority of teachers and administrators in both educational systems choose lower pay and lower PERCEIVED status” (perceived is the operational word) for the sake of their students. He would have us believe that among all the professions, only teachers and administrators of schools are divinely blessed with that rare value of altruism.

However for those of us who are not fugitives from reality, we know of the fact that while teachers and administrators in government schools get lower pay because of their real, not perceived, lower educational status (no relation to altruism.), their counterparts in private schools get higher pay because of their higher educational standing.

No person in any profession who is proud of his vocation and his abilities would choose lower pay and lower status because of some sort of altruism toward those whom he serves. His goal is to EDUCATE his students not to flash his badge of altruism as a sign of being a good excellent teacher.

http://kotzabasis.wordpress.com

Public school teachers enjoy a fairly secure unionised job situation.The prevailing philosophy is one thus of a left wing socialist.Too many lack life's real experiences.They have gone from home,to school and more school.At least those in the private system have to perform to some standards or risk having to go back to the lower pay of the public system.
In the public system there are no real consequences for poor performance or slack behaviour.They have to break the law to lose their jobs.
The best way is to pay the dedicated teachers more money,then people will consider staying with the Public System.It can't be that hard to figure out.

Ajay,

Yes teachers all-to-often "life experiences". Perhaps, a year or two in industry should be a prerequisite to employment and also TER [AUI] over 80. My high school teachers were in the main real shockers. University was much better.

Ajay,

The high rate of unionisation in schools is a result of the poor working conditions and poor employment practices which occur in that field. I have been intrigued by the “school is not real” argument for years. Teachers have employers, they have duties to perform, they have long hours of work, they deal with poor leadership, they deal with difficult students, they deal with difficult parents, they suffer from poorly thought out government policies, they deal with children from abusive backgrounds, they put up with a constant stream of abuse from people who would not last one day in an actual classroom and they deal with refugee children who have seen members of their own families murdered. I think the life experiences in schools are real enough.

There are very few slack teachers. They are overwhelmingly hard-working and dedicated people, though they are not all highly able. More money will increase the number of more able and independent-minded people entering teaching and keep them there.

Oliver,

ENTER scores are a function of supply and demand. If more students seek places in teacher training, the ENTERs will rise. For that to happen, the profession has to be made more attractive; e.g., by reversing the substantial pay cuts of the last three decades, by reversing the substantial staffing cuts of the last two decades, by reversing the increase in short-term contract employment of the last fifteen years and by restoring professional judgement to the operations of schools

I think the life experiences in schools are real enough.
Chris C.
I have no doubt that the students expose teachers to the reality of outside the school. My question is , why don't so many teachers learn anything from that ? How many teachers actually teach ? Most just relay info. A good teacher leaves an impression on a student & instills a sense of wanting to know more. Far too many teachers are mere bureaucrats who worm their way out of real responsibility by claiming to be constrained because "it's not part of the curriculum". If teachers were indeed interested in improving the education standard then why not do what they do when they want better conditions. Strike ! Why not strike to improve education ? Why not strike to be able to discipline students ? If teachers are indeed as committed as they try us to believe then make a move to improve education. Don't be just bureaucrats who blame everyone else & use force only when wanting improvements for yourselves.

What do we expect from our teachers?

Do we expect teachers to instil in their young charges social mores, love of learning, and responsible behaviour? Who is going to decide that little Johnny is wasting his time in a classroom and is a danger to his classmates and should leave? When should that decision be made? Do we allow teachers to discipline children, tell parents how to rear their children, enforce regular bedtimes, provide nutritious food?

Today's parents think that child rearing is their responsibility and get very offended when a stranger tells their child how to behave. If parents can't provide regular bedtimes, nutritious food and be good role models then perhaps children should be raised in boarding schools irrespective of whether the loser parent is black, white, yellow or brindle and irrespective of whether the family is christian, wicca, jewish, muslim or feral.

Kevin Donnelly is one of those people who, when unable to do well in his chosen profession, denigrates those who can. He is the quintessential failed teacher sniping at successful teachers.

Just feel sad for the old man. He's irrelevant to any discourse on the future of education.

The difficulty of the job description all depends upon the attitude of the worker.I left teaching in the late eighties.Those who teach,basically reflect general attitudes of society.

I did my HSC back in 1969 and did many things before entering teaching in 1975.The biggest theme of impotence for teachers,particularly for those in the western suburbs of Sydney,was the lack of respect and displine that eminated from this culture of legal/unionised repression.The tail was wagging the dog.

Public Education denegrates itself,when it lacks the balls to instill respect,discipline and the diversity of philosophies that make up our society.