SECOND REPORT
JULY 2002
INQUIRY INTO THE PROVISION OF PUBLIC EDUCATION IN NSW
ISBN 1875699 511
SPONSORED BY: NSW TEACHERS FEDERATION & FEDERATION OF P&C ASSOCIATIONS OF NSW
INQUIRY PANELLISTS Kathy Esson - Senior Inquiry Officer Ken Johnston - Senior Inquiry Officer Tony Vinson - Chairperson
INQUIRY PERSONNEL Joan Brown - Inquiry Officer Greg Eliovson - Inquiry Officer (part-time) Trudy Wiedeman - Secretary
RESEARCH ASSOCIATES Neville Hatton - University of Sydney
Alan Watson - University of New South Wales
PREFACE
The Second Report of the Inquiry into the Provision of Public Education in New South Wales follows a First Report, released in May 2002, that comprised three chapters on the following topics: 1. Teacher Professionalism 2. Curriculum and Pedagogy 3. The Foundations for Effective Learning.
The present report adds a further four chapters on the following topics: 4. The Structure of Public Education and Social Values 5. Student Welfare and Discipline 6. Buildings and Amenities 7. Rural and Remote Education.
The remainder of the Inquiry’s report will be released in late August / early September 2002. It will cover a number of additional topics including the governance of the education system; the integration of students with disabilities; TAFE and public education; school, community and social disadvantage; teacher preparation; the cost of public education; and planning for the future.
PAGE CHAPTER 4 THE STRUCTURE OF PUBLIC EDUCATION AND SOCIAL VALUES 1 INTRODUCTION 1 - The centrality of social values 1 - An outline of the issues 6 AN OVERVIEW OF THE RESTRUCTURING OF PUBLIC EDUCATION IN NSW SINCE 1988 6 - Dezoning 6 - Selective schools 8 - Opportunity classes 9 - Specialist high schools 10 - Stand-alone senior colleges 10 - Multi-campus colleges 10 - The changing educational landscape 11 THE IMPACT OF THE RESTRUCTURING OF PUBLIC EDUCATION IN NSW SINCE 1988 12 - Dezoning 13 - Academic selectivity - Selective high schools 14 - Arguments put forward in support of selective schools 16 - Arguments against selective schools 20 - Academic selectivity: Partially selective high schools 27 - Academic selectivity: Opportunity classes 29 - Academic Selectivity: Conclusions 30 - Specialisation 32 - Stand-alone senior colleges 34 - Multi-campus colleges 37 - Rationale for establishment 37 - Efficacy 40 - Implementation 42 - Impact on secondary schooling in general 44 THE STRUCTURE OF PUBLIC EDUCATION IN NEW SOUTH WALES - CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 45 - Principles governing the structure of public education in New South Wales 45 - Administrative presumptions arising from the guiding principles 46
CHAPTER 5 STUDENT WELFARE AND DISCIPLINE 52 AIMS OF THE CHAPTER 52 PART 1 - PROBLEMS IMPORTED INTO THE LEARNING SITUATION 52 - Evidence presented to the Inquiry 52 - Scale and impact of misbehaviour 53 - Responses to misbehaviour/behavioural problems 53 - What should be done? 55 SYSTEM RESPONSES TO BEHAVIOURALLY DISTURBED AND DISENGAGING STUDENTS AND YOUNG PEOPLE 56 - School level services 57 - Special programs and facilities for students with behaviour problems 58 - Mental health services 61 THE NEED FOR ADDITIONAL SCHOOL-LEVEL SUPPORT FOR TEACHERS IN HANDLING STUDENTS WITH BEHAVIOURAL DIFFICULTIES 61 - School counsellors: need for a longer term plan 64 DISTRICT LEVEL SUPPORT FOR TEACHERS AND SCHOOLS: A CASE STUDY AND IDENTIFICATION OF ADDITIONAL NEED 65 PART 2 - INDISCIPLINE AND HOLISTIC APPROACHES TO CHANGING THE SCHOOL ENVIRONMENT 70 - Proactive schools 73
CHAPTER 6 BUILDINGS AND AMENITIES 83 AIMS OF CHAPTER 83 BACKGROUND 83 SUBMISSIONS TO INQUIRY 84 - Provision of general resources 84 - Staff working conditions 86 - Inadequate maintenance 87 - Appropriate teaching spaces 87 - Cleaning 88 - Temperature control 88 - Demountable classrooms 89 INTERNATIONAL STANDARDS 89 THE NEW SOUTH WALES PUBLIC EDUCATION ESTATE 92 - Primary school standards 93 - Standards for staff rooms 94 - Communal facilities 94 - Secondary school standards 95 - Funding of school capital works 97 - School asset management 98 - Facilities maintenance 100
CHAPTER 7 RURAL AND REMOTE EDUCATION 104 - Additional educational expenses 104 - City-country gulf 105 - Professional development 106 - Small country schools 106 - Bus transport 106 - Attracting staff 106 - Additional issues 107 EDUCATIONAL DISADVANTAGES FACING RURAL TEACHERS AND STUDENTS 107 SCHOOLS, RURAL COMMUNITIES AND CHANGE 109 TEACHER ALLOWANCES AND INCENTIVES 115
APPENDIX CHAPTER 4 THE STRUCTURE OF PUBLIC EDUCATION AND SOCIAL VALUES
I fear for the future of the country when we’ve got public schools that, maybe in the future, will only be there for people who can’t afford to go to some other school. We’ve got Catholic schools for Catholics, Christian schools for Protestants, Jewish schools for Jewish people, Islamic schools for Muslim kids, Seven-Day-Adventist schools for Seven-Day-Adventist and so on and so on. What we’re doing is we’re dividing the country. … I believe that if we continue to do this - I’m not knocking the right of people to have private education, that’s accepted as a right - but if we keep on going down this path, we are going to reap the whirl-wind. … How are people going to learn to accept Jews and Muslims if large sections of the Jewish and Muslim community are in separate schools? How are we going to learn to live together if we are educated separately? Are we going to have a situation like Northern Ireland, like Lebanon, where people are divided along sectarian lines and we see the results? And this is the thing I fear for. When we’re talking about public education, we are talking about the cohesiveness of the whole society. Teacher, Public Hearing, Sydney Metropolitan area
We deplore the ever more common usage of the term ‘marketplace’ by educationalists and politicians alike in reference to Our Public Education system, which we see as an absolutely essential cornerstone in our democratic society. It is a right, to be defended at all costs. It is not a commodity to be contracted off to the provider with the best price or eloquent promises. Public primary school, regional New South Wales
All businesses and service providers [including public education] wishing to remain successful in the long term must involve themselves in continuous improvement and continually refocus on the needs of the market and stakeholders. P&C District Council, Sydney North Shore ______
INTRODUCTION
The centrality of social values
The way in which public education is structured depends ultimately on the weight assigned to competing social values. Is it better that students of diverse backgrounds and degrees of talent should study together in local, comprehensive public schools, or is more to be gained by admitting the most academically able to opportunity classes and selective high schools? Should there be more, or fewer, selective classes and schools? Do the advantages of concentrating senior high school students within senior colleges outweigh the possible disadvantages caused to the junior high schools from which the students transfer? Where high schools and senior colleges co-exist in a region, is it appropriate that they compete for students? When, if ever, is it legitimate that considerations like stabilising the population of public school students, should determine policy decisions? These matters go to the heart of the future of public education in
1 this State. They are germane to the two major terms of reference of the Inquiry1 and to most of the focus issues proposed at the start of the Inquiry. Some data are available that throw light on these and related questions. However, in the experience of the Inquiry, the polemics that surround these issues often reflect hardened value positions that pay little heed to varying circumstances or empirical evidence. The purpose of this section is to identify some of the contending values that ordinarily confuse debates about the structuring of public education, as a prelude to examining the issues in more detail.
Social policy serves us well when it gives expression to key values in meeting the generality of individual and communal needs, while recognising and providing for some patterned variations in the needs of groups and localities. At the general level, public education has long aspired to provide all children with an equal opportunity to cultivate their talents to the limits of their individual abilities. It has also aspired to be a force for social cohesion, for building mutual understanding between people of different ethnic, religious, vocational and socio-economic backgrounds. This disposition towards social cohesion has advantaged Australian society in the past, by contributing to the peaceful co-existence of different groups and the maintenance of social arrangements and communal services that help to preserve the dignity of all Australians. The challenges of the present era (such as growing sectarianism) make its preservation doubly important. Equally challenging to the preservation of a cohesive and caring society is the widening gap between the economic fortunes, and consequently, educational and social opportunities, of different sections of the Australian community.
Addressing these issues is not the sole responsibility of public education. A range of social institutions including the family, polity, economy and the value generating institutions, including religion, are involved. However, the joint education of young people of diverse backgrounds provides a most helpful basis for fostering mutual understanding and tolerance. Because Australians subscribe to a wide range of values, some with a communitarian orientation, others focussing more on individual success and achievement, schools will necessarily be judged on considerations additional to their community-building endeavours. Among those considerations will be schools’ effectiveness, perceived and more carefully assessed, in cultivating the academic and other abilities of their students. The latter will in turn depend on many things including teacher competence, teaching methods, school culture and environment, the learning resources and equipment of the school, the range of subject offerings and, at least in some instances, the composition of the learning group.
Many other value strands enter the discourse about the way public education should be structured in New South Wales. Nevertheless, tension between a preference for schools as agencies of social cohesion and democracy (a communitarian perspective), and schools as structures and processes for the attainment of measurable, favourable academic outcomes (an individualist perspective), underlies much of the contemporary debate. On one side of this debate are comments such as the following, from a Sydney metropolitan high school P&C:
Most parents send their children to state schools because they CHOOSE to. Where else can they learn the ethic of hard work, in a setting of students of all ability levels and skills? This is the place to find out about the real world,
1 To determine the purposes and values of public education, and to recommend the resources and structures needed to achieve these.
2 to learn to function in it and to learn tolerance … In a comprehensive high school, students of all skill levels, from the very talented to the learning disabled are considered to belong. Everyone’s needs are important. The comprehensive high school says ‘all welcome’, does not have special tests to see if you are good enough, and offers chances to every student, regardless of experience or advantage.
Many submissions to the Inquiry have stated the belief that public education provides what one writer has called “an apprenticeship in democracy”,2 equalising opportunities for those who are disadvantaged, and welcoming ‘all comers’.
On the other hand, the importance of schools in offering tangible benefits to individuals in terms of academic achievement, underpins much support for selective and specialist schools. As the P&C of one selective high school said:
The aim of a selective school is to place students in an educational community in which they can develop their academic capacities and perform at an academic level commensurate with their abilities … For many parents, the value of a selective high school is not simply in maximising the UAI [University Admissions Index] at the HSC but also in giving their children an opportunity to flourish in all aspects of their development.
The polemical nature of this debate, especially as it applies to the ways in which schools should be structured, usually leaves little scope for what was earlier referred to as an attribute of good social policy, namely, the capacity to respond to patterned variations in the needs of groups and localities. For example, as the above quotation illustrates, claims are frequently made that ‘gifted and talented’ students require for their full development the stimulation of working with other peers of similar calibre. This is not only the contention of some scholars and researchers in the field but also the implication of remarks made directly to the Inquiry by many students and parents of students in selective schools. The fact that this claim then forms the basis for an argument that gifted and talented students should be separately schooled, without acknowledging the loss to other school communities of that stimulation, reflects the ‘single-valuedness’ of the proposal. It could still be argued that the gains from selectivity outweigh the losses to students in comprehensive schools, who in any event, might gain new leadership opportunities, but the need is seldom felt to offer any justification.
Principles, well informed by international and local research, for guiding the development of gifted and talented students have been presented to the Inquiry. These focus on the pedagogical practices required to meet the educational needs of very gifted individuals. However, adoption of a wider value perspective that incorporates the importance of social cohesion as well as a focus on academic excellence, invites questions about why these principles cannot be incorporated within the framework of comprehensive schooling. The Inquiry fully accepts the argument of experts in the field that much more needs to be done to assist teachers to identify gifted students whose potential is not realised in their school performance, including unidentified ‘late bloomers’. That can only be to the advantage of the community as well as the student concerned. What the
2 Reid, A. (1999) “The Redefinition of Public Education”, Australian Education Union website: http:www.aeufederal.org.au/Debates/ReidPaper.html
3 Inquiry remains to be convinced of is that ‘giftedness’ is an ‘all or nothing’ phenomenon, which warrants the separate schooling of the majority of young people so designated.
As a second example, the recent move to form some high schools into multi-campus colleges has evoked some of the strongest feelings evinced during the Inquiry. While it is understandable that those at the receiving end of disruption and change may feel aggrieved, it is easy to lose sight of possible long-term advantages that might flow from new structural arrangements. In the Inquiry’s view, a combination of short- and long- term impacts, together with a consideration of each case on its merits, is required. For example, in one part of the Newcastle region, a cluster of three high schools has augmented its HSC offerings by cooperation across the participating schools. The same approach has been adopted by three high schools in Wagga Wagga that are also maintaining their senior numbers in this way, and are anxious to integrate their students’ academic achievements with personal growth across the whole of their secondary years. In another part of Newcastle, difficulties in engaging students’ interest in their academic program during the early adolescent years and the poor retention of senior students3, have invited questions about the need to restructure secondary education in that area. While another solution might always have been possible, the policy decision in this instance to create a senior college with associated feeder junior schools, appears reasonable because it is grounded in local circumstances and not just an abstract policy position. The feeder schools have an opportunity to concentrate on developing pedagogy that better meets the needs of Year 7-10 students, while simultaneously the local arrangements provide for the subject and other needs of Year 11-12 students.
There is a second set of value considerations affecting evaluation of the issues discussed in this chapter. For the past twenty-five years, neo-liberal economics (commonly known as ‘economic rationalism’) has dominated politics and public administration in Australia (and in many Western countries), together with moves towards corporate managerialism, in which private sector management practices are applied to public sector enterprises4. Those in human service professions, such as teaching, have found the effects of these trends particularly confronting, because economic and human service values are often especially difficult to reconcile. Even the vocabulary of education has changed. Concepts such as competition, choice, diversity, efficiency, standards, accountability, performance indicators, deregulation and privatisation have become commonplace. These ideas have infused public education policy to a very significant extent. In New South Wales, they have been evident since 1988, when the Greiner government came to power and commissioned the Carrick and Scott reports5. The Carrick report focused on aligning education more closely with employment requirements, and as requested, proposed a new Education Act (which, after consultation, became the Education Act, 1990). This enshrined the primacy of
3 See the discussion in Chapter 2 of the approach to pedagogy being adopted at Wallsend Junior High School. 4 The impact of these developments on public education has been traced by a number of educational theorists. See for example, Reid, A. (Ed.) (1998) Going Public: Education policy and public education in Australia. Deakin West, ACT: Australian Curriculum Studies Association. Marginson, S. (1997) “Subjects and Subjugation: the economics of education as power-knowledge”, Discourse: studies in the cultural politics of education. Vol. 18, No. 2, 215-227; 5 Report of the Committee of Review of New South Wales Schools. (1989) Chair: John Carrick. New South Wales Government. School-centred education: Building a more responsive State school system. Report of the Management Review: New South Wales Education Portfolio (1990) Director: Brian W. Scott. The Management Review: NSW Education Portfolio.
4 parental choice in the education of children, and coincided with the State government raising the levels of financial support to non-government schools6. The Act also embedded in legislation for the first time, the Minister’s right to establish different kinds of government secondary schools, including senior colleges (Years 11 and 12), selective schools, specialist schools, and single sex schools7. The Scott report presented findings of a management review of the education portfolio, applying corporate management principles to the New South Wales school education system, including the devolution of administrative budgets to schools. As a result of the influence of economic considerations on the management of public enterprises, schools today are subject to the same value standards of efficiency and accountability in attaining specified ends that Australian governments now apply much more widely to social arrangements than was the case in the past.
One element of this trend that has attracted significant concern during the Inquiry is the apparent embrace by successive State and Commonwealth governments, of a ‘market’ orientation in the provision of education. This is reflected in increasing competition among schools, both government and non-government, increasing specialisation and differentiation between schools, and more outcomes measurement. Some observers have argued that this has changed the nature of the relationship between individuals and the education system:
… education moves from being a public good, where the development in children of various capacities for social practice (as workers, citizens, community members, cultural consumers etc.,) is seen as benefiting the whole community, to a private commodity which advantages individuals8.
This economic construction underpins the social cohesion versus academic excellence values outlined above.
The foregoing discussion is intended to prepare the ground for analyses that are not bound by a rigid ideology or values position. As already indicated, an important challenge in the discussion that follows is to try to reconcile the differentiation that has occurred in education the past 10-15 years in New South Wales, particularly in secondary education, with notions of individual and public good. In attempting this, the Inquiry has taken the view that change is inevitable in any dynamic system, and that to simply oppose new developments because they are new is counterproductive. Rather, an attempt has been made to analyse these developments from two perspectives - that of those who are directly experiencing them (the students and teachers in the various kinds of schools), and that of their impact on surrounding schools that may be affected by the new developments.
6 The government raised the per capita grant for students in non-government schools from 20% to 25% of the average cost of educating a child in a government school. The primacy of public education as a State government responsibility was only affirmed as an object of the new Act following public consultation. See Education Reform Bill, Second Reading Speech (1990) New South Wales Parliamentary Debates (Hansard), Legislative Assembly, Vol. CCXIII, p. 1341. 7 Education Act 1990 No. 8, Part 6, Government Schools, Section 29. 8 Reid, A. (1998) “Back to basics: sending the schools to market”. Education Links, No 55/57, Spring, 18-21.
5 An outline of the issues
In relation to public education, among the specific issues repeatedly brought to the attention of the Inquiry have been questions concerning:
• The increased numbers of selective and specialist high schools in New South Wales since 1988, and their impact on the viability of local, comprehensive high schools;
• The continuing establishment and additional funding of senior colleges and multi- campus high schools, their educational rationale, and their impact on local, comprehensive high schools;
• Inequities in the amount of ‘choice’ available to parents and their children, depending on location, socio-economic status, inside knowledge and ‘talent’; and
• The ‘break through’ way in which decisions to create many of the new schooling arrangements seem to be being made, without public transparency and with limited ongoing evaluation9.
The remainder of this chapter addresses these and related points in three main sections:
• An overview of the restructuring of public education in New South Wales since 1988;
• Assessing the impact of the restructuring of public schooling in New South Wales since 1988; and
• The structure of public education in New South Wales - conclusions and recommendations.
AN OVERVIEW OF THE RESTRUCTURING OF PUBLIC EDUCATION IN NEW SOUTH WALES SINCE 1988
There have been many structural changes to the education system in New South Wales since 1988. These include the partial dezoning of schools, the creation of specialist schools, middle schools, senior high schools and college groups, an increase in the number of school-based pre-schools and support units, and new cooperative arrangements with universities and TAFE. In what follows, this chapter focuses on those changes primarily affecting secondary education. Pre-schools are dealt with under the foundations of learning in Chapter 3; support units and changes in the numbers of Schools for Specific Purposes are dealt with in the chapter on integration; and community schools are dealt with in a later chapter, as are TAFE and VET in schools. In Table 4.1 below, the key structural changes to the New South Wales school system are outlined. For practical purposes, it is useful to group the changes into
9 A number of issues in relation to support for private education have also been raised, including: • The amount of Commonwealth and State funding now going to the expanding non-government education sector, and reductions in funding for public education; and • The ease with which new private schools can be established and receive public funding, without regard to their impact on surrounding schools or the wider community. These issues will be addressed in a later chapter on government support and funding for education.
6 three chronological periods: 1988-92, 1993-1998, and 1999 - present. Several things from Table 4.1 deserve comment.
Table 4.1 Structural changes affecting NSW public education 1988 – present
1988 - 1992 Nature of change Number of schools Increase in school choice All NSW schools partially dezoned. Increase in academic selectivity 8 more fully selective and 2 partially selective high schools (total 21). Increase in senior high school choice St Marys Senior High School Increase in high school specialisation 28 technology high schools 18 language high schools 2 more performing arts high schools 1 sports high school
1993-1998 Nature of change Number of schools Increase in senior high school choice Bankstown, Bradfield, Illawarra and Coffs Harbour Senior Colleges (total 5) Increase in academic selectivity Two more fully selective high schools (total 23) Primary schools with opportunity classes increased from 9 to 65. Increase in specialisation 4 more sports high schools 2 more performing arts high schools 1 creative arts high school 1 rural technology high school 1 marine technology high school
1999 - present Nature of change Number of schools Increase in academic selectivity Five more partially selective high schools (total fully/partially selective 28) Five more schools with opportunity classes (total 70) Advent of multi-campus colleges Ten colleges by 2003 (comprising 35 high schools operating as junior and/or senior campuses) Increase in specialisation Two more sports high schools (total 7) Decrease in specialisation Reduction in technology (from 28 to 11) and languages (from 18 to 5) high schools
Dezoning
First, one of the earliest moves to increase choice and competition in public schooling was the decision to progressively dezone public schools in New South Wales, as recommended by the Carrick report. Prior to this time, all schools were zoned to their local catchment area, except for the four agricultural selective high schools and the seven surviving selective high schools (which drew their selective students from all over
7 Sydney and New South Wales, and also took the children of former students and some local students)10. The zoning of public schools prior to 1988 was justified on both social and economic grounds, as encouraging a sense of community through all children attending the local public school, and to allow planning through the predictable utilisation of school facilities.
It has been argued that the assumption behind zoning was of uniformity, of all schools being essentially the same, serving communities with similar needs using similar levels of resources11. Partial dezoning (enabling school selection where vacancies exist) was introduced in the name of choice, and opened up the option for individual parents to send their children to schools other than the local one. It thus recognised that differences in style and focus among schools might exist. All comprehensive schools in New South Wales are now partially dezoned.
. Selective high schools
Second, the number of selective high schools was significantly increased between 1988 and 1994, despite reservations expressed in the Carrick report and an earlier recommendation to phase them out12. Table 4.2 below gives details of this change. This table shows clearly that there has been a more than doubling of fully selective academic high schools since 1988. The rationale for the increase in selective schools, as for dezoning above, was to provide more diversity and choice to parents and students, especially in areas that had limited access to such schools. To this end, selective high schools were established (or in some cases, re-established) in the west, north west and south west of Sydney, as well as on the central coast and in Newcastle and Wollongong, although many rural and remote students still do not have access to such schools. In the past few years, a relatively new phenomenon, the hybrid partially selective high school has been developed. This includes a stream of selected students who are educated as a group separate to, but alongside, students from the local community (with some mixing in the senior years). This pattern has been the case at Sefton and Macquarie Fields High Schools since they became selective. Selective high schools in New South Wales do not enjoy any other advantages except for the talent of their student body.
10 Braithwaite, R.J. and Kensell, H.G. (1992) “Factors influencing enrolment at NSW selective high schools.” Australian Educational Researcher, Vol. 19, No. 2, 39-50. 11 Ruby, A., Wells, L., and Wildermuth, C (1992) “Choice, market theory and education: What are we talking about?” In Choice Theory and Education, Occasional paper No. 19, The Australian College of Education. 12 The Carrick report stated its support for “restricting the places in selective schools and classes to students with exceptional talent”. (1989) p. 250. The Macdonald report (NSW Department of Education, 1977) recommended the phasing out of selective high schools, based in part on research indicating that there were no significant differences in external examination results between groups of students matched on ability in selective high schools versus comprehensive high schools.
8 TABLE 4.2 - Academically selective high schools in NSW
SELECTIVE SCHOOLS 1988 2002
Fully selective/academic Single sex (boys) 3 4 Single sex (girls) 3 4 Co-educational 1 9 Total 7 17
Fully selective/academic-agricultural Single sex (boys) 2 1 Single sex (girls) 0 0 Co-educational 2 3 Total 4 4
Partially selective 0 7
TOTAL 11 28
Opportunity classes
Third, there has been a significant increase in the number of opportunity classes for students in Years 5 and 6. Opportunity classes (OCs) have a long history in New South Wales, having been established in 1932 for the benefit of academically outstanding students. Places in OCs are determined by results on a centrally administered test and the recommendation of the home school. In 1993, the number of schools with OCs, which had previously been limited to metropolitan regions of Sydney, was increased to cover most areas of New South Wales, although some rural areas still do not have access to such classes. Students in OCs are given academically demanding work and encouraged to perform at their best. For most successful students, acceptance into an OC necessitates a move away from the local community school at Year 5.
In expanding the provision for academically talented students primarily through the provision of separate schools and classes, New South Wales has favoured a segregation model for addressing the needs of these students. This contrasts with the pattern in some other Australian states, where there has been a focus on whole-school and system-wide developments to support the needs of academically gifted students, or on the provision of a limited number of selective acceleration classes in mainstream schools13.
13 Information obtained from relevant officers in Education Queensland, the Department of Education and Children’s Services, South Australia, and the Department of Education and Training, Victoria. See also: The Education of Gifted Children (2001), Report of the Senate Employment, Workplace Relations, Small Business and Education References Committee, Commonwealth of Australia, October, Appendix 6.
9 Specialist high schools
Fourth, a large number of specialist high schools have been established, catering to the interests, and sometimes talents of a range of students. Between 1988 and 2002, the number of such schools changed from one to about 30. At their height, there were well over 50 (not including academically selective schools), but following a review of technology and languages high schools in 1999, many relinquished their title as no longer appropriate. While the Conservatorium High School and the Hunter School of the Performing Arts are fully selective, the majority of these schools accept students from their local community, but also select students on the basis of talent (for example, by audition, portfolio or selection trials) and/or interest. Some schools, such as technology high schools, have operated as ‘lighthouse’ schools, disseminating information and expertise to other high schools. During the late eighties and nineteen nineties, there was also a period when many high schools were allowed to declare a centre of excellence in one particular area, such as history or student welfare.
Stand-alone senior colleges
Fifth, along with the growth in selective and specialist schools, the early to mid nineteen nineties saw the beginning of significant structural changes in the actual organisation of secondary schooling in New South Wales. By 1995, five stand-alone senior colleges had been established. These cater for about 2500 senior students, with some studying part-time. Senior colleges offer academic and vocational programs of study for Years 11 and 12, and some also offer Year 10 bridging and general education programs. There are a number of arguments for the establishment of senior colleges, not least the different needs of young adults, which traditional high schools have been slow to accommodate14.
Consistent with this, the five senior colleges in New South Wales offer a more adult learning environment than that allowed at most high schools - one characterised by collegial relationships between students and staff, with most using first names. They require students to undertake more independent learning, although they also retain a strong focus on student welfare and support. In addition, the senior colleges are big enough to offer a good range of curriculum choices, can provide specialist facilities and equipment, and can offer more student involvement in school government15. All provide vocational courses and/or strong links with TAFE, with most co-located with TAFE or a university. Some senior colleges constitute ‘second-chance’ facilities for students who have not been able to complete their education in mainstream schools.
Multi-campus colleges
Finally, a much more recent innovation is the development of multi-campus colleges, incorporating two or more feeder junior high schools and a senior high school. In a matter of five years, the Department of Education and Training has set up nine multi- campus colleges across New South Wales, with one more commencing in 2003, and
14 Power, C. (1985) “New structures for secondary schooling: senior secondary colleges and special schools.” Catholic School Studies, Vol. 58, July, pp42-45. 15 The Inquiry visited four of the senior colleges, Bradfield, Illawarra, Coffs Harbour and St Marys.
10 another, in the Tweed River area, under consideration. The multi-campus colleges involve a total of 35 high schools, which is about 9% of all high schools in New South Wales. There are several different reasons given by the DET for the establishment of multi-campus colleges. The primary ones are:
• Multi-campus colleges can provide a broader and deeper range of curriculum offerings in the senior years;
• Senior campuses can provide increased access to vocational education (by being co-located with TAFE institutes and/or universities);
• Multi-campus colleges provide age-appropriate schooling structures (the more ‘adult’ environment of senior colleges, better focus on Year 7-10 teaching needs);
• Multi-campus colleges may assist in overcoming poor academic outcomes by raising academic expectations and levels of engagement for the full range of students; and
• Multi-campus colleges are a way to counteract negative community perceptions in relation to individual schools (which otherwise leads to a downward spiral of enrolments and achievements).
It is clear that the DET believes that multi-campus colleges can attract students to public education who might otherwise have attended non-government schools or dropped out of formal education. Since 1999, the DET has had a Collegiate Education Plan, which aims to link local high schools, TAFE and universities16. Multi-campus colleges are not all organised in identical ways. However, by bifurcating the secondary school years at Years 9 or 10 for most students, these new colleges represent a profound structural variation on the Year 7-12 high school.
The changing educational landscape
The amount of structural change in secondary education since 1988, particularly in metropolitan areas, is evident in the following figures:
• In 1988 there were 7 selective high schools, 5 specialist/selective high schools (the agricultural high schools and the Conservatorium), and 369 comprehensive high schools in New South Wales.
• In 2002 there are 28 academically selective or partially selective high schools, 2 additional schools that select their full student body (performing arts), an additional 30 specialist schools that select some students, 5 stand-alone senior high schools, and 33 multi-campus high schools (including three that are also selective), with two more to come. This makes a total of 98 secondary schools/campuses that are specialised in some way, leaving just under 300 comprehensive high schools. Overall then, 25% or about one in four of all high schools in New South Wales are now specialised, with a significant number partially or fully selective. Another 30 are single sex.
16 “Collegiate Education Plan to build School, TAFE and Uni Partnerships” (1999) Joint News Release, Hon. Bob Carr, Premier and Hon. John Aquilina, Minister for Education and Training, 11 February.
11
It is doubtless for this reason that officers in the DET have impressed upon the Inquiry that New South Wales does not (any longer) offer “a system of comprehensive high schools, but a comprehensive system of high schools”.
Another set of changes in New South Wales education requires brief mention. The past fifteen years has seen a series of moves by the state and federal governments to deregulate the establishment of non-government schools and to increase their share of public funding. This development has led to the establishment of a large number of new non-government schools that have attracted government funding, and can offer, in the main, low fees. These compete with local primary and secondary schools, and add to the pressure for ‘market share’ being felt by many public schools. Figures provided to the Grimshaw Inquiry by the NSW Board of Studies indicate that in New South Wales between 1991 and 2000, the net number of new non-government schools, or new campuses of existing schools, was 100. ABS figures, calculated differently, put the net increase during the same period at 44, four times the increase in government schools17. Between 1985 and 2000, student enrolments in government schools in New South Wales decreased by nearly 5% from 74.2% to 69.4%, with this fall more evident in respect of secondary schools, where enrolments fell by nearly 7% from 72.2% to 65.3%18. This means that one in three secondary students in New South Wales now attend a non-government school.
THE IMPACT OF THE RESTRUCTURING OF PUBLIC EDUCATION IN NEW SOUTH WALES SINCE 1988
It can be argued that each set of structural responses to challenges facing public education in New South Wales has contributed to the need for another set. So, for example, the decision to increase the number of selective high schools (and to a lesser extent, specialist high schools), while enticing more able students to stay in the public system, depleted the ranks of academically oriented students in many comprehensive high schools. This resulted in a change in the composition of those schools from a balance of academic and other students, to a predominance of non-academic, ambivalently committed students, whose retention rates were lower. This reduced the number of students at the HSC level, and the range of HSC subjects available to those who remained. This in turn contributed to the development of some of the stand-alone senior colleges, and more recently, multi-campus colleges, which can again offer a wide choice of subjects to the full range of students.
The existence today of a more multi-layered education system in New South Wales has attracted both praise and criticism. Those who support increased parental choice and a more diverse education system have argued that the changes enrich the system. This view tends to correlate with a focus on individual achievement (the value of academic excellence introduced earlier). Those who see the changes as depleting the public education system, interpret many of the changes as a move away from values associated with social cohesion. In the Inquiry’s view, a balance between a system
17 Review of Non-Government Schools in NSW, Report 1 (2002). Chair: Warren Grimshaw. NSW Department of Education and Training (Office of the Minister). ABS figures count individual schools only, and not separate campuses of schools. 18 Review of Non-Government Schools in NSW, Report 1 (2002), Ibid. Table 2.2.
12 focused on excellence and inclusion is needed, one that accepts some differentiation within the education system, but strongly supports comprehensiveness. The pursuit of this value balance shapes the rest of this chapter.
The Inquiry’s consideration of the best ways forward will address four interrelated factors: the experience of those affected by the different structural modifications; their effect on academic and other outcomes; their impact on other schools and/or the education system as a whole; and their impact in relation to ‘choice’. The following headings provide a framework for this discussion: - Dezoning - Academic selectivity - Specialisation - Stand-alone senior colleges - Multi-campus colleges
Dezoning
Evidence suggests that the extent to which parents exercise choice varies depending on the level of schooling. Research across Australia indicates that many parents still send their children to public primary schools in their local community. A major nationwide study claimed that “parents of primary school students usually consider the local school as their first option … many believe through anecdotal evidence or previous experience of the school that the local school will be satisfactory for their children”19. A small number of submissions to the Inquiry have included surveys of why parents send their children to particular primary schools and what they most value about them. These findings are consistent with the national findings. A submission from a Sydney Eastern suburbs primary school that also surveyed parents, indicated strong support for the cultural mix in its school:
… the educational and social advantages of being amongst this multi-cultural, multi-racial, multi-everything population are widely recognised by parents, who cite it as a reason for choosing to send their child or children to a public school.
However, in relation to secondary education, parental views changed:
Interestingly, while the inclusiveness of the public system was seen as an advantage for the primary years, when it came to high school it was just as likely to be considered a handicap. It was a frequently expressed view that financial constraints mean public high schools don’t have the resources to adequately cater for the widely varying needs of a student population which included anyone who wants to be part of it.
The situation in secondary schools has always been more complex. The outcomes of secondary education are, of course, critical for individual students. National and local research on this question suggests that a range of factors influence choice of secondary
19 Cuttance, P. and Stokes, S.A. (2000) Reporting on Student and School Achievement, Research report prepared for the Commonwealth Department of Education, Training and Youth Affairs, http//:www.detya.gov.au/schools/publicat.htm, p. 85.
13 school. Importantly, for many people, while academic performance is one factor, it is not by any means the only one. A national study has outlined the complexity of factors parents consider when choosing a secondary school:
For many parents, the right choice involves an appropriate combination of academic, social and extra-curricula programs combined with school policies that match parent expectations … What parents are seeking when looking to choose a school is to find a match between their child’s personality, interests and career aspirations and the programs and culture of the school … Many parents have chosen different schools for different children because their children have different needs20.
In Sydney and major regional centres, where there is a density of schools, there is considerable opportunity for mobility, which can adversely affect the enrolments at some schools. It is also clear that in certain geographical areas, such as some rural areas, dezoning combined with free bus passes to the school of choice, has seriously disadvantaged some schools through what they feel to be no fault of their own. These are important points. However, the Inquiry is of the view that it would be counterproductive to reintroduce zoning, and so force decreased choice on parents. At the secondary level in particular, both the public and private education systems are now predicated on a range of choices for parents within a partially zoned public system. The Inquiry will comment in a later chapter, however, on the government’s continued subsidisation through bus passes of students who bypass local government schools to attend non-government ones.
Academic selectivity: Selective high schools
There is no doubt that selective high schools are meeting a demand among both students and parents, despite many observers having concerns about them. This has been brought home to the Inquiry on a range of visits to such schools, in discussions with parents and students, and through submissions. By definition, selectivity brings together some of the most able students, and the apparent advantages of this academic segregation are highlighted in the media each year, when HSC results are published, showing that several selective schools outperform almost all other schools - government and non-government. In recent months, the composition of selective schools and the nature of the Selective High Schools Test, have come under public scrutiny21. Most recently, the Minister for Education and Training has released a discussion paper on the selective schools test, which advocates several changes, in particular, a revision of the test to address a wider range of subject matter and the inclusion of a writing component22. In New South Wales, the significant increase in the past fifteen years in the number of selective schools (and opportunity classes) has provoked critical
20 Cuttance and Stokes, Ibid. p. 81-2. 21 See for example, Noonan, G. “Put to the test” (2002) Sydney Morning Herald, p. 23, April 20-21; Hewett, J. “A system in need of closer examination” (2002) Sydney Morning Herald, p.11, April 25. 22 Year 7 placement process: A discussion paper, (2002) Student Assessment and School Accountability, Selective Schools Unit, NSW Department of Education and Training, May 2002. Available at: http://www.schools.nsw.edu.au
14 comment23. On the other hand, as the recent Senate inquiry into gifted education noted, the needs of gifted students across Australia have in general been given insufficient attention24.
Entry into New South Wales’s selective high schools, based on the annual Selective High Schools Test, has always been highly competitive. In 1988, there were more than 10,000 applications for just over 2,000 places, a ratio that is essentially the same in 2002, when there are approximately 15000 applicants for just over 3000 places25. Table 4.3 provides data concerning application and acceptance rates at selective high schools over the past few years.
Table 4.3 Selective High Schools Applications and Acceptances 1997/98 – 2001/0226
Year Applicants Acceptances % 1997/98 15958 3049 19.1 1998//99 15588 3073 19.7 1999/00 15122 3093 20.5 2000/01 14998 3107 20.7 2001/02 15343 3351 21.8
Table 4.3 indicates that about one in five applicants accept a place in a selective school. In any one year, approximately 56% are male, and 44% female, a result the DET attributes to a maths bias in the test, and to boys’ tendency to nominate a higher number of selective schools that they are prepared to attend27. There is also a socio-economic trend evident among those students who apply for and are accepted into selective high schools. Material from the DET indicates that in 2001, 1706 applicants from 459 disadvantaged (Priority Support Funding Program, PSFP) schools applied to selective schools and 288 were accepted, reflecting a 17% success rate, compared to a 22% success rate for all students28. In addition, a smaller proportion of students from PSFP schools applied for selective places. Only 11% of selective schools applicants came from these schools, although approximately 20% of all students are in PSFP schools. If students from PSFP schools were proportionately represented in selective schools, 670 (rather than 288) would have been accepted in 2001. Research indicates that teachers tend to underestimate academic talent among those of low socio-economic status and from some cultural groups, including students from Aboriginal and Torres
23 Dixon, R.M. and Gow, L. (1993) “Selective schools for intellectually gifted students: are they justified?” Paper given to the annual conference of the Australian Association for Research in Education, Fremantle, WA. See also Dwyer, M. (1998) “Ripples in the pond: the impact of selective secondary schools on public education”. Education Links. No 56/57, 25-28. 24 The Education of Gifted Children (2001), Op. Cit. 25 See Department of School Education Annual Report, 1988, p. 9. 26 Figures from Table 4.3 were provided by the Selective Schools Unit, Department of Education and Training. 27 Year 7 placement process: A discussion paper, (2002) Op, Cit.; “NSW Department of Education and Training, Submission to the Senate Inquiry into the Education of Gifted and Talented Students” (2001). Interestingly, of those achieving the highest marks in the HSC (the top 2%) in 1999, 57% were female and 43% male, suggesting that attending a selective school may be less important to the success of female students (figures from NSW DET submission to the Senate Inquiry on gifted education, Ibid.). 28 “NSW Department of Education and Training, Submission to the Senate Inquiry into the Education of Gifted and Talented Students” (2001) Op. Cit.
15 Strait Islander, Pacific Islander and Arabic speaking backgrounds, and that these groups lack information about available opportunities29.
As is also evident from Table 4.3, the vast majority of students who sit the Selective High Schools Test miss out on a place, despite the fact that many are highly capable and most would be destined for university30. It is impossible to assess the impact of the testing process on the twelve thousand or so unsuccessful students each year, in terms of their feelings about themselves, or the secondary schools they subsequently attend31. A significant number of the more affluent of these students subsequently choose to go to private schools rather than to other high schools.
The Inquiry has visited several selective high schools and has been impressed by aspects of their ethos and operation. In all the schools visited, students and parents spoke enthusiastically about the opportunities and advantages that they were experiencing. This included not just exposure to academic challenge, and what one student called “a culture of excellence”, but the opportunities for extra-curricular activities as well. Inquiry staff have also spoken to parents and students who have personal and/or general reservations about selective high schools. Given the tension inherent in selective schooling between the values of social cohesion on the one hand and efficiency and excellence on the other, the Inquiry has surveyed in detail arguments for and against selectivity and these are presented below.
Arguments put forward in support of selective schools
Arguments in support of selective schools fall into three broad categories: the view that academically talented students need to be educated together (the ‘like minds’ argument); the contribution of selective schools to the performance of their students; and the accessibility of selective schools on the basis of intellectual merit alone.
On the first of these points, students and parents of students in selective schools have repeatedly argued that academically talented students need the environment of the selective school in which to thrive. As the P&C association of one selective high school wrote:
Compared with a comprehensive school, a selective school provides a more challenging atmosphere for academically gifted students than a comprehensive school where they might have few academic peers. At [our school], students cooperate and support, as well as compete with each other. Students benefit from learning with and stimulating each other. Many students report that upon coming to the school, they feel less socially isolated than in a comprehensive setting. Instead of adopting strategies which hide their abilities (isolating themselves, deliberately under- performing), they no longer feel embarrassed by shining.
29 See submission to the present Inquiry from the NSW Association for Gifted and Talented Children, Inc. (2001). 30 Approximately 5% of each Year 7 cohort in public schools gets into a selective school, whereas in 1999, 38% of the Year 12 cohort in government schools was offered a place at university. New South Wales Department of Education and Training Annual Report 2000. 31 Dwyer, M. (1998) Op. Cit.
16 This is endorsed by parents at other selective high schools. A P&C from a selective high in a regional centre in New South Wales said:
Most parents at [our school] choose the school because they believe that their children will be happier there. Evidence bears this out. Students, often for the first time, find other students who share their interests, who recognise a passion for one or more aspects of learning.
One parent said of her daughter: “When she first came here, it was as if she had come home.” In addition, research on the experience of attending a selective school suggests that the factor contributing most to positive perceptions of such schools by both students and teachers is the nature of the student body, followed by the educational programs on offer32. This is to some extent to be expected, because the student body is the only thing distinguishing selective schools from others.
The Inquiry has met with groups of students at several selective high schools, all of whom identified a wide range of benefits of being there, both academic and non- academic. As one student said:
Doing well is not something that the school forces upon us – the students themselves want to do well … we pull each other up.
The Inquiry has also seen other advantages of such schools, for example, where classes such as Latin and extension English and Maths thrive because of the numbers of students interested in and able to do them.
The Inquiry nonetheless has some difficulty with the ‘like minds’ argument. This is because it is not per se an argument for segregated schooling, but rather, for giving academically gifted students opportunities to learn with others like themselves. While it may be the case that in some primary schools there are only one or two such children in each year, it is also likely that in many, there will be several students, across different years, whose level of performance in English, Maths and other subjects is similar. Creative timetabling is what is required to give these students opportunities to learn together and to stimulate one another. At high school, where the overall number of students is greater, a group of academically talented students is likely to be clustered in each year. The Inquiry has not encountered a high school anywhere in New South Wales that lacked academically able students. While accepting that gifted students need opportunities to mix with others like themselves, there is a lack of value balance that enters the argument when this extends to total segregation. Is it really the case that academically talented students cannot and should not mix with others ever? Is this really what most parents want? Is there nothing such students could learn from a warm, witty, or perceptive student of otherwise average abilities?
The second set of arguments in favour of selective schools is that they positively enhance the performance of those attending them, enabling them to perform to their absolute best. Certainly, students in selective high schools tend to do extremely well in the School Certificate and Higher School Certificate, although this is to be expected. It has been argued to the Inquiry, in submissions from selective high schools, and
32 O’Brien, P. and Vialle, W. (1998) “Students’ and Teachers’ Perceptions of Selective Schooling.” The Australasian Journal of Gifted Education, Vol 7, No. 1, 50-55
17 through a briefing provided by the DET, that selective high schools are particularly successful in adding value to the performance of very bright students. The DET provided the following explanatory statement in support of this claim:
Value-added results are calculated through comparing current HSC results with the school certificate results attained by the same students at an earlier stage in their schooling. The value-added approach levels the playing field because it compares students of the same achievement at the commencement of the final stage of schooling. … As would be expected, students in selective schools tend to score in the highest range of performance at the school certificate. Within this top-achieving group, the value-added results for individual selective schools are extremely high, and compare very favourably with results for all students in the highest achieving group33.
This statement confirms that selective high schools are indeed effective in adding value to already high student performance in the terms outlined. In addition, the statement implies that some comprehensive high schools are effective in improving the performance of the brightest students. In other words, value-added input to bright students is not limited to selective schools, and for at least some very able students, attendance at a comprehensive high school does not disadvantage them in their academic performance. This is critical. It indicates that academically gifted students do not necessarily have to be segregated in special schools in order to perform very well (a fact many private schools that are not academically selective count upon). It should be noted that even allowing for the value-added gain of students in selective schools, it is difficult to argue that this reflects the input of the schools only. Two other factors brought to the attention of the Inquiry are also important – student effort and coaching, and these also need to be taken into account34.
There is no question that getting a high HSC mark is a key factor in choosing a selective school for many parents and students35. Very high HSC results usually translate into a very high University Admissions Index (UAI). The UAI forms the basis of university selection, and because of the level of competition in some courses, can confer a competitive advantage on a student receiving, say, 99.4, over one receiving 98.6. It thus operates in such a way as to render small differences in student performance and in the purported value-added contribution of different school environments highly significant for the individual. Of the 158 students who sat the HSC at James Ruse Agricultural High School in 2000, for example, 52, or one in three, gained places in the highly competitive undergraduate courses of medicine and combined law. The median UAI for this group of
33 Statement provided by the Student Assessment and School Accountability Unit, Department of Education and Training, April 2002. 34 Teachers in selective schools have spoken about the dedication and commitment of their Year 11 and 12 students. This can be so forceful that it puts extreme demands on teachers in terms of extra marking. It suggests that these students themselves bring an extra level of effort to the final years of school, an observation not limited to students in selective schools. Students and parents have also told the Inquiry that large numbers of students in selective schools are receiving coaching in some HSC subjects, in addition to attending a selective school. It is not known how many students in comprehensive high schools are being coached, but clearly, claims that selective high schools alone are responsible for value-adding in these circumstances, need to be treated with some caution. 35 Braithwaite R.J. and Kensell, H.G. (1993) “Effectiveness of Selective High Schools for Gifted and Talented Students: Students’ Perceptions.” Curriculum and Teaching, Vol. 8, No. 2, 52-59. See also Braithwaite, R.J. and Kensell, H.G. (1992), Op. Cit.
18 students (the mark gained by half the student body) was above 99.00 (i.e. in the top 1%)36. These are truly astonishing results. It can be argued that James Ruse attracts some of the most able students in the state, and that these results are only to be expected. And yet the clustering of so many students at the very top of the UAI scale suggests that the school itself provides an environment in which many of their students can excel. The functioning of the UAI may shift the balance for some students and parents in favour of a selective high school to maximise individual gain. And yet for most students, including most very able students, the achievement of a UAI of 99 or more is simply not necessary. Most courses at most universities take students with UAIs well below this37.
Despite the popularity of selective high schools, relatively little research into the short- and long-term academic and other outcomes of different settings for gifted students has been conducted. Briefly, what exists has shown minimal or no academic benefits of attending high-ability schools, once achievement levels at the start of segregation are taken into account38. Factors studied have included academic results, educational and career aspirations and academic self-concept. Some of these findings were discussed in “Working Paper 1”, released by the Inquiry in September 2001. Much research in this area is problematic, however, because of a failure to control for teaching practices and other factors that may vary in the different settings. In addition, some of the research used American students who had not chosen to attend a high (or low) ability school, and so may not be applicable to students in New South Wales selective schools who have chosen their school setting quite deliberately, and who are at the upper end of the ability continuum39. Research in the field is always difficult to undertake. However, the DET is in a position to conduct quite sophisticated research on academic outcomes, and once did so. Unfortunately, there are no recent comparison data available in New South Wales concerning the relative performances of high ability students in selective versus comprehensive high schools. The Inquiry accepts that these data might be sensitive, but would like to see them made public to contribute to this important debate. It is important in part because researchers into gifted education have themselves noted that segregation alone does not raise the performance of gifted students unless
36 James Ruse Agricultural High School 2000 Annual Report. It should be noted that the UAI is affected by which HSC subjects are studied, due to the scaling process. This means that in some selective high schools, many students do high level maths (for example). 37 Ideally, a less competitive way of selecting students for certain university courses should be found, one that is independent of the HSC. This would reduce the pressure associated with the HSC and separate it from university entrance, making it an end in itself (a point recommended in government reports on education since Wyndham). If this occurred, then the attraction of attending a selective school - as well as of attending certain elite private schools – might be moderated. From 2002, all universities in NSW have instituted more flexible entry requirements for medicine. 38 See for example, early work cited in Dwyer, M. (1998) Op. Cit: Marsh, H.W. (1991) “Failure of high-ability high schools to deliver academic benefits commensurate with their students’ ability levels.” American Educational Research Journal, Vol. 28, No. 2, pp 445 – 480; and Craven, R.G., Marsh, H.W., and Print, M. (2000) “Gifted, streamed and mixed ability programs for gifted students: Impact on self-concept, motivation and achievement.” Australian Journal of Education, Vol. 44, No. 1, 51-75. 39 Gross, M.U.M. (1997) “How ability grouping turns big fish into little fish – or does it? Of optical illusions and optimal environments.” The Australasian Journal of Gifted Education. Vol. 6, No. 2, 18-30.
19 accompanied by appropriate curricula and pedagogical accommodations40. Only where extension and enrichment opportunities are also provided does segregation produce positive effects. Again, this suggests that other environments might be able to meet the needs of academically talented students, and that such students may not need to be with their intellectual peers all the time. Additional research is also needed because of unresolved issues in relation to selectivity and academic self-esteem (discussed below), and because there is limited research into the long term outcomes of selective schooling (for example, university and post-school outcomes). Finally, the lack of research in which students are interviewed at length about the ways in which selectivity impacts on them, is to be regretted.
Briefly, the third key argument in support of selective schools is that they provide a high quality education that is non-discriminatory on the basis of gender, race or socio- economic background. The Inquiry has met many parents and students in selective schools who say that they would not be able to afford a similar education in a selective private school. They clearly believe that selective schools give their children an excellent education, and maximise their chance to pursue the careers of their choice. While parents cannot be sure about how their children would fare in a comprehensive high school, the fact that selective schools provide opportunities to students largely on the basis of merit is a positive feature. Debate in recent months has centred in part on the ethnic make-up of selective schools in Sydney, which tends to represent a number of immigrant groups, with many these days from different parts of Asia. But selective schools in New South Wales have always provided an opportunity to the strongly motivated children of immigrants41. This is not to deny that many comprehensive high schools also give the children of immigrants an excellent education, as the Inquiry has witnessed first hand. As noted above, while selective schools do contain students from low socio-economic backgrounds, they are underrepresented.
Arguments against selective schools
Arguments against selective high schools fall into four groups: those based on principle, those concerned at the practical impact of the number of selective schools, those based on concerns about self-esteem, and those that dispute the validity of a once-only allocation of students to a segregated setting.
On the first point, one submission to the Inquiry from a former teacher and parent argued:
The creation of specialist schools and in particular selective schools and opportunity classes has seriously eroded the existence of the comprehensive
40 For example, see Craven, R.G. and Marsh, H.W. (1997) “Threats to gifted and talented students’ self- concepts in the big pond: research results and educational implications.” The Australasian Journal of Gifted Education. Vol. 6, No. 2, 7-17; Rogers, K.B. (1998) “Using current research to make ‘good’ decisions about grouping”, National Association of Secondary School Principals. NAASP Bulletin. Reston: February, pp38-46; Gallagher, J.J. (1993) “Ability grouping: A tool for educational excellence”. The College Board Review. College Entrance Examination Board, Issue 168, Summer; pp21-27 Gross (1997), Op. Cit. and “Submission to the Senate Employment, Workplace Relations, Small Business and Education References Committee: The Education of Gifted and Talented Children” (2001), from The Gifted Education Research, Resource and Information Centre (GERRIC), the University of New South Wales. 41 Noonan (2002) Op.cit.
20 school. Where is the hard evidence that the prospects of the children placed in such learning environments are enhanced by their being taken out of the mainstream? … Why cannot the students who excel in various parts of the curriculum be adequately catered for in a well-resourced comprehensive school? … Parents have been trained by this divisive policy to believe that it is in the best interests of their children to mix only with those who are their intellectual equals. What about EDUCATION FOR LIFE? What about tolerance? Diversity?
This submission questions the very foundation of selective schooling – the idea that academically talented children should only mix with their “intellectual equals”. As noted earlier in this chapter, it thus questions the absolute primacy of the value of maximising individual benefit over those of tolerance and social cohesion. This view is mirrored by a high school council:
The belief that education should ‘prepare people for life’ is seriously compromised by selectivity, and this raises some key questions. Who benefits from this phenomenon? Does one particular group of students have a greater right to the meeting of their educational needs than other groups?
While the Inquiry has sympathy with this line of argument, it does not believe that selective schools, by that fact alone, fail to prepare students for ‘life’, or lack tolerance and diversity. Submissions from proponents of selective schooling have argued vigorously against this claim. In addition, evidence of the ethnic mix in many selective high schools supports their ability to sustain diversity and tolerance. Part of the difficulty in this debate is the link sometimes made in Australia between a ‘fair’ society and one in which everyone is treated in exactly the same way. One submission lamented the fact that “almost every move in Australia towards an increase in excellence … is met with the charge that the move is ‘elitist’.” The author cautioned against the rejection of developments solely on the basis that they involve singling out certain individuals as in need of special programs. The question of elitism is sensitive. Certainly, the Inquiry met some students in selective schools who saw themselves as intellectually superior to most of their peers (which may, of course, be true). But this does not necessarily imply a lack of fellow-feeling with others.
The second argument against selective schools, and in particular against the current number of such schools (28, or about one in every 13 high schools), is harder to refute. This concerns the negative impact of the current number of selective (and to a lesser extent specialist) schools on comprehensive high schools that still form the majority of all high schools. A Sydney Teachers Association claimed:
The recent proliferation of selective schools in New South Wales is weakening the traditional local high school by sapping it of its impetus and lifeblood, its achievers and role models. Whether a student leaves the local school to attend a selective academic high school or a school concentrating on sport or performing arts, the school left behind is the poorer.
21 Parents in the Illawarra region south of Sydney put this point even more strongly:
Comprehensive high school students feel they belong to a ‘left over’ population from which peers have left their group to attend selective, performing arts, sports and private schools or single sex religious schools. Comprehensive has become a euphemism for ‘no particular talent’. Society seems to now value ‘elite’ students only. The rise and development of selective high schools has almost been the death knell of comprehensive high schools.
These criticisms deserve serious attention. Proponents of selective schools are apt to argue that these schools only take about 5% of the government school cohort each year, but as a proportion of students remaining in government schools up to the HSC, this increases to nearly 9%42. The impact of selective schools on the mix of students in government schools in the senior years is thus very significant. Added to this is the impact of students attending specialist, non-government, and some senior high schools. It is difficult to deny the weight of evidence provided to the Inquiry in submissions, hearings and visits to some affected schools, that at least some comprehensive high schools are suffering significantly from the increase in selective (and other specialist) schools. As a Western Sydney high school complained:
With the withdrawal of many of the more academically talented students to other schools, there is a drop in the quality of leadership amongst senior students and so a drop in the tone of the school. This becomes part of a continuing cycle where parents, although wanting to send their students to the local comprehensive school, feel that their children will be disadvantaged, especially if they are talented, and so they send them to specialist government and private schools. The solution often given by the authorities is that we have to ‘get out into the market place and compete’. This is a difficult thing to do when the tools with which we are to compete, our talented students, are being taken from us.
This school and others noted that it is not just the reputation of the school that suffers in these circumstances. Staff become anxious about the future of the school, and as more parents choose other options, a downward spiral can set in that is difficult to turn around. It is also important to note that the system as a whole may be negatively affected by the number of selective (and specialist) schools. As one observer has noted:
… the emergence of a market in secondary education through the creation of specialist and selective high schools may have served to accelerate the drift to private schools through the apparent endorsement by the Government of the existence of a hierarchy of schools.
There would thus appear to be several reasons for considering the number of selective schools to be of concern. What is important to the Inquiry here, is that many comprehensive high schools take seriously their responsibility to assist academically talented students, and want to do so.
42 Calculations based on figures provided by the DET, involving numbers in selective schools as a proportion of all those in government schools in Years 7 and 12.
22 The third set of arguments about selective schooling concerns whether or not some able students suffer a damaging loss in self-esteem when placed with others who may be brighter than they are. The Inquiry has reviewed research literature in relation to self- concept/self-esteem and ability grouping, and has also considered anecdotal evidence. This has received particular attention in New South Wales, due to an ongoing debate between researchers from two different camps43. It is not appropriate to present the detail of the claims and counterclaims made, although the general thrust of the viewpoints deserves attention.
Briefly, on the one hand, Marsh and his colleagues at the University of Western Sydney argue that academically able students who are grouped into classes and/or schools with other such students, will experience a decline in academic self-concept (assessment of oneself as a student). This is because they compare themselves to the others and realise that they are not as good as they thought when they were in a mixed group of students. They call this the “Big Fish Little Pond Effect”, as such students are no longer big fish in little ponds (the best student in their primary school), but instead surrounded by others of equal and superior ability. In contrast, able students in mixed ability groups are likely to have higher academic self-concepts, because when they compare themselves to the others they are more academically competent. Some research directly supports this hypothesis, although the findings tend to vary depending on whether or not global or specific (academic) levels of self worth or perceived self- competence are involved44. The claim is also supported by anecdotal findings about the experiences of those students who are in the bottom half of the selective cohort, and by research suggesting that for a significant minority of students, the pressure to perform well across all academic areas, and the levels of competition and stress in selective high schools, are experienced in negative terms45.
On the other hand, there are several other ‘effects’ that also impinge on bright students’ self-esteem, whether academic, social or general. These include the positive effect of being selected for an academically competitive school or class in the first place (called the assimilation effect)46 which can to some extent counteract the negative effects of comparisons with others. Gross, of the Gifted Education Research, Resource and Information Centre (GERRIC) at UNSW, also argues that many very bright students do not necessarily make comparisons with their peers, but with themselves and their ability to fulfill their own potential (an internal comparison)47. Gross supports ability grouping because she believes that along with appropriate enrichment and extension,
43 See for example: Craven, R.G. and Marsh, H.W. (1997) Op. Cit.; Marsh, H.W. and Craven, R.G. (1998) “The big fish little pond effect, optical illusions, and misinterpretations: A response to Gross.” The Australasian Journal of Gifted Education. Vol. 7, No. 1, 6-15; Gross, M.U.M. (1997) Op. Cit.; Gross, M.U.M. (1998) “Fishing for the facts: A response to March and Craven (1998). The Australasian Journal of Gifted Education. Vol. 7, No. 1, 16-28. 44 Craven and Marsh (1997) Op. Cit.; Marsh and Craven (1998) Op. Cit.; Chan, L.K.S. (1988) “The perceived competence of intellectually talented students”, Gifted Child Quarterly, Vol 32, No. 3, 310-314. 45 Braithwaite, R.J. and Kensell, H.G. (1993) Op. Cit. This study involved students who attended NSW selective high schools during the 1980s. Marsh (1991) Op. Cit. cites an earlier study he undertook in which he found that “for at least some children, the early formation of a self-image as a poor student may be more detrimental than the possible benefits of attending a high ability school.” (p. 446). Gross (1997), Op, Cit., notes that teachers in selective high schools “believe that while the considerable majority of their students benefit both academically and socially, a minority of their students do seem to experience a decrease in self-esteem.” (p. 198) 46 Craven and Marsh (1997), Op. Cit. 47 This is particularly so for students who are task-oriented (wanting to do well for its own sake) versus ego- oriented (wanting to be the ‘best’), Gross (1997) Op. Cit.
23 this provides the ‘optimal environment’ for very bright students. She notes that while academic self–esteem measures tend to decline in Year 7 for students in both academic and comprehensive Year 7 classes, the absolute level of self-esteem of able students is still very high48. The proponents of separate gifted and talented education argue strongly that bright students who are not adequately challenged during their school years are likely to suffer far more from under-stimulation and under-achievement - and even dropping out - than from variations in self-esteem due to placement in a high ability group49. The Inquiry accepts evidence that this may be the case for a small proportion of very highly gifted individuals. However, there are some questions to be raised about the nature of giftedness in general (see below).
What sometimes gets lost in the above arguments is the acknowledgement of individual differences. The selective schools encountered by the Inquiry provide a very positive, but also very intense, secondary education. This is likely to suit some personalities more than others, and possibly, some levels and kinds of ability more than others. Selective high schools should acknowledge this and make greater attempts to select students whom they believe will thrive in such an environment50. In the meantime, the Inquiry believes that findings to date in relation to academic self-esteem and high ability grouping are not in themselves sufficiently conclusive to determine policy recommendations in relation to selective schooling or opportunity classes.
Finally, there are several concerns about the one-off allocation of students to a segregated setting at the time of the selective schools test51. These relate to the nature of giftedness and to the test itself. First, a one-off assessment at eleven (by test, school rating or both) assumes that the capacity being measured is ‘set’ and unchangeable, if not innate - such as the notion of general intellectual ability developed by Spearman, and in modified form supported by Gross and GERRIC52. The Inquiry does not wish to refute the general assertion that some people demonstrate superior intellectual capacity to others, often from an early age, and sometimes across a range of fields, although we have concerns about its definitiveness. But the Inquiry is not convinced that assessed ability should be used as the basis for allocating students to different educational experiences in an all or nothing way, at least to the extent that currently applies. Even within the academic domain, students often display a range of aptitudes, with some quicker and more advanced at maths and others at languages, for example.
48 Gross (1998), Op. Cit. 49 GERRIC submission to the Senate Workplace Relations, Small Business and Education References Committee, Inquiry into Gifted Education (2001) Op. Cit. Also Knight, B.A. “Gifted students: Voices from the classroom”. (2001) Educare News: the national newspaper for all non-government schools, Issue 119, October, 38-40. 50 In some other states, such as Victoria and South Australia, great store is placed on interviews when selecting students for classes involving academic acceleration. 51 A small number of places are available in some selective schools in the higher grades, due to student attrition (e.g. students moving interstate). But in general, mobility rates in these schools are very low, and gaining one of the small number of places after Year 7 is fiercely competitive. 52 GERRIC endorses the use of the term ‘gifted and talented’ to describe high levels of ability in a range of fields, including intellectual, creative, socio-affective and sensori-motor. This nomenclature is based on the work of Gagné, who distinguishes between giftedness as competence or capacity that may or may not be expressed, and talent, which is the performance of that competence. GERRIC claims: “Gifts are natural innate abilities, while talents are systematically developed skills … The teacher’s task, and challenge, is to recognize the gift and foster the talent.” GERRIC submission to the Senate Inquiry into Gifted Education (2001), Op. Cit. p. 12. This recognises that not all gifted students demonstrate commensurate skill, a factor important in assisting in the identification of underachievers and/or students who are capable but simply ‘turned off’ school.
24 The Inquiry’s observation of students in gifted and talented classes, and conversations with teachers trained in gifted education, confirm the general view that many very bright students do not excel at every academic subject to the same extent. In addition, students who are not quite as able overall, may, due to a combination of aptitude and interest, outperform students ‘selected’ to attend a special school, in certain subjects. If ability is not an all or nothing phenomenon, as evidence suggests, then segregation of students into special schools on the basis of a narrow test, is difficult to justify.
A one-off assessment also makes little allowance for change and growth in students over time – factors that may impact positively or negatively on their performance. Teachers have repeatedly pointed out that children blossom at different rates. One of the strengths of Wyndham’s conception of adolescence, which informed his belief in a comprehensive education system, was that adolescents are “dynamic”, and that both their interests and abilities may change. In setting up selective schools based on a one- off test, New South Wales runs the risk of putting children into boxes at too early an age, much as the 11 plus exam in Britain was accused of doing53. The Inquiry does not support this degree of categorisation. Proponents of giftedness emphasise the stable nature of intellectual ability, the ‘gift’ that may or may not be evidenced, rather than notions such as multiple intelligence. But in doing so, they run the risk of denying the variability that exists in every classroom. To the extent that notions such as ‘giftedness’ get in the way of a more flexible and realistic assessment of different students’ capacities in the academic arena, the Inquiry strongly suggests the adoption of more specific terms such as “academically able” and “academically talented”.
This leads to a consideration of the level of ability deemed to connote ‘giftedness’. It is sometimes not clear at which level of, say, intellectual giftedness the need for special intervention occurs. The Inquiry is persuaded that a small number of exceptionally able students will need special programs, including options such as radical acceleration through their school years. In addition, there will be others (deemed ‘moderately’ and ‘highly’ gifted by GERRIC) who will need modification of the curriculum, including significant opportunities for extension54. But it is of serious concern that notions of ‘giftedness’ have trickled down to levels of what used to be considered average to moderate ability, such as IQs of 115 (a level deemed to be ‘mildly gifted’ by GERRIC). Taken literally, this implies that students at this level (up to 16% of the school population) cannot easily be accommodated in regular classrooms. This expansion of notions of intellectual giftedness beyond the top one or two percent of students to include almost anyone who would be considered reasonably capable, weakens the overall argument about the special needs of these individuals, and creates false expectations in many parents. The expansion of notions of giftedness down to students of moderate capability may also help to explain why some teachers view the notion of giftedness with suspicion.
Finally, there are questions about the relationship between giftedness as described above, and the current Selective High Schools Test. The absence of a writing or creativity component to the test, both of which would measure divergent as well as convergent thinking, skews the test in one direction only. There is also widespread agreement that many students are being coached for the test, and that there may be a
53 Shields, C.M. (1996) “To group or not to group academically talented or gifted students?” Educational Administration Quarterly, Thousand Oaks: April, pp295-315 54 GERRIC submission to the Senate Inquiry into Gifted Education (2001), Op. Cit.
25 practice effect in relation to it55. The influence of coaching and practice effects only underscores the fact that the selective test does not measure innate ‘giftedness’. The Inquiry is of the view that the test measures a combination of ability and industry, a point also apparently endorsed by the head of GERRIC56. This would help explain the relatively high number of (certain kinds of) NESB students selected on the basis of the test, as many of these students have a strong motivation to do well. This is not necessarily a problem; students who are capable and industrious are entitled to be rewarded. But it puts a dent in the argument that all of these students are so profoundly gifted that they need a segregated environment in which to shine. There is also a social justice issue here, because only affluent parents – or those who make severe sacrifices - can afford coaching fees. As with any issue in the public sphere, ‘choice’ is not equally available to all people. Both underachieving bright children and those from socio- economically disadvantaged backgrounds may miss out as a result, as evidence suggests that they do. In 2002, the DET has released a prototype of the selective schools test, in an attempt to counter some of these arguments.
The competing values of social cohesion (the good of the many, a multi-faceted school that mirrors society) and efficiency and individual achievement (grouping able students together) stand in stark relief in relation to selectivity. After considering the evidence, the Inquiry rejects the claim that most highly capable students are unable to be accommodated in comprehensive public schools in New South Wales, although with some caveats (see below). At present, there are also many academically talented students in the New South Wales public education system who would benefit from more stimulation and more enriching and demanding educational experiences than they are currently offered (including selective students, who are quite often critical of the teaching they receive, and have indicated this to the Inquiry) 57. Chapter 2 of the Inquiry’s report addressed this in general terms and recommended the urgent need for a revitalisation of classroom practices and productive pedagogy in New South Wales.
In contemplating a way forward for academically talented students, it is important to note that there is a range of generally accepted ways of structuring special extension programs that can be undertaken in comprehensive schools. These include: - ability grouped classes (for example, selective classes, in which the curriculum can be telescoped); - subject-specific groupings for students talented in particular areas (‘A’ streams or mixed year vertical groupings in key subjects); - withdrawal programs that enable able students to work with others in the school or across several schools; - the clustering of several gifted students in an otherwise comprehensive classroom (for example, through a shared work table); - mentor programs that link gifted adults with outstanding students; and - after-school or vacation enrichment and extension programs.
55 These points are acknowledged in the DET’s recent discussion paper on the test, Year 7 Placement Process: A Discussion Paper (2002) Op. Cit. 56 Noonan (2002) Op.cit. 57 Braithwaite and Kensell (1993) Op. Cit.; O’Brien and Vialle (1998) Op. Cit.
26 For highly gifted students, early entry to school and acceleration (by a year or more, or in certain subjects), are also options58.
The Inquiry is of the view that with adequate resourcing, including the appropriate training of teachers, many of these strategies can be used in all schools and will meet the needs of the majority of students.
Academic selectivity: Partially selective high schools
Some of the positive and negative arguments outlined above in relation to selective schools can also be made in relation to partially selective schools, although the negative impact of partially selective high schools on other high schools is obviously muted. On he face of it, schools that combine a local and selective intake look like an answer to concerns at the loss by comprehensive high schools of their more academically talented students. In addition, with their wide mix of students, partially selective schools look well placed to attend to both individual achievement and social cohesion as important values. In fact, some teachers in such schools have argued that their schools are once again genuinely comprehensive, because they have the full range of students. However, in practice, these potential gains need to be managed with care. On the academic side, the evidence is quite positive. The Inquiry visited two high schools that have been partially selective for more than ten years. Half their students enter the schools via the Selective High Schools Test, and half come from the local community. Data suggest that these schools are not only successful in adding value to the performance of their selective students, but that some of this can ‘rub off’, in terms of higher expectations by teachers, on the ‘community’ students. As one teacher told the Inquiry, “Teachers here have a clear understanding of excellence. If they don’t see excellent work, they increase their expectations.” In terms of academic excellence, these schools seem to be doing well.
In terms of social cohesion, the situation is more complex. In the two schools visited, students identified clearly as either a ‘selective’ or ‘a community’ student, a point exacerbated because they shared virtually no classes together in the early years of high school. Teachers in one school noted that the two groups did not mix at recess and lunchtime. An attempt by the school to include some ‘community’ students in selective classes in Years 9 and 10 was only slowly breaking down barriers. One student reassured her friends in the Inquiry’s presence that despite being in the selective class, “I’m really a ‘community’”. When asked why students could not take music, art and PDHPE (Personal Development, Health and Physical Education) together, the school cited administrative problems related to having the two sets of classes on different lines of the timetable. This identification was less entrenched in the school that had until recently operated a vertical curriculum, which enabled a small amount of mixing between the groups. In general, segregation between the groups loosens in both schools in Years 8, 9 and 10, and is not the basis of organisation in the HSC years, where subject choice becomes paramount.
58 See GERRIC submission to the Senate Inquiry into the Education of Gifted and Talented Students (2001) Op. Cit.; NSW Department of Education and Training submission to the Senate Inquiry into the Education of Gifted and Talented Students (2001), Op. Cit.; The Education of Gifted Children (2001), Op. cit.; and “Implementation strategies for the education of gifted and talented students”. (1991) NSW Department of Education and Training.
27 The Inquiry has been concerned by developments in two new partially selective schools in a multi-campus college. A proposal from the staff of one school to teach the selective students separately in core subjects only, was rejected by the college principals and not supported by the DET. In addition, any access to the selective stream after Year 7 will almost certainly be based on external testing, rather than the school’s judgement, thereby retaining the total separateness of the selected group. A ‘two-track’ system is thus being encouraged. In South Australia, which has a very small number of partially selective schools, students are only segregated for four core subjects and are mixed for all others. There are also opportunities for students to move into and out of the selected group if there is a need. A less definitive allocation of students to groups is consistent with a focus on both academic excellence and social cohesion.
Not surprisingly, the question of the access that non-selected students will have to enrichment and advancement opportunities in partially selective schools is a key area of concern for parents. A parent expressed her views this way:
As the parent of a child about to enter high school in a ‘non-selective’ stream, my concern with this model is that students in the non-selective classes will know as soon as they start high school that even if they try hard to excel and achieve, that there will be no movement between the top (selective) classes and the bottom (non-selective) classes in core learning areas. This will be a disincentive to academic performance. … Children in the non-selective classes will get the message that they are not as bright or as able as children in the selective stream and they will have lower expectations of themselves.
This comment reflects key findings in the research literature on the negative effects (for some students) of ability grouping. This literature is vast, and beyond the scope of this report to present in detail. However, three things seem clear. First, it is not appropriate to allocate students to forms of ability grouping in an all or nothing way, because testing is always contaminated by student achievement at particular points in time, and students develop at different rates, as noted above59. Second, it is critical to ensure that the teaching provided to students in different streams does not ‘set them up’ for success or failure. In other words, it is important that students in ‘lower’ streams are not exposed only to low level tasks such as memorising and repetition, and students in higher streams to critical thinking and problem solving60. And third, streaming is a system of social polarisation that can entrench social divisions61 and reinforce both positive and negative school cultures, and therefore behaviour. One researcher noted that “The lower groups tend to develop their own values and rewards and become increasingly antagonistic towards school” 62. There is some agreement in the literature, however, that ability grouping may be justified if and when “students are not routinely separated by ability, but are chosen for special abilities … relevant to the curriculum differentiation that will take place” 63.
59 Hallinan, M.T. “Tracking: From theory to practice. (1994) ” Sociology of Education, Vol. 67, No. 2; 79-84; Winn, W. and Wilson, A.P. (1983) “The Affect and Effect of Ability Grouping”. Contemporary Education. Vol. 54, No. 2, Winter, pp119-125. 60 Hallinan, T. (1994) Ibid. 61 Oakes, J. (1994) “More than misapplied technology: A normative and political response to Hallinan on tracking.” Sociology of Education, Vol. 67, No. 2, 84-89. 62 Winn and Wilson (1983), Op. Cit., p. 122. 63 Winn and Wilson (1983), Op. Cit., p. 122.
28 The Inquiry acknowledges that what one observer called “the dual school” presents challenges. However, there are also some relatively simple ways of overcoming them. First, in terms of the school community, it is important that the school signal clearly that all students within the school are valued for what they bring to it. This can be symbolised in various ways, including through awards for activities ranging from academic excellence to citizenship, creativity, sport and effort. Second, it is important that teachers not undermine the multiple focus of the school they are in. This is an issue of professional integrity as well as skill. Strong leadership on the part of principals, and where necessary, professional development opportunities, are needed here. And third, an important way of counteracting social division in these schools is by increasing the degree of permeability between the selected and community classes.
The Inquiry knows of no values or evidence-based rationale that would support a rigid division of students within the same school into two totally separate streams (the ‘gifted’ for all subjects, and the ‘non-gifted’ for all subjects), and does not support it. There would appear to be very little justification in terms of social values or educational outcomes for this move. While being ‘selected’ into a defined, high ability group is doubtless seen as advantageous, the opportunity for academically able students to be extended in the subjects in which they really are gifted (rather than presumed to be so), should be available to all students within the hybrid schools and elsewhere. To deny that opportunity is to ignore the value of social cohesion, to organise a school contrary to available evidence, and to constitute within a range of schools a potentially destructive educational and social divide.
Academic selectivity: Opportunity classes
Like selective schools, opportunity classes are also very popular. For each of the past five years, there have been 9-10,000 applicants, with 14-15% gaining admission to OC classes. Opportunity classes have also attracted a proportion of students out of the private school system and into the public (7% of new OC students in 2002 were from non-government schools). OCs serve a very small proportion of students in each Year 5 and Year 6 government school cohort (less than 2%). This means that vast numbers of highly able upper primary level students either do not sit the test, or do not get in to an OC. It is difficult to see why these students should be denied the stimulation and enrichment offered in OCs, as well as the kind of extension work that might equip them to compete in tests such as the Selective High Schools Test. The number of OCs compared to the number of Year 5 and 6 classes is sufficiently small that their impact on other schools is within acceptable limits. Many schools only lose one or two students a year to OCs. However, an increase in the number of classes could quickly alter this balance.
Arguments in favour of opportunity classes include the ‘like minds’ argument above and the academic success of OC students. Arguments against include possible negative impacts on some students, and the one-off selection in Year 4. Anecdotal evidence suggests that OCs operate as de facto prep classes for selective high schools (although the DET does not keep figures on the number of students in OCs who are successful in gaining places in selective high schools). The NSW Primary Principals Association has
29 expressed concern at the amount of pressure being placed on students to gain admission to an OC, through coaching and parental expectations, and at the focus on academic giftedness, rather than creativity more generally, in current testing procedures64.
Understandably, because OCs cater for so few high performing primary school children, some primary schools have developed gifted and talented programs for their academically able students. There are many models of these. Some use withdrawal, some special extension exercises, and some individual progression models. In one school visited by the Inquiry, the gifted and talented program had led to the training of a number of teachers at the school in aspects of gifted education, and this, combined with an energetic and committed Principal, had fuelled a revitalisation of teaching and learning more generally. The Inquiry had concerns, however, about the structuring of this program, which involved the introduction of a stream for gifted students, alongside the local students. The tangible division of students into ‘gifted’ and ‘not gifted’ has been very successful in attracting parents to the school, including parents of students in non- government schools. But the rigid segregation of students into two streams, starting in kindergarten, with some students mixing only with ‘like minds’ over their entire primary education, is inconsistent with the creation of an inclusive school community.
Academic Selectivity: Conclusions
Public education should recognise, develop and extend in an informed way the outstanding talents possessed by all young people. To the greatest degree practicable, individual excellence must be supported as of right and because it serves the best interests of a community that needs to garner its human talents. It is equally important that those talents be brought to fruition within a system that honours and encourages all students to reach their potential in a wide range of fields free from premature and fixed presumptions about the scope of their individual abilities. What is contemplated is a reconciliation of the earlier discussed emphases on individual achievement and communitarian values. A renewed focus on academically able students within mainstream schools would give both expression to the value of social cohesion and appropriate attention to the values of efficiency and individual achievement in the sense of maximising the academic progress of individual students in the subjects in which they excel. It is the burden of the recommendations at the end of this chapter to outline a practical course of action that will help to achieve the envisaged value reconciliation without (i) diminishing the gross national talent as a result of the altered arrangements; or (ii) losing the educational traditions associated with a core of well established selective schools.
The practical challenge is to plot the staged transition from the preservation of a group of totally selective high schools and the extension opportunities available within hybrid schools, to a position where all schools afford extension opportunities. This point was put cogently by the Secondary Principals Council, in its submission to the Inquiry:
The most important requirement is for the system as a whole to provide credible assurances to parents that their local public secondary school is able
64 NSWPPA (New South Wales Primary Principals Association) Position Paper: OC classes (2002), http://www.nswppa.org.au/occlass.html.
30 to cater for all the needs of gifted students. This means that the DET needs to properly resource its policy on gifted and talented students. This will require particular attention to teacher training. It may require, for gifted students in comprehensive schools, targeted funding as is provided for students with learning difficulties. DET directorates and schools need to investigate ways of building flexibility (for example, class sizes, teaching loads) into provision for gifted students. Pre-service and continuing teacher development must provide all teachers with the skills and tools to allow … for identification, enrichment, curriculum compacting and the use of learning models … to better meet the wide-ranging needs of gifted and talented students. Any argument that the public education system should not have selective schools is difficult to sustain in the absence of such assurances and support.
It is also important that moves to increase opportunities for academically talented students in all New South Wales schools not simply rely on traditional models and understandings of gifted education provision. Necessary improvements might see learning extend beyond the current curriculum in terms of both breadth and depth, and beyond the perimeter of the school. It might involve the more creative use of timetabling, such as the vertical unitised curriculum adopted in some schools (see Chapter 2), and more use of technology and distance education. It would require that all schools and not just new ones become flexible learning centres rather than stratified collections of classrooms (see the design standards for new schools, discussed in Chapter 6). It would see students grouped at different times in different numbers and different ways, depending not on age or stage, but on ability and interest. It is simply not possible to reconcile these notions with the current rigid division into a separate enclave of students in some schools – the ‘selected’ and the rest.
However, there is one important caveat to this general proposition. Some selective schools have developed over long periods as centres of excellence in the education of highly academically talented students (albeit in traditional academic ways). The Inquiry has visited several of these schools. From reviewing their records and encounters with their pupils (as well as teachers and parents), the Inquiry is aware of the exceptional individual attainments of the students. There are two reasons for recommending the continuation of this group of schools. First, quality institutions like the above-mentioned schools evolve from the contributions and efforts of dedicated builders, with the interplay of human forces sometimes adding fortuitously to the positive outcomes. Such social good fortune is not lightly to be discarded. Second, shifts in social policy can seldom be so ‘right’ as to warrant the overturn of such achievements, even if the value balance tilts unevenly towards the pursuit of individual achievement.
The way forward is not separable from the initiatives for improving public education in New South Wales already tabled in the first report of the present Inquiry. A major focus of that report was on the revitalisation of teaching and learning in public education, through increased teacher professional development and through system-wide curriculum and pedagogic reform. Pre-service education for new teachers is also essential, and is dealt with in a later chapter of the Inquiry’s report. As emphasised in Chapter 2, teachers need time and space to introduce the types of changes being projected here in relation to developing outstanding abilities in all children. Once again, the Inquiry’s recommendations about professional development funding and management (Chapter 1) are pivotal to the whole reform project for, as previously
31 argued, it is by means of the professional development measures already outlined that the necessary time and focus can be procured. The Inquiry also reiterates earlier recommendations (Chapter 2) concerning an increased emphasis on pedagogy over curriculum development and the supportive role to be played by a proposed Pedagogy Clearinghouse. All of these measures form a foundation for the present proposal to make available enrichment and extension opportunities to all students in all schools, rather than to only a select few.
Specialisation
In this section, the impact of forms of specialisation other than straight academic selectivity in high schools is briefly examined. This includes sports, creative/performing arts, technology and languages high schools, as well as others that advertise a special focus area or area of expertise65. The Inquiry has not devoted detailed attention to specialist high schools in New South Wales, in part because with the exception of school sport, no information concerning negative impacts of these developments has been brought forward. In addition, with two exceptions, these schools combine a local intake with a specialist one, and so meet the basic requirement of combining individual excellence and social inclusion (notwithstanding some of the problems of stratification within schools identified previously). The Inquiry is also of the view that some differentiation, within an otherwise comprehensive high school, is acceptable and perhaps even necessary. The question then becomes how much, and of what kind.
As noted early in this chapter, secondary schooling in New South Wales confronts students with a variety of choices. There is little doubt that the hierarchy of schools created through institutional arrangements such as deeming some to be selective and/or specialist, makes the task of surrounding comprehensive schools harder. Comprehensive high schools have responded in a variety of ways to this challenge. For example, a number have instituted special programs of one kind or another, such as girls’ or boys’ initiatives, gifted and talented programs, or innovative approaches to middle schooling66. Schools that are in a genuine position to offer an area of expertise or specialisation, should, in the Inquiry’s view, be encouraged to do so. Their expertise should be acknowledged and made publicly known, to assist parents in making appropriate choices for their children. This ‘soft’, less formal kind of differentiation, draws on the more positive aspects of school choice and competition, such as increased transparency and responsiveness to the views of the local community67. However, where schools are given (or appropriate) a label purely to give them a market advantage, but lack the relevant facilities and/or teaching expertise, this degrades the value of genuine cases, and should cease.
The situation with officially designated specialist high schools is somewhat different. In important ways, the ideology of specialist high schools runs counter to that of comprehensive high schools. Specialist high schools do not just assume that ‘special’ opportunities must be provided for talented students in some or all schools, but that such
65 Agricultural high schools have not been dealt with in this section, but rather under the section on academic selectivity, as entry to them is gained through the Selective High Schools Test. 66 See, for example, the series of articles entitled “Class Acts”, in the Sydney Morning Herald, June 10-14, 2002. 67 Hirsch, D. (2002) What Works in Innovation in Education – School: A Choice of Directions. CERI Working Paper, OECD/CERI.
32 students develop best in the company of others like themselves. It reflects yet again the trend in New South Wales towards the segmented provision for students with special abilities. In general, the Inquiry sees no need for specially designated schools. However, given that there are now relatively few such schools, and some are more ‘softly’ differentiated than others, as discussed above, they need to be considered on their merits.
Briefly, the Inquiry acknowledges the conduct of recent reviews by the DET in relation to all technology and languages high schools, that have reduced their number to those that are truly focusing on one or other specialisation. Such reviews should occur periodically in relation to all specialist schools. In different ways, languages and technology have been in need of nurture within the school system, although whether or not this should continue, especially in relation to technology, should be revisited in the future. In the meantime, the Inquiry can see no objection to the continuation of these specialist high schools. The same view is taken of a number of schools that have recently been promised sophisticated information and communications technology, which would also give them an area of specialisation.
In relation to the arts, the situation is a little different. There are six creative and performing arts high schools in New South Wales, two fully selective and four that also take students from their local communities. With the exception of the Conservatorium of Music, there are three such schools in Sydney (Newtown, Bankstown, and Kuring-gai), and one each in Wollongong and Newcastle. There are arguments that can be made for aggregating artistically talented students together, and the Inquiry has been told of the positive synergy and bonding that occurs when devotees of dance or drama find themselves with others who share their passion. In relation to both performing arts and sport, the Inquiry visited schools that were impressive as centres of excellence in their areas of specialisation and had international reputations. While the objection can be raised that it is important to have talented creative and performing arts students in a wide range of schools, the number of specialist schools at present is limited, and many talented students remain in the comprehensive system. For as long as that number does not grow, those that exist should remain.
In relation to sports, the issue is more complex again. There are currently seven sports high schools in New South Wales, five in Sydney and one each in Newcastle and Wollongong. While PDHPE (Personal Development, Health and Physical Education) can be taken as an HSC subject, many students in sports high schools attend because of their skill in playing a particular sport. It is argued that having equally talented school colleagues enhances the development of skills and expertise and results in meaningful intra-school competition. The key argument made against sports high schools is that, in the words of one observer, they have “killed school sport” in many other high schools. In inter-school competitions, not surprisingly, the sports high schools usually come first in sports in which they specialise, leaving all other schools to battle for second place. This seems a high price to pay. However, the Inquiry understands that not all sports high schools compete in local school sports competitions. In addition, there are said to be a number of reasons why school sport is on the decline, especially for students in the senior years, including the pressure of the HSC and the use of sport time for students to attend TAFE courses. It is nonetheless of concern to the Inquiry that the seventh sports high school was recently established without detailed consideration of the consequences for other schools. This should not be repeated.
33 In conclusion, the Inquiry believes that ‘soft’ differentiation is preferable to formally designating some schools as specialist, and that no more specialist sports or arts high schools should be established.
Stand-alone senior colleges
Stand-alone senior colleges and collegiates address the challenges of keeping students at school to Year 12 through institutional arrangements that differentiate among students on the basis of age and stage. In many instances, the senior colleges have also been endowed with physical amenities well in excess of those enjoyed in most comprehensive high schools. These include larger libraries (often linked to TAFE and/or a university), cafeterias, lecture theatres and seminar rooms. This makes any evaluation of their impact, particularly in terms of measures of student satisfaction, problematic, because it confounds the degree of stage specialisation with the provision of amenities.
There are several ways of assessing the success or otherwise of the senior colleges, including student evaluations, teacher perceptions, academic outcomes and evidence concerning their positive and/or negative impact on surrounding schools. On the first of these points, the DET has published the results of a commissioned study undertaken in 2000 on the educational experiences of students and teachers in the five stand-alone senior colleges in New South Wales68. In relation to students, the findings demonstrated: - Very high levels of satisfaction with school; - Very high endorsement of teachers’ sense of fairness and ability to encourage students, keep control and explain things well; - High levels of belief in the capacity of their school to meet their social and personal as well as academic and vocational goals; - Almost universal endorsement of each college’s ability to deliver a wide range of subjects; - High levels of satisfaction from boys, contrary to some other studies.
Comparison data using students in Year 7-12 high schools was not available for the 2000 study. However, a 1996 study compared students in six senior colleges (half government and half non-government) and in 100 government and non-government 7-12 high schools in New South Wales. The findings of this study confirm students’ high regard for the senior colleges and their programs. In addition, the authors note that for those students who have found traditional schooling unsatisfactory, the colleges appear to provide an effective alternative learning environment. Some caution is needed in interpreting these results because by definition, students have actively chosen to go to a stand-alone senior high school, whereas students in 7-12 schools are more likely to have been channelled into the senior years, but the findings are nonetheless very positive.
In terms of teachers’ views, teachers in the five senior colleges in the 2000 study agreed that the colleges had many positive features. They were very satisfied with the teaching environment, with the tone of the colleges, with discipline procedures, with their interactions with colleagues, and with the leadership in their schools. Many saw their schools as achieving both academic and social/personal goals for students, as having clear expectations of students, and as encouraging self-confidence and personal growth
68 Polesel, J., Teese, R. and O’Brien, K. (2001) Five Senior Colleges in the New South Wales Department of Education and Training. Final Report. New South Wales Department of Education and Training. January.
34 in students. However, a majority of the teachers believed that students’ personal problems were time-consuming and that students found it difficult to settle in to college. Importantly, the claim made to the Inquiry by some teachers in comprehensive high schools to the effect that student - teacher relationships in senior colleges cannot develop in as positive ways as in 7-12 schools, is not borne out by these findings, in the eyes of either students or teachers. The Inquiry experienced this firsthand in discussions with students at Coffs Harbour Senior College and at St Marys Senior High School, where students highlighted their relationship with teachers as a major advantage, pointing out their accessibility and openness, saying: “They’re your friends, they don’t talk down to you.”
Evidence in relation to the academic outcomes of these schools has not been formally made available to the Inquiry. Anecdotal evidence suggests that St Marys Senior High School and Coffs Harbour Senior College do very well in traditional academic terms. St Marys’ 2001 Annual Report, for example, indicates that value-added data is very good, especially for the lower third of the ability range69. The other three senior colleges work with a much more varied population, and so statistical data would not be expected to be as strong. However, in discussions with Illawarra Senior College, the Inquiry was impressed by the attention given to individual students and by anecdotal claims concerning success rates.
The final question, concerning the impact of these colleges on surrounding schools (and TAFE colleges) is not quite so straightforward. The research study cited above noted:
… each of the colleges operates within its immediate (and sometimes more extended) geographical environment as an alternative choice … In all cases, there is an element of competition with local providers - an inevitable consequence of clearly delineated alternatives being offered70.
Competition can occur between senior colleges and other high schools, and with Institutes of TAFE. However, the greatest criticism and concern during the course of the Inquiry has been levelled at the two colleges that provide what the above report called a “quasi-selective academic environment” 71, St Marys Senior High School and Coffs Harbour Senior College. Both of these schools have many more applicants than available places, and both select students on the basis of a commitment to learning (numbers at Coffs Harbour are capped at 450, and are more than 800 at St Marys). This increasingly means that highly capable academic and vocational students, as well as school leaders, are accepted, rather than the full range of students, especially at St Marys (which is in such high demand). In addition, both have outstanding facilities compared to many 7-12 high schools, and so are physically attractive, as well as offering a more adult environment, a wide range of subject options and so on. Given that neither has any feeder schools, it seems inevitable that the students for these two schools would
69 As indicated above, value-added data shows how well students perform in the HSC compared to the School Certificate. Where students do better on the HSC than would be predicted on the basis of their School Certificate result, it is assumed that the school has contributed to this (has ‘added value’). 70 Polesel et. al. (2001), Ibid, p. 17 71 Polesel et. al. (2001), Ibid, p. 17
35 come from other government (and non-government) schools, and thereby deplete them, a fact apparently not fully appreciated when they were established72.
The Inquiry met with staff and students at Coffs Harbour Senior College, and inspected the College’s facilities. The school and its students were both very impressive. A recent research study found that while Coffs Harbour had put pressure on enrolments in surrounding 7-12 traditional high schools, it had also attracted actual and potential students from non-government schools in the area73. In addition, the authors cited several factors contributing to the continuing strength of a number of local comprehensive high schools, including strong leadership and public relations, schools with positive reputations and histories (e.g. no recent ‘bad’ incidents), and a critical mass of working parents committed to public education. Visits by the Inquiry to several high schools in the region confirmed this general impression, although negative views about the impact of the Senior College were expressed. Some schools lose a dozen or more of their top Year 10 students to the Senior College every year. This not only depletes those schools, but means that they are less well placed to compete against some very active private schools in the area, especially in terms of HSC results. In addition, there is strong resentment in several high schools over the invidious comparisons implied by Coffs Harbour Senior College in its local television advertising, which claims that students who join the college can combine “learning with lifestyle”. This style of advertising is demoralising to other government schools less privileged with respect to buildings and amenities. The Inquiry sees no place for this kind of marketing, and certainly not when funded, as in the present case, by the DET.
The situation in relation to St Marys Senior High School is more complex. On the one hand, the Inquiry was extremely impressed on visiting the college with its facilities, staff, students, achievements and atmosphere. While St Marys claims to be very careful in its advertising to avoid a promotional approach, this is not the perception of some surrounding high schools. Schools from as far away as Parramatta in the East and Nepean in the West have commented on the negative impact of St Marys on their Year 11 and 12 enrolments and HSC results. Many schools have lost teachers (and expertise) because of declining senior enrolments74. The St Marys Mt Druitt Teachers Association, in its submission to the Inquiry, referred to the “brain drain” of St Marys Senior High School. A submission from an affected school said:
We lose half of our top Year 10 performers at the end of each year [to St Marys], and this, in return, impacts on our higher school certificate results two years later.
72 The announcement of the establishment of St Marys Senior High School said that it would not “threaten surrounding high schools as they will retain their Year 11 and 12 enrolments”, and would “offer new opportunities without limiting choices available at neighbouring schools.” Media Release, “Senior High School for Western Sydney”, Minister for Education and Youth Affairs, the Honourable Dr Terry Metherell, April 20, 1988. 73 Campbell, C. and Sherington, G. (2001) “’Residualisation’, regionalism and the recent history of the State comprehensive high school”. Paper presented at the ACOSS Roundtable on Social Investment in Education, August. 74 St Marys takes well over 200 Year 10 students from government high schools in western Sydney each year, as well as up to 150 from non-government schools.
36 It is clear that senior officers in the DET are also concerned at the impact St Marys has had on a number of surrounding high schools. A briefing paper prepared by the current Principal of the school considers a range of options for limiting St Marys’ impact on other schools, including capping enrolments from those schools (for example, taking a certain maximum percentage from each), forming St Marys into a collegiate with feeder schools, and expanding its drawing area. The briefing paper also contemplates St Marys and three nearby high schools that are amongst those most affected in terms of numbers by St Marys, becoming a ‘virtual’ collegiate. The Inquiry is of the view that any decision on these options needs to be made following appropriate consultation with the local community, and in the light of relevant medium-term demographic projections for high schools in the Mount Druitt school district.
In summary, there is clearly a range of strengths attached to stand-alone senior colleges, and impressive educational activity taking place in all of them. The Inquiry commends the colleges offering alternative pathways and second chance options to individuals who have not experienced success in mainstream schools. The Inquiry also notes the impressive work being done by the two academically oriented colleges, and considers the facilities that they have been given entirely appropriate to their task. It is regrettable that more high schools in New South Wales are unable to offer equivalent facilities. There are ongoing concerns, however, in relation to these schools’ impact on surrounding schools.
Multi-campus colleges
The advent since 1999 of ten multi-campus colleges, involving 35 high schools, has changed the secondary education environment in New South Wales dramatically, with effects that are yet to be fully experienced. Most of these colleges split secondary education into two stages, roughly covering the compulsory and post-compulsory stages of education, with some or all students moving from one campus to another for the senior years. At the level of principle, the new arrangements retain the comprehensive make-up of the student body. However, multi-campus colleges raise challenging questions about choice. The transformation of more than 30 local high schools from comprehensive to age-selective, clearly limits the choice of families in those areas who would prefer a 7-12 comprehensive high school. In addition, the speed with which the current changes have occurred, and the extent of change, leave a range of unanswered questions. Many comments have been made to the Inquiry about the colleges, and in addition, Inquiry members have visited some of the campuses of nearly all of them. While each multi-campus college is unique, as a group they raise a number of key issues. These include the rationale for their establishment, their efficacy, implementation issues and their impact more generally on secondary education in New South Wales.
Rationale for establishment
During a discussion about the collegiate initiative, one observer noted to the Inquiry: “If collegiates are the solution, what is the problem?” This question encapsulates a repeated theme raised by teachers, parents and students, concerning why the DET has moved so quickly to establish so many multi-campus colleges. This is not surprising, given the disruption that the wholesale reorganisation of schools into junior or senior campuses involves. The primary reasons given by the DET for their establishment were
37 outlined above. However, there remains scepticism among teachers about the educational rationale for structural change. As one Sydney Teachers’ Association commented:
There has been no educational rationale or research evidence given to show that the formation of collegiate systems will be to the educational benefit of the students who attend those schools involved in the collegiate system or to students who attend nearby schools affected by the establishment of the collegiate.
Not surprisingly, given the current market orientation of much public sector policy making, economic considerations are sometimes touted as the ‘real’ reason for the collegiate development. A regional Teachers Association argued:
The current push for restructure within the public education system in New South Wales, particularly that which sees high schools moving away from the local, comprehensive model to selective, junior and senior multi-campus models, seems to have far less to do with developing quality learning environments and communities than it does with creating economically viable units.
The DET Collegiate Education Plan claims that creating separate senior colleges with wider curriculum choice will encourage students to stay at school, but this is as much a hypothesis as a rationale. In practice, the rationale for each multi-campus college - educational or otherwise - is sometimes hard to discern. Many examples could be given of this, including in relation to the new colleges on the central coast and inner Sydney. However, for the purposes of this report the example of Chifley College, in Sydney’s west, will suffice.
Chifley College was created in 2000 to address low retention rates and poor academic outcomes in several schools in the Mount Druitt area75. It was also initiated in response to a crisis, in the form of negative publicity about Mount Druitt High School’s 1996 HSC results76. The impact of St Marys Senior High School (as well as low fee non- government schools) in attracting the more academically committed students from schools such as Mount Druitt has already been noted77. The schools that make up Chifley College experience many of the challenges of serving a severely socio- economically disadvantaged population (all five campuses receive PSFP funding, as do most surrounding primary schools). These extend far beyond low retention and poor HSC results, to include:
75 Chifley College comprises the former Shalvey, Dunheved and Mount Druitt High Schools as 7-10 feeder schools, Bidwill High School as a 7-12 school, and the former Whalan High School as the senior campus (Years 11-12). 76 See “Class we failed”, Daily Telegraph, January 8, 1997, page 1. The article indicated that the highest Tertiary Entrance Rank (TER) of any student in the 1996 HSC exams at Mount Druitt High School had been 44.4.This precipitated several reviews of schooling in the area. 77 See comments on St Marys above; Mt Druitt High School: Review of 1996 Higher School Certificate Performance. (1997) Dr. Alan Laughlin, Assistant Director-General, Department of School Education, February, 1997; and Polesel, J. (with Teese, R.) (2001) The New South Wales Multi-Campus Schooling Model: The Sydney Experience. New South Wales Department of Education and Training, October.
38 - Very low levels of basic skills in all secondary years; - A high NESB population, with many students coming from families with low levels of education and/or commitment to education; - High staff turnover, with few experienced staff, and many who are probationers and/or overseas trained, with no experience of teaching in Australia, especially in maths and science; - High absentee rates (up to 25% per day); - Significant levels of behavioural problems; - High levels of family dislocation and poverty, and a highly transitory student population; and - Poor retention rates at several points, including the transitions from Years 6 to 7, 8 to 9 and 9 to 10, as well as in the senior years.
If this range of educational challenges were ever to be successfully addressed, then initiatives commencing in kindergarten would be needed. One of several reports into education in the area noted the need for smaller K-1 classes, more preschools, more reading recovery and STLD teachers and more welfare and discipline support78. The Inquiry has been informed by several sources that none of these recommendations was implemented, with the exception of a few extra early childhood teachers for one year. Rather, the spotlight has been on the College to somehow cope with the many real and pressing problems encountered in the area. The Inquiry has visited the Mount Druitt (junior), Bidwill (junior) and Whalan (senior) campuses of Chifley College, and has been impressed by many of the initiatives taking place, and by the commitment of many of the teachers under very difficult circumstances. For example, in several schools, a conscious shift from ‘looking after the kids’ (a welfare focus) to an emphasis on academic content and rigour, is being implemented to help raise educational standards. Literacy and numeracy are also being addressed. Some schools are introducing productive pedagogies and/or team teaching in Years 7 and 8, to help engage adolescent students who are in danger of dropping out. These are all positive initiatives, ones that seem appropriate to the needs of the students at Chifley. But none is dependent on a collegiate structure. It is not even clear how a collegiate structure might add to or hinder their positive impact.
However, this does not mean that clear educational reasons cannot be advanced for a focus on middle or senior schooling. In broad terms, the two educational challenges collegiates claim to address are problems concerning the education of young people in the middle years of high school, and the need to provide a compelling environment with many options and more freedom, to students in the post-compulsory years. These are legitimate issues of concern. That is why the Inquiry’s analysis in Chapter 2, on curriculum and pedagogy, is of pivotal importance to the reinvigorating of the New South Wales public education system. A positive focus on the engagement of students by such means as the use of an integrated and relevant curriculum, structured group learning and problem solving activities, authentic assessment, and other means outlined in Chapter 2, supported by system-wide initiatives, would be a major strategic response to the first of the above-mentioned educational challenges.
78 The Way Forward: from preschool to employment (1998). Recommendations for improving comprehensive education in the Mount Druitt area. NSW Department of Education and Training. (August 1998).
39 The question that remains unanswered, however, is to what extent the structural division of schools into junior and senior campuses is necessary to achieve these benefits79. On the one hand, the Inquiry has encountered examples that support this claim. As summarised in Chapter 2, Seven Hills High School, which is a junior 7-10 campus of Nirimba College, and Wallsend junior campus of Callaghan College in Newcastle, have both been the sites of impressive pedagogical reform focused on the middle years. And both credit their new lease of life to being given a revised mission as a 7-10 campus. On the other hand, the development of collegiates has been accompanied by several other initiatives that, if sustained, could contribute to the further revitalisation of public education without the need for the collegiates themselves. First, all multi-campus colleges enjoy a significant degree of staffing flexibility compared to traditional high schools, because of the way the senior staffing formula is calculated. This translates into additional release time for staff, enabling them to liaise with other campuses, and means that most campuses can appoint extra positions such as Head Teacher, Welfare. Many comprehensive high schools would jump at the opportunity for these resources. Second, in several collegiates, substantial sums are going into refurbishment and new buildings in order to upgrade facilities to a high level. This can only enhance these schools’ educational effectiveness and attractiveness. And third, the teachers in some of the colleges, such as Sydney Secondary College, are undergoing an intensive professional development program in relation to pedagogy and classroom practice, centred around ‘middle schooling’, but also focusing on senior teaching. These three factors are destined to lift the performances of the Colleges concerned, but all these initiatives could have been introduced without a collegiate structure. A clear rationale for collegiates remains elusive.
Efficacy
The second aspect to be considered in relation to collegiates is whether or not they are effective educationally. At one level, it is too early in relation to most of the new groupings to make a firm assessment. Academic performance, for example, cannot really be evaluated until a cohort of students has gone right through the new system. It will only be then that comparisons of students in junior and senior colleges and surrounding high schools can be made, and even then the variables will be confounded due to the staffing and other resources given to the colleges. However, the Inquiry has briefly considered two kinds of information in relation to this question: a DET commissioned study on student satisfaction with multi-campus colleges80, and informal evidence concerning retention and absentee rates in the different colleges.
The research study examined three colleges: Nirimba, Chifley and Georges River. It found that in relation to the senior campuses of these colleges (Wyndham, Whalan and Oatley), students were very positive, endorsing the choice of subjects on offer, expectations placed on them (including the pressure to work hard), opportunities for workplace training and the colleges’ friendly atmosphere. Students were also very
79 Australian Curriculum Studies Association (1996) From Alienation to Engagement: Opportunities for reform in the middle years of schooling. Australian Curriculum Studies Association Inc., Belconnen, ACT. 80 Polesel, J. (with Teese, R.) (2001) Op. Cit. This research investigated the efficacy of three Sydney multi- campuses: Nirimba College and Chifley College in Sydney’s west, and Georges River College in the south. The views of students, teachers, and to a lesser extent, parents concerning the college’s educational goals and outcomes, and indices of satisfaction were assessed at each site. Students were surveyed in Year 12 in the senior colleges, and Year 10 in the junior colleges.
40 complimentary about their teachers’ knowledge of their subject areas and their ability to manage the classroom and student learning. There were also some concerns expressed. The transition to the senior college was seen as a major hurdle, with the need for more transition programs and inter-mixing between the campuses (parents and teachers also agreed with this). Teachers in the senior campuses saw the breadth of the curriculum, and its ability to meet the needs of a wide range of students as major advantages, including links with TAFE. The size of the colleges was felt to enable teachers to be part of a teaching team, because everyone was working together to develop their skills as HSC teachers. Experimentation in terms of teaching (for example, lectures) was also evident81.
In relation to the 7-10 (junior) campuses, the students surveyed were very positive about their schools’ ability to help them achieve good academic results, to provide them with workplace opportunities, and to teach them good writing and communication skills, and were generally positive about other aspects of their learning environment. An exception was student-teacher relationships (accepting different points of view, letting students have their say), and discipline (being friendly and fair). The authors interpret this as reflecting the developmental tensions of adolescence. The study of the three colleges also found that parents were positive about the 7-10 colleges, as helping make younger students feel important, and in encouraging them to work hard in the years before the HSC.
Teachers expressed the view that the creation of junior colleges enabled them to focus on the needs of junior students, free of the weight of the HSC. This included a renewed focus on literacy, including ‘social literacy’ (how to read and respond appropriately to social signals), on ‘at-risk’ students and more generally, on teaching and learning and forming a positive orientation to school. The provision of leadership opportunities to students at a younger age was also cited as positive in its impact, although some felt that the lack of older role models was problematic.
The other kind of data that can be considered at this stage is retention and attendance rates at the new colleges. These are variable. In relation to Chifley, the above research report concluded that while Chifley could never achieve its “full potential” while losing so many students to neighbouring schools, “the establishment of the multi-campus structure provides Chifley with its best opportunity to date to retain and nurture such students82”. This is because the senior campus can offer a wide range of both academic and vocational programs. However, it is clear that Chifley is having difficulty attracting students. Nearly half the students in the Mount Druitt area are bypassing Chifley campuses altogether, in favour of other 7-12 comprehensive high schools. And many academically oriented students are still choosing to attend St Marys or one of several other local high schools for Years 11 and 12, rather than go to the senior campus of Chifley. On the other hand, retention rates in colleges such as Nirimba, Georges River and Callaghan are increasing83. At Georges River College, retention rates are up in the feeder schools, and the Oatley senior campus is in such high demand that it has had to
81 The findings of this study are of interest to the Inquiry because they stand in contrast to the conclusions reached in relation to senior high schools by the Catholic Education Commission in NSW, which led to its decision to revert in most areas to 7-12 high schools. See “Senior High Schools: The NSW Catholic Experience” (2000), Advice forwarded to the NSW Shadow Minister for Education and Training by the Catholic Education Commission, New South Wales, October, 2000. 82 Polesel, J. (with Teece, R.) (2001), Op, Cit., p. 25 83 See for example, Annual Report (2000) New South Wales Department of Education and Training.
41 limit applications for entry from non-government school students. The students spoken to at Seven Hills, a junior campus of Nirimba College, looked forward to going on to the senior campus for Years 11 and 12, impressed by the links with TAFE and university and the chance to call teachers by their first names. In 2001, 90 of 100 Year 10 students at Seven Hills made this transition, suggesting good retention rates across the two campuses. At Callaghan, retention rates have also increased significantly.
In conclusion, evidence in relation to the educational efficacy of the different colleges is variable, and as most are still in their infancy, it will be some time before results are clearer.
Implementation
Much has been said to the Inquiry concerning problems associated with the implementation of the collegiates in New South Wales. Many of the complaints received by the Inquiry revolved around the issue of observance of accepted practices in managing change. The extent of that observance is sometimes viewed differently by District officers and school principals on the one hand, and their staff and the school community, on the other. Teachers at Callaghan College and at Sydney Secondary College noted that while the principals of the constituent schools were consulted and involved in decision-making, the staff as a whole were not. The staff of one school wrote:
The teaching staff at our school had no real participation in the decision to move to a college system. Staff were misled and were surprised when a college was announced. Consequently, staff have no real concept of ownership of the change and don’t see themselves as genuine stakeholders.
Students felt the same way, one group informing the Inquiry that the collegiate was “sprung on them”, rushed through with consultation only after the decision had been made. A student at Sydney Secondary College recommended to the DET:
That, just as tolerance and acceptance for diversity of ideals, views and all people are promoted as key values in public education, those advocating educational change should practise such values through genuine, non- confrontationalist consultation with those affected.
While nothing can be done about the past, lessons for the future include the need for adequate consultation and involvement of all stakeholders in the changes, clear guidelines for implementation, efficient institution of the new arrangements, and fair handling of everyone affected. The Inquiry would not argue that every whim of local communities should be acceded to in relation to school restructuring; change would be almost impossible if this were so. Rather, both local communities and broader, state- based priorities need to be considered in relation to educational change. Where local interests are involved, it is unlikely that any approach will gain universal agreement, but the tabling of explicit criteria for choosing appropriate arrangements for students in their junior and senior high school years would encourage rational debate. The conclusions and recommendations section of this chapter is an initial contribution to that process.
42 In terms of implementation, the timing of the implementation of several colleges has been problematic, sometimes preceding the refurbishment of buildings and provision of facilities to meet student needs. At Callaghan and at Brisbane Water College, a tough decision has forced Year 10 students to relocate to the senior college with very short notice. The effective formation of Chifley College has been severely hindered by delays to the senior campus, which is only now being built. Much good will and educational efficacy has been lost as students have failed to continue from the feeder schools to the senior campus. In the view of senior College officials, the College was implemented a year earlier than it should have been. The Jesmond senior campus of Callaghan College is, in the words of one observer, “a dump”. Where students are asked to change campuses, the existence of appropriate facilities would appear to be a minimum prerequisite.
There is also currently a lack of clarity concerning just what a collegiate is. Flexibility within reason is a good thing, but it is not clear how the DET sees the current multi-campus colleges evolving. For instance, in the case of Chifley, the late appointment of a college principal, and Chifley’s lack of financial status as a college (because global budgets and PSFP funds still go to the individual schools), have made the development of a College ethos difficult. In addition, Bidwill’s continuation as a 7-12 school within the Chifley structure leaves it somewhat divorced from the rest of the college. The corporate allocation and management of funds would seem basic to a meaningful collegiate, and yet in all current collegiates, funding continues to go to individual schools. Individual schools within two of the colleges told the Inquiry that they see themselves as separate entities, ‘hooking into’ the college on a needs basis. Senior college officials noted that they are unable to direct component schools to undertake cooperative and corporate activities. Nirimba College operates without an overall college principal, with each school developing its own distinctive identity. Perhaps as a consequence, there is a view among staff that Nirimba has yet to develop a unified identity. Northern Beaches College contains a number of schools that have not been asked to alter their composition or allegiances at all - an arrangement tagged by one senior official in the DET as a “Clayton’s college”. It may be that this latter model, which is more in the nature of a consortium than a college, offers advantages without the disadvantages of full scale restructuring. For example, the Inquiry understands that at Northern Beaches, students will sometimes be able to stay at their campus but access courses offered from other campuses.
Finally, there are significant unresolved professional and industrial issues in relation to staff in the collegiates that have the capacity to cause widespread disaffection among teachers, if not carefully and clearly dealt with. Evidence from other states and overseas where junior and senior high schools exist suggests that over time, specialisation tends to be inevitable, and junior high school teachers are disenfranchised in terms of senior positions, and to some extent, vice versa84. Teachers interviewed in three multi-campus colleges were all too aware of possible threats to their mobility and advancement if they specialised, particularly very early in their careers, although as a group, these teachers varied from supporting specialisation to opposing it85. The provision of opportunities for junior campus staff to retain currency in their subject speciality, and for senior campus
84 Polesel, J. (with Teese, R) (2001) Op. Cit.; The Challenge of Change: A review of high schools in the ACT (1983) Report of the review committee, ACT Schools Authority, Canberra. 85 Polesel, J. (with Teese, R) (2001), Ibid.
43 teachers to be exposed to state-of-the-art middle school pedagogical practices, have yet to be ironed out. These issues are not unresolvable, but they do require attention.
Impact on secondary schooling in general
One immediate impact of the creation of the multi-campus colleges has been the modification of the availability of secondary education in different parts of the state. A number of parents, for example, have commented on the loss of choice (of a 7-12 school) implicit in the move to collegiates and other forms of specialisation. There is now no choice - without significant travel times - of a Year 7-12 comprehensive co- educational high school on parts of the central coast, in Dubbo, or in some parts of inner Sydney and western Sydney. This situation is exacerbated in Western Sydney, which not only has St Marys Senior High School, but two of the collegiates, Nirimba and Chifley. This means that of the 24 high schools in the Mount Druitt and Blacktown Districts, for example, 9 form part of collegiates, and 3 (the senior campuses of the two collegiates and St Marys) are senior colleges. Two of the senior colleges already have impressive facilities and the other will soon have them86. The possible impact on the 14 high schools that are not included in these arrangements is already significant, and may increase. If the Whalan senior campus of Chifley College were to prove popular, for example, it could pull senior students from a range of surrounding high schools as well as from its feeder schools. Some of these schools are currently benefiting from the failure of Whalan to be built.
A second issue is the uncertainty - some have said ‘destabilisation’ - caused by the advent of the collegiates. While many of the multi-campus colleges are still in transition, there is a widespread belief among teachers that this model may be a prototype for the future. To say that feelings are running high is an understatement. At present, it is not clear what the DET long-term plan in relation to comprehensive high schools or collegiates might be, and some clarity about the future (including the DET’s commitment to comprehensiveness and to diversity) would seem essential for the effective functioning of the system. What seems to be lacking from the debate at present is a consideration of collegiates in the context of other initiatives that might achieve some of the same ends. In particular, options such as community education centres offering particular subjects to a range of schools (for example, languages), the use of communications technology to link students in different schools, more distance education, and flexible and cooperative timetables to enable student movement across schools (as in Newcastle and Wagga Wagga), seem under-utilised. The Inquiry has been surprised at the rigidity evident in some schools when such options are mentioned: “But we don’t have the same period lengths/we start and end the day at different times”, has been said, as if these were immovable barriers. The looser form of college represented by Northern Beaches also raises the potential of more consortia, rather than full reorganisations. In each case it is important that there is a clear educational rationale for the option chosen.
At one level, the DET’s decision to institute collegiates is understandable as an attempt to do something tangible in the face of falling public education enrolments and other challenges. This strategy represents a relatively quick way of turning around public secondary education in some localities. But as already noted, the DET has confounded
86 There is also more than one Catholic senior college in the area.
44 the move by introducing other initiatives, such as more time for staff to develop programs together and impressive facilities. These initiatives, together with system-driven pedagogy, are needed in the vast majority of high schools, and if provided, would enhance not only their educational efficacy but their market appeal. It is this direction, along with different kinds of cooperative ventures among schools, that the Inquiry believes should now become the DET’s focus, rather than more ad hoc collegiates. The latter need time to ‘settle’, and to be appropriately evaluated.
THE STRUCTURE OF PUBLIC EDUCATION IN NEW SOUTH WALES – CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
This chapter began with a consideration of two sets of values that might inform the systemic provision of schooling: individual excellence and social inclusion. It has explored a range of schooling options, focusing on secondary education, in respect of these two values. It has shown that some initiatives have the potential to balance these values in ways that are productive, and that some are more problematic. It is clear that New South Wales has moved in the past 15 years from a state in which the vast majority of high schools were comprehensive, to one in which selectivity and specialisation have become more common. This has inevitably altered the equilibrium among schools, with positive and negative effects. Some comprehensive high schools are thriving, and some are suffering. Some families are exercising careful choice about schooling, and some are attending the local high school, for better or worse. Some schools are well endowed; others are in urgent need of resources. While there is still a socio-economic gradient evident in this, it must also be acknowledged that some of the new arrangements are providing first class facilities to communities that might otherwise lack them. It is the Inquiry’s view, and that of others, that school differentiation and choice are permanent features of the educational landscape87, and that this needs managing within the context of the values considerations outlined above. But this is not, in and of itself, a negative force. As a recent OECD report noted:
… the evidence in practice shows that wider school choice produces neither automatic benefit nor automatic damage. Much depends on the context in which policies are implemented, and on other changes that are taking place simultaneously within an education system88.
It is important that in the coming period, the DET gets the balance right, both for the public education system itself, and for the latter’s reputation in the community.
Principles governing the structure of public education in New South Wales
In order to contribute constructively to ongoing debate, and as a prelude to making a number of specific recommendations, the Inquiry proposes the following guiding principles to inform the structure of public education in New South Wales.
87 Hirsch, D (2002). Op. Cit. 88 Hirsch, D (2002). Ibid. p. 34.
45 • In recognition of the centrality of the role of public education in preparing students to live in an inclusive, democratic society, the public education system should seek to retain the maximum degree of comprehensiveness compatible with meeting the needs of a diverse range of students.
• In recognition of the need to enable the most talented students to develop to the fullest extent possible, opportunities should be provided for them to learn together in appropriate contexts in all schools.
• In considering structural arrangements for public secondary education, in general, Year 7-12 high schools that do not differentiate on the basis of ability or age, should be considered the norm, and any departure from this form, such as selective and specialist schools and multi-campus colleges, should be based on cogent and explicit justification of the values and evidence supporting the change.
• In the absence of an explicit justification to the contrary, multi-campus colleges that take the full range of students are preferable to stand-alone, quasi-selective senior colleges.
• Permeable forms of selectivity, where students learn in special groups some of the time but also join together as an integrated community, are preferable to ‘two-track’, exclusive forms of selectivity.
• An essential consideration in any decision to restructure schooling arrangements should be the likely impact the change will have on the standing and wellbeing of surrounding schools, school districts and towns.
• Any decision to change schooling arrangements should seek to minimise the dislocation of affected students and their families.
• Change management procedures should include a genuine and transparent consultation process, a realistic timeline for consultation and implementation, and guidelines for handling industrial issues.
Administrative presumptions arising from the guiding principles
Without denying the possibility of particular circumstances justifying one or another form of educational structure, the foregoing principles carry with them a number of administrative presumptions:
• Priority should be given, in the first instance, to retaining local comprehensive Year 7-12 high schools, and to addressing the problems some of them encounter (academic outcomes, retention and absentee levels, numbers of senior students, failure to meet the needs of particular groups of students) through adequate resourcing of buildings, equipment and staff. For example: * Where academic outcomes and retention and absentee rates are problems, priority should be given to the revitalisation of the school as a learning community, through whole school initiatives, pedagogical and curriculum reform and appropriate professional development of staff.
46 * Where lack of a good sized senior student cohort and limited HSC subject choice are problems, the following hierarchy of options should be considered prior to any assessment of the need for structural change: - Cooperation with surrounding secondary schools, either physically or technically; - Itinerant servicing to a range of schools (for example, a roving economics teacher); - Provision of subjects in a community centre to students from a range of schools (for example, languages); - Distance education. * Where a school is failing to attract or to meet the needs of academically talented students, an academic extension (gifted education) initiative should be instituted, involving professional development and the accessing of appropriate resources. * Where a school is failing to thrive more generally, the introduction of a special focus area based on existing school expertise (such as a ‘soft’ specialisation in sport, music, science, gifted education, vocational education) should be considered to provide a focus for revitalising the school. More formal specialised status should be avoided unless compelling reasons for seeking it can be advanced.
The specific recommendations that follow, pursuant to the issues dealt with in this chapter, are framed in the light of the above principles and administrative presumptions.
Recommendation 4.1 Academic extension programs in all comprehensive primary and high schools That a restructure of opportunities for advanced learning in New South Wales schools occur in accordance with the following principles:
(a) Throughout 2003 and 2004, all schools in New South Wales should establish an Academic Extension Working Party under the auspice of their Professional Development Committee, to develop knowledge among staff of procedures for identifying able students for extension and well-informed ways of providing those educational opportunities89. To assist with this task, the Professional Support and Curriculum Directorate should make relevant material available in electronic form via the proposed
89 It is recognised that this recommendation mirrors policies already promulgated in the DET’s 1991 “Policy for the Education of Gifted and Talented Students”. Much, however, remains to be done. The Inquiry also understands that the NSW policy is shortly to be reviewed.
47 Pedagogy Clearinghouse90. By 2005, every school in New South Wales should be equipped to teach the most able students across a wide range of subjects, at both the primary and secondary levels, and will have soundly based extension programs available to achieve this goal. (b) In order to provide the Professional Support and Curriculum Directorate with expert assistance in developing support materials and extending guidance to schools during the preparatory years 2003 and 2004, and during the first year of implementing the new policy (2005), it is recommended that an additional allocation of $700,000 be made to the Directorate in each of the three years to secure the services of individual experts and centres of excellence in gifted education. This initiative should enable the Clearinghouse to engage three information officers appropriately qualified in the education of academically talented students, to provide: (i) direct advice and support materials to principals, link persons in schools (for example, within professional development committees), and individual teachers; and (ii) short-term workshops or groups focusing on immediate planning issues within schools, liaising in each instance with District Offices so that information is disseminated and linked with initiatives in lighthouse schools (see below).
Estimated cost of educational resources and guidance over the three years 2003- 2005……………$700,000 x 3 = $2.1 million
(c) That as an impetus to academic extension programs in New South Wales, schools that can demonstrate that they have expertise in teaching academically talented students be invited to apply for funding to provide professional development advice to networks of schools in their area91. A sum of $30,000 should be allocated to each of the selected ten lighthouse schools for each of three years to develop collaborative programs with schools in their network, including training teachers in those schools in the identification of academically talented students and in
90 This should include: a general guide to the investigative and planning work that needs to be undertaken by the Working Parties; key resource materials and an annotated list of others available for purchase (via the Professional Development Committee); and authoritative sources of additional information including leading practitioners, agencies and academics. It will be necessary to ensure that what the Inquiry judges to have been the past mistake of over-prescribing curricula and leaving too little space for teachers’ imagination and discretion, does not re-appear in the new guise of enrichment and extension. In other words, principles, guidelines and illustrative examples, rather than finely detailed instructions, should be the order of the day. The Working parties may individually or collaboratively decide to run workshops or use consultants to assist them in this field. To ensure that scarce resources are used to maximum benefit, the Professional Support and Curriculum Directorate should furnish schools with a list of potential workshop leaders/consultants who have been briefed on the purposes and goals of this new policy direction. 91 This model has been tried successfully in Queensland and in South Australia.
48 providing a differentiated curriculum to those who require it. At least four lighthouse schools should be in rural or regional areas. The aim would be that after three years, all schools in the network would have strong programs in place in relation to academic extension.
Cost of ten lighthouse schools over 2004 – 2006: $300,000 x 3 = $900,000
Recommendation 4.2 Academically selective schools (a) That there be no more opportunity classes and no more fully selective high schools established in New South Wales. (b) That the seven longest established academically selective high schools92, along with the four rural agricultural high schools, remain fully selective schools, entry to which should be by a combination of school recommendation and a revised Selective High Schools Test, as outlined in Recommendation 4.3. (c) That the remaining fully selective high schools become partially selective, commencing in 2006. This would involve accepting up to half their students from their local communities, not based on a selective test. The remaining students would be selected on the basis of the selective test, as amended. (d) That a transition from the current arrangement in which partially selective high schools separate selected students in all or most subjects, be initiated. From 2004, selective students should be taught in separate classes for English, Maths and Science, as is currently the case. All other classes in each subject should be comprised of students of mixed ability, taken from across the age cohort. In each of these classes, students with high aptitude should be given opportunities to engage in extension activities. In Years 8 and above, where considered desirable, a top class or classes may continue to be constituted in English, Maths and Science. (e) That under the auspices of the Strategic Research Directorate, the DET resume research into the effects and outcomes of selective schooling. Over a period of several years, the DET should investigate the short- and long-term outcomes of fully and partially selective schools, as well as different forms of ability grouping in comprehensive schools. Refined quantitative analyses should be used, together with qualitative research to ascertain motivational and other subjective effects of the different programs under consideration.
92 Fort Street High School, North Sydney Boys High School, North Sydney Girls High School, Sydney Boys High School, Sydney Girls High School, Sydney Technical High School, St George Girls High School.
49 (f) That a review of remaining fully and partially selective schools be undertaken in 2012 to determine their continuing need.
Recommendation 4.3: Selective High Schools Test That the Selective High Schools Test should be amended from 2003 to test a wider range of talents than are currently assessed, as recommended in the recent discussion paper. The Inquiry’s view is that the test should include two new elements, a writing component (as currently proposed) and a creativity component to test divergent thinking. To ensure that students from non- English speaking and socially disadvantaged backgrounds are treated equitably, it is further recommended that the creativity test be as far as possible non-verbal, and that students applying to selective schools be able to count their best four of five test areas in their overall mark.
Recommendation 4.4: Opportunity classes (a) That the number of opportunity classes in New South Wales be halved from 2006. The decision on which schools to delete should be made in order to retain a spread of classes across the state. Schools that have had opportunity classes should be encouraged to continue to utilise their expertise in teaching academically talented students when teaching all students in the school. (b) (b) That the DET Strategic Research Directorate undertake research into the short- and long-term outcomes of students who attend opportunity classes, including investigating the social and emotional effects of early segregation. (c) That a review of remaining opportunity classes in New South Wales be undertaken in 2010, to ascertain their continuing need.
Recommendation 4.5: Specialist schools That no additional formal specialist high schools be established in New South Wales. Rather, the DET should encourage schools to develop curriculum priorities where appropriate, as an element of locally responsive schools.
50 Recommendation 4.6: Stand-alone senior colleges (a) That notwithstanding the apparent success of stand-alone senior colleges, no more be created unless they are linked to feeder schools in such a way that they do not drain other local comprehensive schools of senior students. Any such developments should be consistent with the principles and administrative presumptions outlined above. (b) That the negative impact of St Marys Senior High School on surrounding high schools be addressed within the context of other developments in the Mount Druitt school district, through the following means: • The superintendent of the Mount Druitt school district should convene a committee representative of teachers and parents from high schools in the district to consider possible futures for district high schools. • The DET should provide the committee with up-to-date, accurate demographic information on projected numbers of high school students in Mount Druitt and surrounding school districts over the next ten years. • The committee should seek input from all high schools in the Blacktown and Penrith school districts prior to making any recommendations. • Recommendations should be forwarded to the Minister for Education and Training by mid 2003, for implementation as soon as practicable following a decision.
Recommendation 4.7: Multi-campus collegiates (a) That the junior campuses of multi-campus colleges be the focus of ongoing pedagogical and curriculum reform so that they can meet the needs of adolescents in the middle school years. (b) That multi-campus colleges focus on transition programs between junior and senior campuses, in an effort to increase retention rates and to ease adjustment to senior college. (c) That the DET Strategic Research Directorate instigate a comprehensive research program to evaluate the benefits and limitations for students of attending multi-campus colleges in comparison with equally well resourced Year 7- 12 comprehensive high schools.
51 CHAPTER 5 STUDENT WELFARE AND DISCIPLINE
AIMS OF THE CHAPTER
The pursuit of effective teaching and learning is a central concern of public education. That pursuit was a unifying theme in the earlier consideration of teacher professionalism and curriculum and pedagogy (Chapters 1 and 2) as well as the requirements of a good foundation for young people’s schooling (Chapter 3). Less obviously than in preceding chapters, the issue of effective classroom practices, or pedagogy, again looms significant in the consideration of student welfare and discipline. However, the appropriate starting points for exploring this important aspect of public education are the practical experiences and impressions of the innumerable teachers, students and parents who have made student misbehaviour one of the dominant themes of the present Inquiry. These opinions are summarised in Part 1 of the chapter. The focus of the commentaries has been a range of ‘external’ factors that impair young people’s orderly and effective participation in learning. Those considerations have extended from matters as broad as changing patterns of child and youth behaviour and questioning the stability and socialising role of today’s families, to the effect of emotional and mental disorders on students’ responses to correction by teachers and school administrators.
The Inquiry’s intention in this chapter is to give due weight to the lived experience of teachers and school communities with respect to student misbehaviour. The aim will be to respond with practical recommendations that will improve the management of problems that, broadly speaking, are imported into the learning situation. What the Inquiry wishes to avoid is the exclusion from consideration of the contribution that education practices themselves make to student disengagement and student misbehaviour. Part 2 of the chapter is devoted to this ‘whole of school’ perspective on indiscipline. Essentially, what will be attempted is an extension of the equation linking students’ behavioural dispositions and circumstances, on the one hand, and their behaviour in the classroom and school, on the other, to take account of the amplifying or calming effect of a school’s climate and educational practices.
PART 1 - PROBLEMS IMPORTED INTO THE LEARNING SITUATION
Evidence presented to the Inquiry
Many teachers have suggested that the problem of student indiscipline has become more severe in recent times, although principals of the schools affected have indicated that most of the difficulties have been caused by around five per cent or less of students. There has been little challenge to this estimate which is also consistent with the picture painted by students throughout the Inquiry. All parties agree that although small in number, the misbehaving students can disrupt learning and demoralise teachers and fellow students. Senior students at one country high school described student misbehaviour as the major problem of the public education system. Primary pupils at another country school painted a similar picture stating that the first requirement of a misbehaving student is that he or she should apologise for disrupting the work of fellow students.
52 Using the processes of investigation available to it - submissions, public hearings, discussions with teachers, parents and students - the Inquiry has been left in no doubt about the reality of student indiscipline. However, the issue of just how much more severe the problem is today than it was in previous decades is unclear because of the absence of consistent data. Moreover, the problem is not evenly spread across all schools. Some, usually located in socio-economically better off areas, make no mention of it, while in others it occupies a disproportionate share of staff time and energy. The same processes of inquiry that have drawn unrestrained comment on student indiscipline, have almost without exception across more than 140 schools failed to elicit evidence of, or comments upon, student violence. As will be seen from the statements that follow, the spotlight has been upon swearing, confronting behaviour, rudeness, disobedience, inattention, inappropriate clowning, refusing to cooperate, and generally disrupting the business of learning.
Scale and impact of misbehaviour
A rural teacher expressed frustration with the problem of indiscipline in his rural high school, declaring:
At present these students have to be tolerated for far too long, with a detrimental effect on both staff and student welfare. What seems to be needed is a separate institution to house the recalcitrants…
Despite obviously feeling pressured by the problem of student misbehaviour, when the teacher who made the above comment calculated the number of students among 1,000 pupils requiring special attention, his estimate (2.5%) was half of the proportion generally nominated by principals.
A teacher at a high school in the state’s north observed:
Having had a visit by the Inquiry to our school I believe it was the students who identified the single biggest factor that could destroy public education - poor discipline. Teachers and good students have to deal with students who claim ‘You can’t tell me what to do.’ Solve this and you will save the education of the majority.
The P&C at another high school in the north stated in a submission:
We are dismayed that unruly students often prohibit a good learning environment. Teachers disciplining these students absorb considerable class time…Schools must have greater flexibility in dealing with disruptive students.
Related submissions were received from two schools in the state’s west:
There is no denying that behaviour problems are becoming more and more the norm. Many students now come from itinerant or unsettled families. In many cases neither parent has a job. Many bring family and neighbourhood problems to school. It is expected that the school fix these problems. As a staff we are becoming disillusioned with our inability to cope with an increasing welfare workload ... Unruly children are costing valuable learning time in a typical classroom.
53 Student behaviour and discipline is one of the most off-putting things about teaching today and a massive issue at this school. [I mean] children who, despite our best efforts to make class work interesting and appealing, will not stay in the room, will not do as they are asked, and are constantly disruptive, are aggressive towards other children and sometimes staff with little provocation, who use abusive language to teachers and other children. How do you teach effectively when discipline takes up so much of your teaching time?
A teacher at a Sydney high school added:
We have increasing numbers of disruptive, defiant and behaviour disordered students, but no supplementary or specialist staff on site, no special lesson programs offered to us, no additional accommodation or funding and release for teacher training. Our Learning Support teacher has specialist training to help staff and students in this area of behaviour disorders, but is only allocated 1.5 days per week for all her work and we have 900 students … my colleagues are becoming very demoralised and burnt out by what seems like a war of attrition in the classroom and the playground.
Responses to misbehaviour/behavioural problems
A Teachers’ Association submitted that departmental suspension policy has exacerbated the problem of managing students with challenging behaviour:
The amount of documentation and warnings that have to be given to students undermine their effectiveness. The procedures are very time consuming and lead students to believe that there are no consequences for their poor behaviour with a resultant impact on teacher morale, health and welfare.
The contribution made by school counsellors to dealing with student discipline and welfare problems is greatly appreciated by school staff, but seen to be inadequate to the task. One Sydney high school has submitted “To expect that one person, servicing more than one school can deal adequately with the issues now facing our youth is ludicrous”. The following comment by the staff of a Western Sydney high school is typical of other submissions on this point:
The quality of counselling services is severely limited by excessive caseloads and documentation requirements…Counsellors are forced to fight a rearguard action to address the symptoms of a problem that belongs to society as a whole. In a school with 973 students we have 0.7 of the services of a school counsellor. The potential client base for each school counsellor is around one thousand students and their families. This client base is stretched over two or more schools with the needs of each school population often being grossly different. At a school like ours at least 25% of students have had some contact with the school counsellor during their stay at the school with many being regular clients requiring repeat testing, ongoing documentation, reporting, liaison with
54 school staff, parents and outside agencies as well as personal counselling. Some school counsellor work activities are redundant and little more than semi-legal documentation, for example, retrospective investigations into long suspensions, long after the suspensions have been resolved or students have been expelled from school.
The theme of counsellors having little time for direct work with students was equally present in the comments of country teachers and parents as the following submission from a country teacher illustrates:
School mirrors society with increasing social and emotional concerns impacting on our students’ lives and, consequently, their education. The Department needs to acknowledge the growth in requirements for counsellor time in schools…We are isolated and do not, like many towns in the state, have access to local mental health providers.
Two high school counsellors commented on their profession becoming an “endangered species”:
The DET keeps giving counsellors new responsibilities, including: management of critical incidents (for example, the sudden death of a teacher, youth suicide, a natural disaster), child protection, mental health programs (for example, prevention of depression, anti-bullying programs), and integration. At the same time, the greater demand for accountability has generated overwhelming paperwork for counsellors … There is a high attrition rate among counsellors often due to burnout and problems in attracting people to the job, so that school counsellors are becoming an endangered species.
What should be done?
Several submissions from P&C groups as well as parents encountered during school visits and public hearings, have spoken of the jettisoning of ‘difficult’ students by private schools and the acceptance of all comers by public schools. There have been frequent calls for private schools to deal with their own difficulties rather than simply passing them on to the public sector. Another frequently made suggestion for improving the situation is an expansion in the number of school counsellors and a trimming of the documentation side of their work to allow a greater focus on direct service to students. Yet a further suggestion that appeared in some submissions but which more often was put directly by the executive staff of schools during Inquiry visits, was that many schools need an additional deputy principal or head teacher to assume responsibility for discipline and student welfare. A variant of this opinion was that schools need an additional ‘student welfare’ teacher to deal with students with behavioural and emotional problems. Some other schools emphasised the need for more specialised ‘social’ assistance in the form of a school social worker who could liaise with families, work with teachers in the management of difficult students and act as a link with social agencies and social services. These suggestions will be taken up later in the recommendations section of this chapter.
55 On the question of the number of counsellors needed, a Sydney metropolitan boys high school recommended that every school with 600 or more students should have a full time school counsellor. “This would ensure that all students who are experiencing difficulties or distress could access psychological services.” The Inquiry team has taken the many opportunities available to question counsellors on the proportion of their time devoted to assessment and documentation. The consistent answer has been approximately 40-50%. This issue will be the subject of detailed attention in later chapters, particularly in the Inquiry’s review of the ‘integration’ of students with disabilities into mainstream classes.
Additional thoughts and suggestions have been submitted to the Inquiry. The parent of a student with learning difficulties noted that bad behaviour is often the result of poor learning, not the cause. “Earlier identification and support of learning difficulty students could drastically reduce the number of behaviour problem children.” A teacher at a Central Coast high school saw the necessity for ‘time out’ rooms for children to recover their equanimity, while another in the Hunter region considered that teachers need more authority to deal with recalcitrant students. The same remark was occasionally made in meetings with staff but even direct questioning on what specifically was required beyond existing punishments, failed to draw an answer. A Teachers’ Association expressed support for a government decision to spend $46 million over four years to assist students with behavioural problems by establishing 11 new special schools and 17 tutorial centres to cater for these students’ needs. On the other hand, a Sydney high school believed that instead of making the aforementioned investment in behaviourally challenged students, the Government should better resource schools that already cater for students with such behaviour, including students already rejected from other government and private schools - “the fish John West rejected”.
When it comes to reasons for the lack of student discipline, various explanations are offered. It has been common to hear the claim that poor discipline can be traced to the increasing number of dysfunctional families within the community. Some teachers argue that parents should shoulder greater responsibility for their children’s behaviour. In a similar vein, there is concern that an increased recognition of the rights of students has not been accompanied by an acceptance of the responsibilities that such rights entail. Others have argued that teachers no longer have a legitimate set of powers or adequate deterrents to support their authority in classrooms and schools. Some teachers believe that the number of behaviourally and emotionally disturbed young people in schools has increased with the integration of special needs children into normal classrooms.
SYSTEM RESPONSES TO BEHAVIOURALLY DISTURBED AND DISENGAGING STUDENTS AND YOUNG PEOPLE
It is useful to consider the foregoing views of teachers, students and parents about what is needed in the way of support and behaviour programs, against the DET’s conception of what is, in fact, being provided. Relevant in this context is a wide range of DET programs and services covering students who are disruptive and poorly behaved in school, students who are disengaging from school, and young people who are described as being ‘at risk.’ There are also a small number of programs run in collaboration with the NSW Department of Health. Figure 5.1 depicts the continuum of services currently available for students with behaviour problems, from least to most serious. This continuum ranges from interventions teachers themselves are expected to initiate, to support services for students and teachers, to locally developed tutorial centres, to centres for young people with
56 severe emotional/mental health problems and/or behavioural problems. There are counterpart arrangements in other Australian states.1
Figure 5.1: Range of Programs for responding to behaviourally disturbed and/or disengaged students and young people
School level services District/community services
FUNDING GATEWAY TUTORIAL DET SCHOOLS DET- TEACHERS SUPPORT/ PROGRAMS CENTRES – BEHAVIOUR CENTRES WITHIN DEPARTMENT AND ITINERANT FOR COMBINATION SCHOOLS - FOR DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH OTHER SUPPORT YOUNG OF DISTRICT SEVERE STUDENTS OF CENTRES SCHOOL - TEACHERS- PEOPLE AND SCHOOL BEHAVIOUR WITH JUVENILE FOR BASED BEHAVIOUR ‘AT RISK’ RESOURCES DISORDERS EMOTIONAL JUSTICE TREATING PERSONNEL DISORDERS MENTAL HEALTH DISORDERS
These services will be dealt with in three groups. First, services based in schools will be examined, and some needed additional innovations proposed. Second, services in the middle of the continuum will be described, noting that considerable additional resources are currently being directed to some of them. And third, services that fall more at the mental health end of the continuum will be examined, and suggestions for improvements in service provision for the minority of disturbed and highly disruptive students put forward.
School level services
Starting on the left of the continuum, teachers have an important responsibility for enforcing guidelines for appropriate behaviour and disciplinary procedures developed at school level2. Many minor infractions are resolved on a daily basis by teachers in their classrooms. There is a body of research and other information available that can guide teachers in their handling of disruptive behaviour in the classroom. It is more appropriate to review this resource in a later chapter in the context of teacher preparation. It is mentioned here to mark its potential usefulness. When teacher interventions fail, the DET provides a range of school-based personnel to assist teachers with student behaviour problems. These include: • School counsellors; • Executive staff (such as deputy principals); and
1 The Victorian Department of Education, for example, has a range of short-term alternative settings for students with behavioural problems. These include community schools which provide on-going schooling for secondary students who have difficulty adjusting to the procedures of mainstream schools; special education units for limited term referral; medical centres for students with psychiatric problems; teaching units, usually attached to mainstream schools, offering students from nearby schools specialized teaching for a limited time; community based residential units providing educational support for residents in protective care; and a number of district based, short-term alternative settings for students experiencing difficulties in school ( Murphy, C., (1996) Victorian Department of Education: Children and youth with emotional or behavioural problems, in J. Izard and J. Evans (Eds). Student Behaviour – Policies, Interventions and Evaluations, Camberwell, The Australian Council for Educational Research, pp. 69-84 2 There is considerable variation among these in different schools. Whole-school programs to raise the standard of behaviour of all students are examined in the second part of this chapter.
57 • Home-school and school-community liaison officers (including Aboriginal education assistants).
There are currently 770 school counsellors in NSW schools, and they constitute the primary behavioural specialists in the system. The ratio of school counsellors to students is approximately 1:1000, with counsellors allocated to schools on a per capita numerical basis. Because many schools have less than 1000 students, most counsellors are responsible for students in more than one school. This is one reason why they are often not immediately available when teachers call on their services. As indicated above, the Inquiry has received many complaints about the numbers and availability of school counsellors, which means that they have limited time for follow up and tend to deal only with urgent cases. Recommendations concerning the number and allocation of school counsellors are included below. School executive staff have always been involved in student discipline and welfare, and this continues to be the case. The Inquiry has been concerned in some schools at the amount of time taken up in student discipline by executive staff, distracting them from their primary educational leadership role in the school. Various forms of school-community liaison officers are also provided to those schools which are deemed to need them. Like school executive staff, these personnel are not responsible solely for student behaviour, although it forms a significant part of their workload.
The second stage on the continuum covers two other forms of system support provided directly to schools. Funding Support is currently available for students who have been diagnosed with a mental health problem or have certain kinds of behaviour disorders (such as Oppositional Defiant Disorder). Approximately 2,400 students in NSW currently receive support in relation to mental health and behavioural issues under this program. This represents well under 1% of all students in government schools, and assists teachers with a small minority of students whose behavioural problems relate to diagnosable conditions. There are also approximately 360 itinerant support teachers (behaviour) based in District Offices and available to schools. Apart from working individually with a caseload of students with behavioural problems, the itinerant teachers also work with each referred child’s classroom teacher, helping to instil greater skills and confidence in handling behaviourally challenging students. The Inquiry has heard very mixed assessments of the work of the itinerant behaviour teachers. In some districts, their services are readily available and valued; in others, teachers feel that their provision of assistance is ‘too little, too late’.
Special programs and facilities for students with behaviour problems
The third kind of service along the continuum goes under the title of Gateway Programs, and covers DET instigated services for young people who are disengaging from school or have already done so. These programs had their origins in the Drug Summit that took place in 1999, where concern was expressed over young people in South Western Sydney who were disengaging from school and deemed to be ‘at risk’ of becoming involved with drugs. The program has evolved into a multi-faceted, locally based service that can be used flexibly to support the educational, social and welfare needs of young people in any location whose actions appear destined to result in self harm in one form or another. In this respect, the Gateway Program builds on the success of the Commonwealth-funded Full Service Schools Program that developed pathways and support services for at-risk young people. The program is sustained by the Equity Coordination Unit within the Student Services and Equity Directorate of the DET. Using existing sources of funds, a small team comprising six education officers work with principals and schools to devise
58 locally-relevant responses to young people’s disengagement from schools or training programs. The generic term Gateway appears to denote programs that utilise one or more of the following program elements: i. Identification and case management of young people through counselling, academic and vocational support, and referrals to other agencies; ii. individual education plans for identified young people, based on interests and capabilities and achievable targets; iii. vocational and life skills courses, including TAFE modules that lead to other TAFE courses that can be pursued once students leave school; iv. mentoring by suitable volunteers, including teachers, but primarily community volunteers and some young people who have been trained for the role by TAFE; v. training and development for parents and caregivers to increase their capacity to support their children (for example, programs addressing parenting, conflict management, literacy, school procedures and learning about the community), and vi. training and development of teachers and other school staff focused on how to develop the strengths of young people at risk (for example, improving teaching practices and student engagement, curriculum ideas, relationship building, behaviour management and creating more responsive classrooms and school organisation).
Next on the continuum are tutorial centres which, for more than a decade, have been a useful adjunct to the management of secondary students whose behaviour is unacceptable. They have been funded by a combination of district and school resources and largely developed on the basis of local initiative. Some are located within schools; others are to be found in various sites like unused community facilities, community sports centres, Police and Community Youth Clubs and former teacher housing residences. Their operation is flexible but the general pattern is for students, after a settling-in period, to maintain partial attendance in their normal classes and continue, as far as practicable, to keep up with their lessons. In addition, students receive help with basic skills and work on identifying and remedying problem behaviour. Some of the general features of tutorial centres are illustrated below in relation to centres developed by Narooma and Shoalhaven High Schools.
Two examples of tutorial centres
Narooma High School Tutorial Centre The Tutorial Centre’s program caters for 4-6 students who, for one reason or another, have difficulty coping with mainstream schooling. The Centre operates in a room within a community sports centre under the direction of a member of the High School staff assisted by a teacher’s aide. The program had only been operating for some weeks at the time it was visited by the Inquiry in March, 2002. The primary points of interest, therefore, included the school’s initiative in establishing a remedial centre in a separate community setting – an ambition contemplated by some other principals but not acted upon – and the careful planning of the program to give due attention to students’ personal and academic needs. The staff of the Centre maintain close contact with each student’s teacher so that the work undertaken is similar to that being attempted by the home class. The main aim of the program is to
59 encourage students to take responsibility for their behaviour and acquire social and academic skills that will enable them to manage themselves more considerately in the school setting.
Students attend the centre from 9.15am to 2.30 pm Monday to Wednesday. They attend sport on Wednesday afternoon and do normal lessons on Thursday and Friday. The 2.30pm closure allows the staff to debrief and review the students’ behaviour and progress. Major areas to receive attention include conflict resolution, the enhancement of self-esteem, relaxation and stress management, and self- discipline. A weekly conduct card is maintained and signed each day by teachers and the student’s parent/carer. The card identifies up to three behaviours that the student needs to improve. Work sessions at the Tutorial Centre range across academic subjects, life skills and group discussions. Maths, economics, nutrition and other subjects are integrated into engaging ‘real-life’ exercises, such as pooling students’ money to shop for food that they then use to prepare a meal. The students set basic rules of conduct and also establish the consequences for breaking the rules. The aim is to create a safe, pleasant and non-threatening environment.
Enrolment at the Tutorial Centre requires the consent and support of the student’s parent/guardian. Family involvement is a high priority and parents are encouraged to visit the Centre regularly. The teachers also attempt to maintain close links with the home through telephone calls, letters and awards. There is a Management Committee that meets frequently to review students’ progress and future strategies. There is an emphasis upon re-integration into mainstream schooling or, for older students, transition to the workforce or further training.
Shoalhaven High School The Park Road Centre, situated in the Police and Community Youth Club (PCYC) adjacent to Shoalhaven High School, provides an alternative education to students who are school refusers and/or long-term truants. These students are often motivated to learn, but find the school environment intimidating and hostile. Often such students have emotional problems, eating disorders and/or drug and alcohol addiction, or they may have been bullied at school. Without a facility such as Park Road, many would slip through the net and fail to achieve an educational qualification.
The Park Road Centre offers an informal setting in a comfortable room for up to eight students at a time. These students take a full academic curriculum through the Karabar Distance Education Centre, and are assisted in their studies by a teacher and teacher’s aide. Many of the students are unable to be with large groups of people and become distressed in almost any social situation. They attend Park Road for three days a week, working on their own at home for the other two days. The coordinator-teacher at the Centre observes that the social interaction between students is a key component of their experience at Park Road, and a central element in enabling many to integrate back into regular high school. Students can undertake secondary education up to the School Certificate at Park Road, and then if they choose, can attend Shoalhaven High for the Higher School Certificate. There is close liaison and cooperation between the school and the centre. In addition, the Park Road Centre provides other assistance to its students, including relaxation training, attendance at counselling and psychiatric sessions, and social outings. The aim is to help students become more confident and more able to handle unfamiliar social situations and other requirements of normal life.
60 Over the years, the Centre has developed expertise in handling the sensitivities of its student population, and has seen many students successfully complete the School Certificate and often, the Higher School Certificate. A graduate of the Centre went on to be dux of the High School. Park Road represents a creative and energetic response to a group of students whose needs cannot be met in the regular school environment.
Also in the middle of the continuum are DET operated Behaviour Schools for students whose behaviour is unacceptable but considered modifiable. These schools service students who are deemed not to be suffering from mental health problems. Recently, the NSW Government agreed to the creation of 11 new behaviour schools located in areas where there is an identified ongoing need for their services. They will cater for two groups of students. The first comprises those in Years 8-10 who are unlikely to return to a regular school setting. The aim is to provide these students with specialist support to increase their social skills, literacy and numeracy, vocational preparation and transition to an independent adult life style. The second group comprises students who are in Years 7 and 8, and who are likely to return to a mainstream setting. The aims with this group include intensive intervention on specific behavioural problems, maintenance in key learning areas and support for reintegration into a mainstream high school. Students in Years 5 and 6 who have exhausted all available school and district options for managing their behaviour may also be referred to the new schools.
Mental health services
Finally to the right of the continuum are services for students with mental health problems and students in trouble with the law. First, centres and programs under the Department’s sole control cater for students with emotional disorders of a less serious kind than would require treatment at the combined Health/Education facilities. Next, schools within the Department of Juvenile Justice, catering to the educational needs of incarcerated juvenile offenders, also occupy an extreme position on the range of services. There are nine such programs and the one visited by the Inquiry, Sheppards Park at Wagga Wagga, has an enthusiastic and competent staff providing intensive, even if basic, educational services. And third, there are three centres for students with severe mental health problems that are run jointly with the NSW Department of Health. These centres are at the right hand side of the continuum represented in Figure 5.1 because they are not located in schools and because they deal with the greatest degree of severity of the attendees’ problems and the most highly specialised therapeutic services.
THE NEED FOR ADDITIONAL SCHOOL-LEVEL SUPPORT FOR TEACHERS IN HANDLING STUDENTS WITH BEHAVIOURAL DIFFICULTIES
It should be evident from the above summary, that a wide range of services to assist students with varying degrees of behavioural difficulty, is available to teachers and schools. However, despite the range of services provided, it is clear that teachers do not feel that their needs for support are being met. The pervasive problem of student misbehaviour that is not readily amenable to day to day management, and that is often grounded in causes beyond the classroom, remains. Teachers have frequently referred to the spill-over of tensions and problems from students’ homes into classrooms and schools, with teachers and other students bearing the brunt of problems that have their origins elsewhere. Parental neglect, sometimes associated with dependencies of various kinds, can mean some families do not support the
61 school in its attempt to encourage a measure of self-discipline and order in children’s lives. These and many other factors that contribute to student indiscipline have already been alluded to by teachers, students and parents above. The Inquiry recognises that despite existing services to assist teachers, more is required. This is particularly so in some schools, which for various reasons, have more than their fair share of students with significant behaviour problems. Many teachers believe that what is needed is a school staff member who can specialise in assessing what is required to settle and re-engage misbehaving students and to link them and their families, where appropriate, to relevant community services.
Classroom teachers and school management are not well placed to fill the role that is envisaged here. Not only have the demands of the curriculum (refer to Chapter 2 of this Report) restricted the capacity of teachers to follow through on individual cases of indiscipline, they are also unfamiliar with the broad-based facilitating approach needed in working between students, teachers, families and service providers. In the past, when funds have been available, schools have recognised the need for specialised staff to concentrate on work of this nature. In some instances, they have drawn upon the resources provided by the Commonwealth Disadvantaged Schools Program to employ community liaison officers. More recently, as part of the Commonwealth Full Service Schools Program, schools have employed student support officers to develop school and community preventive strategies for young people on the brink of leaving or being excluded from school. While these examples have not focussed specifically upon indiscipline, they demonstrate the value of a specialist staff member to trace student difficulties beyond the school into family and community contexts. The Inquiry believes that a limited number of schools should be invited to pilot the appointment of an additional professional person in their schools to deal with behaviour problems.
Regarding the choice of professional role, there is an advantage in the selected schools nominating the professional background they believe to be most appropriate in their circumstances. However, that decision is not simply a matter of intuition: there exists a range of strategic priorities and they need to be carefully weighed in the context of local circumstances. The case justifying the school’s choice should explicitly indicate the main objectives to be pursued on the basis of considerations such as the following:
• Linking individual students and families to relevant community services;
• Providing direct in-school counselling and support services;
• Devising and managing off-campus tutorial centres;
• Devising and helping to implement proactive ‘whole-of-school’ discipline and student welfare strategies (see Part 2);
• Connecting behavioural problems to classroom practices and the development of pedagogy; and
• Linking the school to efforts to strengthen the community of which it is a part (see later chapter on “School and Community”).
62 The feasibility of creating the requested specialist staff role in all schools is qualified by at least four things: - the overall cost, - variations in the scale of the problem across schools, - variations in the size of schools, and - the need to pilot and assess different types of appointments and ways of operating.
The DET has constructed an index for the purpose of allocating specialist ‘behaviour’ staff across its 40 school districts according to need. The factors taken into account include population size, socio-economic status, learning difficulties, average daily attendance, and short and long term suspension rates. This index enables the question of variations in the scale of problems across schools of different sizes to be addressed in an objective way. The index also permits the possibility of concentrating on a limited number of schools in which behavioural problems are severe, thereby containing the costs to a manageable level. In the Inquiry’s view, one third of the schools should be from outside metropolitan Sydney, one third should be primary schools, and half should have 800 or more students. Schools of 400 or fewer students should attract a 0.5 appointment.
The Inquiry recognises that this proposal is not without its potential pitfalls, as well as its advantages. The main danger is that the availability of a specialist role may cause other staff members simply to refer individual ‘cases’ and ignore aspects of the way the school operates that may be implicated in student misconduct, a theme taken up in Part 2 of this chapter. On the other hand, the problem of indiscipline among students is sufficiently widespread and serious in its educational and social consequences to warrant concentrated attention.
Recommendation 5.1: That a three year trial be conducted of a specialist discipline/student welfare role in each of twenty schools identified on the basis of objective data as having severe discipline problems. The selected schools should fulfil the scale, type and location requirements specified in the text. Estimated annual cost of staffing $65,000 x 17 = $1.1 million Estimated annual support costs $15,000 x 17 = $0.25 million Estimated total annual cost ……………………$1.4million
Recommendation 5.2: That an internal, collaborative evaluation be conducted by each of the twenty schools participating in the project, utilising the professional development and funding models recommended in Chapter 1. The aims should be twofold: i. to use the action research projects to lower the level of indiscipline in the relevant schools, and ii. to engage the professional community of each school in reflecting upon and improving teaching and other school practices that lift educational and behavioural outcomes.
63 School counsellors: need for a longer term plan
The recommendations concerning pilot projects to improve and evaluate mental health services support, and discipline/student welfare roles, involve very modest expenditures and, in the opinion of the Inquiry, should be proceeded with as a matter of urgency. By the evidence of school staff and parents, as well as direct observation by the Inquiry, the services provided by school counsellors also represent a vital component of schools’ responses to indiscipline and associated student welfare matters. The problem is that, apart from the heavy demands upon counsellors to assess and document issues of various kinds3, it would require miracle workers to deal effectively with their current caseloads. Only a proportion of students at any time need direct professional services but the evidence of a recent national mental health survey (discussed below) shows that counsellors, as primary carers within the school system, have a substantial number of potential clients. Furthermore, the role of counsellor extends to providing professional advice to executive and classroom teachers on ways of handling students’ behavioural and emotional problems. The present counsellor/student ratio of approximately 1:1,000, with a counsellor’s services sometimes spread over several schools, is quite unacceptable. As a guide to defining a more feasible and productive task, the Inquiry believes the DET should have the goal within a decade of reducing the counsellor/student ratio to 1: 500 with the services of each counsellor, in all but exceptional circumstances, spread over no more than two school communities.
The adoption of a longer than usual time frame for the accomplishment of this recommendation is in recognition of the cost of the proposal and the fact that it would require a sustained period of recruitment and training to acquire more than 700 additional teacher/psychologist counsellors. Indeed, an attempt to remedy the present situation rapidly looms as such a formidable task as to invite continued reliance on a range of stopgap measures. However, schools need an adequate supply of counselling services, together with the other reactive and proactive measures recommended in this chapter, if they are to handle the student behaviour and welfare challenges of the 21st Century. Therefore, a long-term incremental plan is needed to begin to improve the situation with investments of money and other resources of a manageable scale.
Recommendation 5.3: That a ten-year recruitment and training plan be instituted to increase the number of school counsellors by 700 so that an effective counsellor/student ratio of approximately 1:500 is attained with the spread, in all but exceptional circumstances, of each counsellor’s services being confined to two school communities. Estimated annual incremental cost…$75,000 X 70 = $5.25 million Estimated annual cost after 10 years……………….= $53 million
3 A later chapter dealing with the ‘integration’ of students with disabilities will recommend a reduction in the frequency of some documentation involving school counsellors.
64 DISTRICT LEVEL SUPPORT FOR TEACHERS AND SCHOOLS: A CASE STUDY AND IDENTIFICATION OF ADDITIONAL NEED
Before considering what additional district- or community-based services may be required, it is instructive to consider those actually provided in one school district. Problematic student behaviour of the kinds described in submissions to the Inquiry and reported during school visits, occur throughout the length and breadth of the state. While it is not possible to review the problems confronting each region and the ways in which they are being managed, in the interests of gaining a deeper understanding of the issues it is helpful to focus on the example of a single school district. One particular district has generously assisted the Inquiry to gain an appreciation of the multi-layered responses that can be made to students’ behavioural difficulties. For present purposes, this structure is illustrated mainly by reference to two high schools, referred to as ‘A’ and ‘B’, both located within the said district. Although the Inquiry raises questions about one of the programs used by the schools, this should not be interpreted as indicating an overall critical view of what is being attempted. To the contrary, the Inquiry has been impressed by the diversity of methods used to deal with students’ behavioural difficulties and commends the district for its initiatives. The one exception is a type of segregated control unit, discussion of which will follow consideration of the district’s positive responses to students’ behavioural problems.
When a school is unable to deal with a behaviour problem on its own, it turns to options available within the district. There are several. As one option, both High School A and High School B make use of an alternative educational facility (AEF). This program is conducted in cooperation with a youth centre conducted by a religious organisation. Students attend two days per week and spend the remaining three days in their home classrooms. The AEF scheme caters for less serious cases of disruptive or misbehaving students who are not seriously emotionally disturbed. It draws on Years 7-9 students from High Schools A and B and two nearby schools. Each school sends five students to the AEF and they remain in that program for two terms. The District Office handles admissions to the program which is staffed by a teacher and a teacher’s aide who work with the students on basic numeracy, literacy and presentation skills, as well as problem behaviour identification and correction. The principal of High School A stresses that the AEF is a re-entry program and that 75% of the participants successfully reintegrate into mainstream classrooms. The principal attributes much of this success to the fact that within the small AEF class students can form a positive relationship with the teacher and they experience some personal success. It is believed that this new attitude towards both staff and learning is eventually transferred to mainstream classes. The principal of High School B adds another dimension to this explanation for the apparent success of the AEF project. He argues that apart from any other more specific factors, a young person’s temporary placement on a program like AEF acts as a ‘circuit breaker’ that provides ‘time out’ and the opportunity for all parties to make a fresh start.
The second available option in the District is a Links to Learning program. This is described as being applicable to students caught up in various forms of socially distressing or otherwise unacceptable behaviour that impact upon their present or future learning. These are normally less serious than those leading to placement in the Alternative Education Facility. The program, which involves a period of placement with a community-based employment and training agency, is sufficiently flexible to deal at different times with the perpetrators and victims of unacceptable behaviour, such as bullying. In any one year, approximately 50 to 60 students from Years 7-9 at High Schools A and B participate in the scheme which is funded under the
65 DET Community Grants Program. Considerable success is claimed for the project with the rationale again revolving around the notions of ‘relationship learning’ and the opportunity for a fresh start.
In addition to the Alternative Education Facility and Links to Learning programs, there exists a district school for students with severe behaviour disorders. Another district initiative is a proposal for a Gateway Program to fund mental health services for the schools in the area. This emphasis on the need for additional mental health services reflects the conviction of the principals of both high schools that a significant proportion of the residuum of students with behavioural problems who do not respond to the ‘circuit breaker’ type programs described above, have emotional or mental health problems. This was illustrated in the case of High School B by reference to an audit of discipline stages attained by students in August of 2001. The stages range from ‘A’ (student is cooperative - the starting point for the year for most students), to ‘F’ (essentially that the student’s behaviour is “intolerable”) with ascending degrees of indiscipline in-between. With two-thirds of the year elapsed, all but approximately 50 students were still at Stage A. The principal believed that of the 50 who were experiencing difficulties, 30 had their behavioural problems resolved by participation in the AEF or the Links to Learning programs. In the opinion of the principal, the remaining 20 had severe personal problems for which specialist mental health assistance was needed.
These students require a more specialised response. Before describing current district provisions in this area, it is useful to consider evidence concerning the number of students who are in need of sophisticated behavioural and/or mental health services. That there exists a group of students whose aggressive or impulsive behaviour can be puzzling, if not intimidating, to staff and students, has been amply illustrated to the Inquiry. The community is indebted to the executive and classroom teachers who exercise restraint and compassion in their handling of such behaviour but its occurrence and prevalence should hardly be surprising. The child and adolescent component of a recent National Survey of Mental Health and Wellbeing found that some 14% of children and young people in Australia have mental health problems that are comparable in severity with problems seen in children actually attending a mental health clinic4. The survey had its methodological shortcomings5 but it is authoritative in its field. The estimated percentage of children and young people nationally with mental health problems is two or three times the number typically said by NSW principals to be disruptive or aggressive. However, the national survey figure of 14% included a wide range of conditions, some of which would be less likely to thrust themselves upon the attention of teachers than aggressive behaviour, such as depression. On this latter point, the rough estimate of the principals - 5% - coincides with the national survey average figure of 5.2% for aggressive behaviour (slightly higher for younger males and slightly lower for older females).
The national survey also revealed that children and young people living in sole parent, step/blended or low income families were more likely to have mental health problems. Children and young people living with unemployed parents had a higher prevalence of what were termed ‘externalising’ problems than those in families where
4 Sawyer, M. G., Arney, F. M., Baghurst, P. A., Clark, J. J., Graetz, B. W., Kosky, R. J., Nurcombe, B., Patton, G. C., Prior, M. R., Raphael, B., Rey, J., Whaites, L. C., Zubrick, S. R., (2000) The Mental Health of Young People in Australia: The Child and Adolescent Component of the National Survey of Mental Health and Wellbeing, Canberra, AusInfo 5 Raphael, B., (2000) Promoting the Mental Health and Wellbeing of Children and Young People. Discussion Paper: Key Principles and Directions. Canberra, National Mental Health Working Group, Department of Health and Aged Care, pp. 6-7
66 parents were employed. The conclusion was drawn that the findings “…highlight the importance of social disadvantage on children and young people’s mental health and wellbeing”6. The survey also found that those with more mental health problems and disorders consistently had lower self-esteem and functioned less well in school and peer activities.
The present Inquiry is wary of construing all major and persistent disengagement from schooling as a reflection of mental health problems. In Part 2 of this chapter evidence will be adduced of the part played by classroom practices and school environments in school discipline problems. Nevertheless, when behavioural problems do not yield to basic classroom management measures or ‘circuit-breaking’ procedures like those that have been described, then teachers deserve and need the support of mental health specialists. This was acknowledged in a recent discussion paper, Promoting the Mental Health and Wellbeing of Children and Young People, prepared by the National Mental Health Working Group:
Partnerships with schools are critical to ensure that each child’s opportunities for learning and development in the school setting are maximised.7
A division of labour is recommended by the discussion paper: care for children and young people should be provided largely by primary care providers (including school counsellors); specialist mental health care should be available through child and adolescent mental health services, which also need to provide specialist support and consultancy to other providers (emphasis added). In the view of the Inquiry, while what is envisaged is sound, the supply of specialist services on-the-ground is too meagre for the plan to work uniformly well in New South Wales. Apart from the Inquiry’s own observations, the national survey shows that the majority of young people do not receive help for their mental health problems. For those who do, school counsellors, family doctors and paediatricians provide most care, with skilled mental health services providing only a small proportion of care. This insight has shaped a key strategy recommended by the National Mental Health Working Group:
Thus it is critical that the mental health skills of those who see the most children and young people are supported and developed, with clear pathways to care and back-up from specialist child and adolescent mental health services.
The strategy recognises that a small number of children and young people with the most severe and complex disorders require tertiary level mental health care, including specialist clinics, high intensity and targeted community-based programs and, where appropriate, inpatient services.8
Returning to the school district under consideration, it becomes clear that although its objectively assessed level of student behaviour problems is high9, available mental health support services fall far short of what would be needed to fulfil the strategy outlined above. High Schools A and B simply cannot obtain the mental health guidance and clinical back-up that they require. This appears to be the explanation for why an otherwise forward looking district has had to resort to the type of control unit that is of concern to the Inquiry. The unit is located within a high school and
6 Raphael, B., op. cit. p.10 7 ibid, p.36 8 Raphael, NB., op cit, pp. 41-42 9 This is a reference to the previously mentioned formula developed within the DET to allocate behaviour specialists to the school Districts according to their comparative needs.
67 provides classes for seriously emotionally and behaviourally disturbed students who have not responded to earlier interventions. There are two classes with a total of twelve students. Each class has a teacher and teacher’s aide and it is generally intended that students remain in the unit for two terms before being integrated back into their regular school. Some students spend part of the day in the unit and part of the day in normal classes. However, the behaviour of some students remains so problematic that they are likely to leave school before such re-integration takes place.
The unit is isolated from the remainder of the host school by a wire fence that, while not an impenetrable barrier - there is a gap in it and the gates are often open - marks the permissible limits of the students’ movements. The reality of the students’ containment was brought home when a member of the Inquiry staff was invited by one student in the unit to join her so that she could introduce two student friends from the general school community with whom she was conversing through the cyclone fence. Two explanations were given for this degree of isolation: first, it provides motivation for young people to improve their behaviour so that they can return to the mainstream program; and second it prevents young people in the unit from further alienating staff and possibly other students by their behaviour until they have been prepared to resume their place in the general school population.
Whatever the justification, when does the degree of control and segregation of students reach a point when its presence in schools is inappropriate? Figure 5.1 displayed a wide range of responses to students’ behaviour difficulties. The last two (schools within the Department of Juvenile Justice and centres for treating mental/emotional disorders) involve collaboration with other departments in providing education services in settings necessarily and appropriately separated from mainstream schools. These are preceded by two other responses (centres for students with emotional disorders and behaviour schools) which also are provided in separate settings, while the earlier interventions presented along the continuum are extensions, or components of, mainstream schooling. It is a core characteristic of the school as a social institution, and essential to its broad purposes, that students participate on an equal basis in its educational and communal processes. It is antithetical to the required environment of tolerance and mutual respect for ideas and persons that one group should be visibly segregated for a substantial period inside an enclosed compound within the school grounds.
If it is the case that segregation is necessary for the good order of the school, then that should occur in another location that can meet the specific needs of the young people, whether they be psychiatric, behavioural or occupational. The examples of the tutorial centres conducted by Narooma and Shoalhaven High Schools illustrate the way an ordered but relaxed environment in a detached centre can assist young people to acquire the basic social skills needed to adjust to mainstream schooling. Schools are not part of the correctional system and the adoption of quasi-custodial practices, even on the most limited scale, should be rejected as being totally inappropriate.
In the Inquiry’s view, if the intentions of the National Mental Health Working Group were to be implemented in districts of high need, then a serious beginning would have been made to providing schools with the level of mental health services that they require. It would eventually be less necessary to contain students whose behaviour is puzzling or intimidating or simply incomprehensible to the non-specialist, in units that have little to offer them by way of constructive help. However, the Inquiry is aware that not all regions are as lacking in school mental health support services as the district considered in some detail above. For example, the South Western Sydney Area Health Service (SWSAHS) offers, or is preparing to offer, the
68 types of assistance needed in areas where schools have to cope with high levels of puzzling, fractious student behaviour. At the level of helping teachers to understand and respond appropriately to emotional and mental disorders, a Mental Health Literacy Workshop currently is being piloted with DET cooperation in some schools in South Western Sydney10. The content includes coverage of aggressive and oppositional behaviour and should be of considerable practical help to teachers. Another focus for the prevention of conduct disorders is styles of parenting that are strongly associated with the development of emotional and behavioural problems in children. Programs designed to improve parent communication and behaviour management skills are being implemented in South Western and South Eastern Sydney with apparent benefits so far as the disruptive behaviour of children is concerned11. In relation to the encouragement of social skills in children, a program called Playing and Learning to Socialise (PALS) is being developed within day care and pre-school settings in SWSAHS12.
It is not necessary here to review the full range of support services provided by SWSAHS but beyond the valuable educational and general interventions described, it is useful to consider what clinical assessment and treatment services are provided to disturbed students. A School Link publication, ‘Pathways to Mental health Care’ clearly sets out the referral possibilities in three of the four Local Government Areas within the Area Health Region. Among the listed agencies are those providing individual assessment and treatment services. Because despite the best intentions, such published arrangements sometimes provide slow responses or leave workers without urgently needed assistance, an over-arching arrangement has been instituted that will broker some form of appropriate assistance within a reasonable period.
The Inquiry recommends that, for a trial period of three years, using the experience and relevant programs and arrangements of the South-West Sydney Area Health Service as a model, liaison officers should be appointed to ensure that similar arrangements are instituted in three Sydney and three non-Sydney school districts. The existence of the previously mentioned index of behavioural problems used to provide district level resources provides an objective means for determining which districts are most in need of additional assistance. In addition to educational and health promoting programs the liaison officers would also directly provide, or cause to be provided, mental health assessments and therapeutic services, including in-patient care in those cases where such assistance is warranted. The recommended pilot projects should be approached in a spirit of learning how to give practical effect to an already existing policy intention of providing mental health assistance to school students, and professional guidance to the school staff who are struggling to be of assistance to disturbed young people. Within the proposed three year trial both of the departments primarily involved would learn a great deal about the types of collaboration already acknowledged to be needed but generally unavailable to teachers, like those dealing with the twelve ‘secured’ students discussed earlier in this chapter.
10 Bensch, D., Brattoni-Rynsaardt, J., Burgess, B., Ferrington, R., Kotselas, P., Moffa tt, B., Thorpe, D., (2002) Mental Health Literacy Workshop, School Link Program, Department of Education and Training, South Western Sydney Area Health Service 11 Parada, R., Brennam, J., Crisante, L., (1999) Does Altering Parents’ Beliefs and Behaviours Decrease Non-compliant Aggressive Behaviour in Children? The Positive Parenting Program in Western Sydney, Australian Society for Psychiatric Research Annual Scientific Meeting, 2-3 December, University of New South Wales; 12 Wingecarribee Health Service, PALS, A programme to Help Young Children Develop Social Skills.
69 Recommendation 5.4: That mental health service liaison officers be appointed to support schools in six education Districts to respond appropriately to students with severe emotional and mental health problems in areas of high need. The Districts should be chosen on the basis of the formula discussed in the text and should include an equal number of Sydney and non-Sydney areas. The mental health services provided should range from support and guidance for school staff in their handling of disturbed students, to mental health assessments and the provision of direct services in non-clinical and clinical settings. Estimated staffing costs per annum: 6 x $ 80,000 = $ 480,000; (Responsible authority, NSW Health).
Recommendation 5.5: That a Memorandum of Understanding be developed between the NSW Department of Health and the Department of Education and Training specifying the services to be provided within the six designated Districts and the mutual reporting and other arrangements for ensuring the successful management of the proposed cooperative scheme.
Recommendation 5.6: That a research team comprising representatives of the Department of Education and Training and the Department of Health, in cooperation with staff of the six Districts and representatives of the schools concerned, progressively assess the service outcomes of the project.
PART 2 - INDISCIPLINE AND HOLISTIC APPROACHES TO CHANGING THE SCHOOL ENVIRONMENT
Public discussion about student behaviour has often been framed by particular incidents of school violence that have been taken up by the media and conveyed to the public as a sign of malaise within public education. While safety and security within schools is essential for teaching and learning, the public focus on isolated, dramatic and newsworthy incidents distorts the debate. Research, both in Australia13 and overseas14 supports the observation of the present Inquiry that it is the ongoing, cumulative nature of minor infractions and disruptions, rather than their magnitude, that irritate and frustrate teachers and distract them and their classes from teaching and learning.
Indiscipline needs to be considered within an educational framework that gives priority to learning and teaching, and includes a balance of reactive and proactive
13 Johnson, B. Oswald, M & Adey, K (1993) Discipline in South Australian Primary schools. Educational Studies, 19 (3) 289-305. Burke, C. Jarman, K, & Whitmore, L (1994) Disruptive and anti-social behaviour in primary schooling: Foci for professional development and community education, Journal of Teaching Practice, 14 (1) 1-16. 14 Department of Education and Science (1989) Discipline in Schools, (The Elton Report), London: HMSO.
70 strategies to create and maintain a system of order within schools. Reactive strategies refer to actions defined in response to students’ misbehaviour. These, essentially, are what were considered in Part 1 of this chapter. Proactive strategies anticipate patterns of behaviour and seek to prevent, minimise and resolve acts of indiscipline.
In a practical world it is not a matter of one type of strategy being chosen over the other. However, schooling in its broadest sense is a preparation for reasoned participation in considerate relationships with others. The more that discipline can be based on consensual observance of shared principles rather than the imposition of rules, the more effective, lasting and satisfying it is likely to be for all members of school communities.
Without denying in any way the practical necessity for reactive strategies such as those considered in earlier sections, the remainder of this chapter will concentrate on showing that with time, patience and planning, some schools have used proactive strategies to attain principled order that is supportive of teaching and learning. Reactive approaches in general see the focus of intervention as being 'inside the person' whereas proactive strategies concentrate their attention on processes 'inside the school'. A major limitation of a school or departmental policy that is over-reliant on reactive measures is that it focuses almost exclusively on the behaviour of the individual student and ignores other factors that contribute to a well-behaved school. An American study of eight schools over a three-year period recognised that an effective strategy to reduce the incidence of misbehaviour involved change at the individual, classroom and school levels15. The study was based on the realisation that some individual students are more likely than others to misbehave, some teachers are more likely than others to produce high levels of indiscipline in their classrooms by their teaching and management practices, and some schools more often than others fail to manage student misbehaviour. We can add another level to the analysis and confidently assert that children in some neighbourhoods or communities suffer from more social and economic dislocation and stress than others and are more likely to experience disciplinary problems in schools16.
Other researchers have noted the marked variation in rates of suspension, truancy and delinquency between schools that have very similar student profiles17. The Inquiry has visited schools where a change of leadership and a concerted effort to develop proactive discipline strategies has ‘turned around’ the school and dramatically reduced the level of behaviour referrals from classroom teachers to senior staff and the overall rate of suspensions and expulsions. The research indicates that if we are concerned with ‘what works’ in this difficult area, we need to extend our view of indiscipline from individual behaviour to encompass school, classroom and community processes18. We would expect the most effective outcomes to occur when we adopt a multi-level approach to discipline and order within schools. This implies fair and effective ways to manage disruption within classrooms and schools as well as proactive whole school efforts to consider wider
15 Gottfredson, D., Gottfredson, C., & Hybl, L., (1993) Managing adolescent behaviour: a multi year, multi school study, American Educational Research Journal, 30 (1): 179-215. 16 In particular, children living in areas of concentrated disadvantage (see Vinson, T., Baldry, E., (1999) The Spatial Clustering of Child Maltreatment: Are Micro-Social Environments Involved? Canberra, Australian Institute of Criminology Trends and Issues, June). 17 Rutter, M., Maughan, B., Mortimore, P. & Ouston, J., (1979) Fifteen Thousand Hours: Secondary Schools and their Effects, London: Open Books. 18 Watkins, C. & Wagner, C. (2000) Improving School Behaviour, London: Paul Chapman Publishing Ltd.
71 patterns of which the behaviour is part, and to draw upon appropriate supports in the school and community.
Before considering strategies developed by some NSW schools, the following summary is presented of important general characteristics of a proactive approach to indiscipline in schools that are emphasised in the research literature19:
1. A philosophy of inclusivity: Proactive schools develop an ethos that expresses a positive regard for young people, a respect for diversity, a genuine interest in youth cultures, a commitment that all children can learn successfully, a special effort to help those who are most vulnerable, and support for teachers in their work with young people20.
2. A professional learning community: Earlier in this report, the Inquiry stressed the importance of reflective dialogue and collaboration between teachers in the development of productive pedagogies (see Chapter 1). Strong and regular professional collaboration, especially around improved teaching and learning, is also associated with positive relations between students and less student misbehaviour21. The Inquiry has visited schools where teams of teachers have worked together to develop integrated learning programs and productive pedagogies (see Chapter 2). In every case, the reflective dialogue and collaboration between teachers has revitalised teaching and re-engaged reluctant learners with positive effects on the rate of misbehaviour.
3. The school as a community: Schools that have a strong ethos of communal organisation (developed collegial relations, frequent contacts between teachers and other staff and students, responsiveness to students’ need for affiliation and a positive approach to student participation) have higher teacher satisfaction and morale, higher teacher enjoyment of work, lower teacher absenteeism, increased student interest in academic work, lower levels of student absenteeism, and improved student behaviour22.
4. Promoting positive discipline: Proactive schools focus on positive behaviours and preventive measures rather than punitive actions to improve discipline. In some cases the shift has been associated with conscious whole school efforts to consistently praise and reward acceptable behaviour so that it becomes the norm throughout the school community. In other instances, schools have developed anti-bullying, anti-racist and anti-homophobia programs to alert staff and students to forms of discrimination and violence within the school and wider community. Mentoring, peer mediation and other forms of conflict resolution, have also played a valuable preventive role in an increasing number of schools.
19 Wayson, W., de Voss, G., Kaeser, S., Lasley, T. & Pinnel, G. (1982) Handbook for Developing Schools with Good Discipline, Bloomington, Indiana, Phi Delta Kappa. McEvoy, A. (2000) Antisocial behaviour, academic failure, and school climate: a critical review, Journal of Emotional and Behavioural Disorder, Fall. 20 Thompson, P. (1999) Against the Odds: Developing School Programmes that Make a Difference for Students and Families in Communities Placed at Risk, Thinking About Full Service Schools, No: 4, Sydney: Australian Council for Equity in Education. 21 School of Education, University of Queensland (2000) School Reform Longitudinal Study: Final Report, vol 1, May, Brisbane. 22 Bryk, A. S., & Driscoll, M. E., (1988) An Empirical Investigation of the School as a Community, Chicago: University of Chicago School of Education.
72 5. A school organisation that supports student wellbeing: A proactive school is aware that the way it organises its core functions of learning and teaching can increase or diminish patterns of disruptive behaviour. Features of school organisation that have an influence upon student engagement in learning and rates of misbehaviour include school and class size, assessment regimes, playground spaces and physical amenities, and the school timetable.
6. Critical reflection and democratic procedures: A proactive school initiates regular reviews of its curriculum and internal processes and how they can be changed to increase student and staff wellbeing. It frequently surveys the views of students, parents, and teachers, and uses the data to monitor the wellbeing of students and staff and plan future actions. The participation of students in rule making, and the sense of ownership that results, is a valuable training in democratic procedures and participation. Proactive schools are more likely to identify needs and solutions that reflect their own style of operation rather than simply bolting on external ‘solutions’ for indiscipline in schools.
Proactive schools
In the course of its investigation, the Inquiry has visited a number of schools that have successfully used proactive measures to enhance student and staff wellbeing and minimise the extent of disruptive behaviour. These schools embody many of the qualities of proactive schools described above. Teachers consult with students to identify problems and develop school rules, and work collaboratively to ensure students experience success within a caring and supportive environment. The emphasis is upon choice and responsibility, and the negotiation of process rather than on an inflexible code or set of sanctions. The purpose in this section is to describe some of the strategies used by students and teachers to achieve and sustain a well-behaved school and examine the policy and system supports that might strengthen and extend such practices.
Before examining specific strategies, it is important to restate a point made in Chapter 2 about curriculum, pedagogy and engagement in learning. There is considerable evidence that classroom misbehaviour and disruption are related to the boredom and lack of success that some students experience in learning23. The Inquiry has proposed a major reorientation in the Department of Education and Training’s Strategic Planning process to elevate the place of pedagogy in schools (recommendation 2.1). This reorientation, along with the recommended increase in resources for teachers to access professional development (recommendation 1.2), should have very positive effects upon student engagement and motivation. It would help to reduce the level of disruption within schools and classrooms.
Returning to more particular strategies, the Inquiry was impressed with insights offered by students attending a NSW Student Representative Council (SRC) meeting in Sydney in May, 2002. They expressed great concern about the poor physical state of their schools, the unattractive wire fences erected to prevent vandalism and intrusion, and the indiscipline that gave public education a bad reputation. Despite these difficulties, the students were clearly proud of their public schools. A wider sense of ownership and pride in their school among students generally, they argued, would reduce the level of indiscipline and damage to school property.
23 Woods, P. (1990) The Happiest Days? How Pupils cope with School, London, Falmer Press. Lloyd- Smith, M. & Davies, R. (Eds) (1995) On the Margins: the educational experiences of ‘problem pupils, Stoke, Trenthem.
73 They regarded genuine student participation as an important vehicle for generating a broader sense of ownership and pride within the student body.
The Inquiry witnessed the valuable role of student participation in changing a school climate when it visited Sir Joseph Banks High School. In an effort to promote positive discipline, the staff and students had developed an imaginative and effective anti-bullying campaign. The Student Representative Council surveyed the students throughout the school about the extent of bullying and, together with the Welfare Team, worked through the issues. In order to create interest in the issue and engage the hearts and minds of their fellow students, the SRC created a range of strategies that evoked fun and enjoyment. Posters appeared mysteriously around the school declaring that ‘Anti is coming!’ The students prepared a brochure, in comic format, using the slogan, ‘Bully Busters’. They created a soft, cuddly mascot (an ant), and a super-hero character (complete with mask, purple and black outfit with orange cape) who appeared in person at the assembly that initiated the campaign. The anti-bullying message was spread in assemblies, in classrooms, in two special issues of the regular school magazine, and in posters around the school. The campaign generated student stories, poetry, drama and testimonies of teachers who recounted incidents when they were bullied during their schooling.
Students reported to the Inquiry that the campaign had transformed the school climate. They claimed that there were more positive interactions in the playground and a greater willingness to seek help from others when incidents of bullying occurred. One student described how she, along with others, had come to realise that bullying involved not only verbal and physical aggression but also the social exclusion of others. They described how the campaign had heightened the unacceptability of bullying and encouraged students to intervene when instances developed and to speak out when they were victimised. Both staff and students agreed that the key to the success of the campaign has been the high level of student involvement and the willingness of staff to listen to their ideas and take them seriously.
The Inquiry has encountered many schools that have mechanically followed the Departmental injunction to develop discipline codes consisting of school rules and a graded series of practices for dealing with unacceptable behaviour that lead eventually to suspension or exclusion from the school community. The existence in the background of a codified system of rules and sanctions may be necessary for formal determinations where a degree of specificity is needed to protect the rights of all parties. However, where day-to-day discipline is effective it more often than not rests upon a clear and defensible set of principles and a few sensible rules presented in positive language. The authority of the principles and rules, and the likelihood that they will shape behaviour, is increased when all groups in the school have shared in their development. In illustrating the application of these principles the inquiry draws heavily upon two examples, Canterbury Boys High School and St Marys Senior High School. It is acknowledged that the last mentioned school has the advantage of being for young adults in the post-compulsory stage of their education but some of the measures adopted are capable of general application.
Canterbury Boys High School is an example of a school that over a number of years has replaced an ineffective coercive discipline regime with a more effective system that relies on negotiation, responsibility and structures of support for teachers and students. A teacher who has lived through the change, described to the Inquiry how the process got underway:
74 There were meetings held in the school and there was agreement that we were going to have to change the way we operated. We made visits to a number of schools … I remember we went to Wiley Park Girls and we went to Balmain High. We were particularly interested in the Glasser system there, and we thought we would try and apply it here. It had to be a system with which we were comfortable. It couldn’t be ‘their’ system or anyone else’s system. We had to make it our own. So we had a number of meetings, we came up with the Glasser system, and a very strong part of that was 'catch the kids being good'. Reward them for doing the right thing, and have a non-violent approach in language.
The staff began by surveying every student in the school to find out what they thought about school in general, the behaviour in the classroom and playground, and any changes that would improve school life. The consistent message from students, and subsequently from parents, was that they wanted a strong but fair system of school rules. After further consultation, the students came up with a set of rules, expressed in positive language, which became the eight rules governing behaviour throughout the school community, for example, arrive to class on time; enter and leave the class quietly; look after your own, the school’s and other people's property; and respect the right of others to work. A similar approach has been observed in other primary and secondary schools. For example, in Bourke Public School students participate in the development of simple but effective rules for each classroom and work area.
St Marys Senior High School has a clear focus upon learning and students sharing in the creation of a mutually supportive and enjoyable learning environment. Trust is a word that students invoked in discussion with the Inquiry to describe their relations with one another and with their teachers. The latter were said to be available to assist with study problems at any time that was practicable, within or outside of working hours. Behind the informality that characterises teacher-student relations there has been a considerable investment of time in professional development and the pursuit of productive pedagogy24. In the past, when the school was a Year 7-12 high school it had a typical range of discipline problems. More recently the school has been strongly committed to the belief that an educationally engaged student, from whom adult self-management is anticipated, will behave in a responsible manner. This orientation, rather than a more controlling one, has seen a transformation in students’ conduct.
At Canterbury Boys High the involvement of students in setting the norms of acceptable everyday behaviour within the school was an essential part of the change process. The draft rules, explained the teacher:
were fed back to the students, explained to them, they had another say, and the result was that they felt they owned the rules. We had a lot of meetings to discuss and explain the rules to the students, and we have done that ever since, at the beginning of the year. If the kids don’t own the rules in the first place, or understand how they function, and respect the system, then it’s not going to work.
24 This concept is discussed in Chapter 2 of the present report, Curriculum and Pedagogy.
75 At St Marys Senior High School the Inquiry caused minor puzzlement by asking to see a copy of the discipline code. When someone retrieved the document - it was about a third of a page in length - instead of codified infractions and penalties it consisted, essentially, of several broad statements of principle. They are as follows:
The aim of the discipline policy is to uphold the ethos of our school and preserve the adult learning environment in which St Marys Senior High School currently operates. To maintain the reputation of their school students are to display respect at all times to both fellow students and staff, and act in a manner which conforms to school expectations. Paramount to the preservation of the school ethos are the honourable values of respect and tolerance. These values are enforced to ensure a safe and harmonious school atmosphere conducive to effective study.
The Student Representative Council formulated the code, a fact that has no doubt contributed to its adoption by students generally. The principal added the comment that “We don’t have discipline here. We have choices exercised by students - which we respect - and those choices have consequences. The general question before us is “How does it happen in the adult world? Why don’t we do that?” Because the students are young adults, there is an effective welfare system in the background, supporting students in their growth and waiting to be used if necessary. Students expressed particular appreciation of a teacher mentor scheme as well as mentor groups, and a range of specialist teacher and human service support staff.
With students and teachers moving in and out of the school, the process of building ownership and commitment to the norms of good behaviour must be ongoing. At Canterbury Boys, new students and new teachers are systematically in-serviced into the rules and how the system of discipline operates. Every couple of years, the survey of student perceptions and opinions is repeated and the data analysed to see whether changes are necessary. The result of this consultative process, as the principal noted to the Inquiry, is that discipline is no longer embedded in a ‘them’ and ‘us’ atmosphere of confrontation:
The change has been very powerful for the deputy and me, especially when we have to deal with those few students who are referred to us. ‘We all know the rules’ I say, ‘I can’t change the rules, even though I am the principal of the school. We all agreed these are going to be the rules.’ And they really have no come back, because they realise they are the community’s rules. We find that empowering, too, because it doesn’t mean that we have to be both judge and jury. They know that actions have consequences, whether they are positive or negative.
When researchers have sought the views of disruptive and misbehaving students about effective discipline, three features seem to be central: that it is fair, that it is delivered in a respectful manner, and that it is seen to be motivated by a concern for the wellbeing of the students25. At Canterbury Boys High School, these qualities are reflected in the negotiation that takes place between students who break the rules and their classroom teacher. After talking through the behaviour in relation to the rules, the student and teacher agree on an individual plan for the student to work on in relation to their behaviour so as to minimise future infringements. The negotiation focuses not only on what the students must do, but also on what the teacher can do to support the student in keeping to the plan. Canterbury Boys’ practices in this
25 Pomroy, E., (1999) The teacher-student relationship in secondary school: insights from excluded students, British Journal of Sociology of Education, vol 20, no. 4, pp 465-482.
76 regard resonate with the steps taken in some other schools, at the point when a behavioural problem has resulted in a student taking ‘time out’. Both Bourke Primary and Castle Hill High School, for example, work with such students to develop a plan for successfully restoring them to their classes by improving their behaviour. At Canterbury Boys, if the student has worked through three such plans, and the behaviour persists, it is referred to the head teacher as a more serious matter. Generally, however, as a teacher explained, the system encourages classroom teachers to take responsibility for negotiating behaviour at the classroom level:
A lot of things that could become major issues don't, because they are solved at the classroom level … The students know how it operates and they think its fair. Coupled with the negotiation aspect is a reward system. We try to praise them whenever possible, and give out merit certificates. Once they get a certain number they see the head teacher or year adviser and get a higher level of reward or certificate. The students love that. It’s certainly not: 'You broke that rule, do this!' It’s a matter of working things out with the teacher, and sometimes a parent, to negotiate an outcome. Yes, it’s time consuming. But the long-term benefits are worth it. I would find it difficult to work in a system that didn’t operate this way. If you spoke to a lot of teachers in this school they would feel the same.
Embedded within this whole school approach to discipline are various specific programs that sustain a sense of safety and wellbeing within the school community. Each year, the Year 7 students are taken out of classes for a day for a range of special activities focusing on anti-racism and anti-bullying. These same concerns are built into the curriculum throughout the school to cover various aspects of discrimination, such as disability, sexism and homophobia. The unacceptability of discrimination is discussed and the process for dealing with it within the school is made clear to the students.
In addition, various mentoring programs are used to support young people who are disengaged from school. One such group is made up of Pacific Island boys who figured disproportionately in rates of suspension, non-attendance, and classroom misbehaviour. The school draws on school and District resources to employ a Pacific Island ex-student to mentor the boys and assist them with their literacy needs and study skills. The program has a strong cultural component. Overall, the scheme has been enriching for the school as well as strengthening the boys’ attachment to learning and minimising incidents of misbehaviour. In similar fashion, a mentor scheme for Cleveland Street High School students who are soon to leave school or judged to be ‘at risk,’ has not only supported individual students but also given a practical focus to the pastoral care program and been an integrating force within the school.
A second mentoring program at Canterbury Boys involves Year 7 students who are selected to be mentors to the incoming new intake of Year 6 students (see Chapter 2). An interesting aspect of this program is that a proportion of the mentors are selected, not because they are the compliant, elite students within the cohort but because they are on individual plans for misbehaviour or returning from suspension. This has the effect of not only deepening the attachment of the students to the school and its values, but also of reintegrating offending students
77 back into the moral community of the school26. For precisely the same reasons, Eagle Vale High School in South Western Sydney uses offending students who have ‘turned the corner’ as a positive influence on students whom it believes can be prevented from making the same errors.
Finally, an intensive mentoring program at Canterbury Boys High School works with students who come back from suspension. They work with a staff member who has trained as a mentor and been given a time allocation to do the job. They meet and talk through the reasons that led to the suspension, come up with ideas about how such behaviour can be prevented, and how the school can support the student to adapt back into school life. The staff member has described her work to the Inquiry:
The first thing I do in a session, if they have just come back from suspension, is to talk about why they were suspended, the issue that gave rise to it, their choices. We then set a goal - maybe a short-term goal, like not to get suspended or a longer-term goal, like making it through to the end of the year. Then we might design a behaviour sheet, where you tick a box if the student gets into trouble for particular behaviours. It’s voluntary and they take it around to their classes and get teachers to sign it. Currently I have been talking with a boy about his behaviour in class and he says that he doesn’t ask any questions. So we set a task where he has to ask ten good questions during the week, and teachers sign off on it. When he reaches that goal he gets a merit certificate and we can concentrate on other behaviours. So that’s what we do - look at the behaviours, set goals and look at the choices they make from week to week. They always have something to work towards.
Canterbury Boys High School has developed a whole school approach to discipline where offenders are held accountable for their misbehaviour within a community of support, an idea that in recent years has come to be associated with restorative justice. Instead of stigmatising and excluding an offending student from the school community, the aim of restorative justice is to acknowledge the harm done by the behaviour to self and others, and to 'make things right' through appropriate reparation and strengthened relationships. Instead of isolating the very students who are in greatest need of social supports and education, the aim is to reintegrate the offender back into the school community. In Queensland, trained teacher-facilitators used restorative justice principles to deal with incidents covering assaults, victimisation, property damage and theft in a program that covered 119 schools27. The evaluation revealed very high levels of participant satisfaction with the procedures, the emotional support and the substantive outcomes, a greater sense of justice, higher levels of social support for those affected and reduced levels of re-offending. In Canberra, an anti-bullying program (Responsible Citizenship), based on restorative justice principles, has been trialed and evaluated in a primary school context28. The evaluation indicated that the children developed skills for working
26 A focus on accountability and reintegration rather than exclusion and punishment is central in the notion of restorative justice. An example of its application to school discipline is described in: Morrison, B (2002) Bullying and victimisation in schools: A restorative justice approach, Australian Institute of Criminology, Trends and Issues in Crime and Criminal Justice, No. 219, Canberra ACT. 27 Cameron, L. & Thorsborne, M. (2001) Restorative justice and school discipline: Mutually exclusive? In Braithwaite, J. & Strang, H. (eds.), Restorative Justice and Civil Society, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. 180-194 28 Morrison, B (2002) Bullying and victimisation in schools: A restorative justice approach, Australian Institute of Criminology, Trends and Issues in Crime and Criminal Justice, No. 219, Canberra ACT.
78 through differences and generally exhibited behaviour strategies that were less characteristic of either victims or bullies.
The purpose of this section has been to describe some of the strategies used by students and teachers to achieve and sustain a well-behaved school. While much of this chapter has necessarily focused upon the responses of the DET to manage the relatively small number of students who are persistently disruptive in school, the Inquiry is also keen to foster processes within schools that reduce the incidence of disruption and anti-social behaviour and lessen the stress on teachers. The challenge is to develop policy and system support for schools wishing to move from an over-reliance on punishment and control to more effective forms of compliance that reflect the principles and practices discussed above.
There is no shortage of good models and ideas to achieve this outcome. The schools described in this section are but a sample of schools that have developed effective proactive polices and practices to maximise student and staff wellbeing and minimise disruption and misbehaviour. In addition, schools can draw upon a range of resources (anti-bullying, anti-racism, mentoring, peer mediation, child protection) produced by the Student Welfare and Behaviour units within the DET, and also access specialist advice from the Student Welfare and Behaviour consultants based in the District Offices. Recent interest in health promoting schools29 and the mental health of young people30 has also generated a range of valuable ideas, resources and programs that can support schools to develop effective proactive discipline and student welfare programs.
The Mindmatters31 program, developed by the Commonwealth as part of its national mental health strategy, is one such resource. This program, which consists of a comprehensive set of text and multi-media resources and a professional development program, aims to promote and protect the social and emotional wellbeing of students and teachers by fostering a school environment in which people feel safe, valued, engaged and purposeful. The health promoting school model adopted by Mindmatters, places student wellbeing at the centre of change that embraces curriculum and teaching, the school ethos and environment, and community partnerships and services.
While Mindmatters offers schools a rich compendium of information, practical ideas and activities, it has less to say about the process of organisational change. One of the strengths of the Gatehouse Project, developed by a team from the Centre for Adolescent Health at the Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne, is that it fills this gap. As with Mindmatters, the Project’s primary aim is to increase the capacities of school communities to address the emotional and mental health needs of students. Although this particular project has been instigated by health workers, similar procedures could just have easily been part of exercises led by applied social scientists, social workers, community developers and other involved in strengthening human communities. Since beginning in 1997, the Gatehouse project team has worked with 12 schools and monitored developments in 14 control schools. Its special contribution, as far as proactive discipline is concerned, is that it has developed a collaborative change process for schools to work through to increase
29 World Health Organisation (1995) The Health Promoting School – a Framework for Action in the WHO Western Pacific Region, Regional Office for the Western Pacific. 30 Moon, l., Meyer, P. & Grau, J (1999) Australia’s Young People: Their Health and Wellbing, Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. 31 Details of the program and the text and multi media components can be found on the Mindmatters website. http://www.curriculum.edu.au/mindmatters
79 connectedness to the school and engagement with learning. The key features of the process are:
• Problem setting and problem solving capacity: A member of the Gatehouse team works as a ‘critical friend’ with teachers, and students to conduct a student survey about peer relations, student-teacher relations, and attitudes to learning and discipline. The ‘critical friend’ works with the staff and students to analyse the data, identify risk and protective factors within the school environment, and reflect on aspects of the school organisation that bear on student and staff wellbeing. The aim is to come up with strategies to strengthen a sense of security and trust, enhance opportunities for good communications and build a sense of positive regard through valued participation in aspects of school life.
• Changing school structures: Student welfare, pastoral care or student management teams are typically preoccupied with crisis management around discipline. Recognising this limitation, the Gatehouse Project developed the idea of a broad based and representative whole-school adolescent well-being team to coordinate change within each participating school. It contains the principal or deputy principal, the student welfare teacher, sub-school leaders, curriculum leaders, students’ representatives, parent representatives, and a community worker. This change reflects the whole-school approach and encourages a broad attitudinal shift within the school community. Patterns within the survey data of alienation, isolation, boredom, failure and lack of involvement come to be seen, not simply as properties of individuals, but as indicators of a lack of connectedness to school and disengagement from learning. Some starting points for school change arising from this process are: preventive strategies in regard to bullying; peer mediation and leadership programs; more challenging curriculum; teacher and student work teams; and increased opportunities for student participation in decision making.
• Access, use and enhanced networks of support: Earlier in this chapter it was pointed out that actions to enhance student wellbeing and good discipline are more likely to be effective if they work across the boundary between school and community. There is no shortage of support agencies outside the school (curriculum, professional, speakers, programs, social services and the like) but the problem is to access such support systematically in accordance with schools needs and priorities. In the Gateway Project, the ‘critical friend’ acts as the link between the adolescent well-being team and targeted external support.
As this section has indicated, there are examples of good practice that can be used as a basis for wider change. The difficulty from a system point of view seems to be a lack of strategic focus and leadership rather than a shortage of ideas and resources. The challenge is to develop a coherent strategy that can bring these elements together to support a process of democratic whole-school change. Some of the important ingredients in this process have been discussed above: a school audit of relationships and other aspects of student and staff wellbeing; student wellbeing and behaviour considered within a broad educational context; students held accountable for their misbehaviour within a community of support; student participation as a basis for ownership of the rules; an emphasis upon choice and responsibility for one’s actions; an external ‘critical friend’ to support change and liaise with other agencies; collaboration between all stakeholders; and a focus upon reviewing change to see what works. The Inquiry believes that there is an urgent need for the DET to play a more active and strategic role in assisting schools to
80 develop effective proactive school practices that will minimise the incidence of indiscipline in schools.
With this end in mind, the Inquiry urges the DET to invite selected schools with high rates of student misbehaviour and disengagement from learning, to participate in a Positive Discipline and Student Wellbeing Project. The aim of the Project will be to minimise the level of disruption and misbehaviour by fostering whole-school, proactive approaches to school discipline and student wellbeing. The Project will reflect a model of whole-school change that embodies collaboration between teachers, students, and parents; a diversity of responses that are sensitive to local circumstances; an appreciation of best practice that is currently on offer; and a focus on intellectual and emotional wellbeing as a prerequisite to engaged learning and an ordered school environment.
Approximately forty-five participating schools should be drawn from Districts within Bands 3 and 4 according to the Index of Need used to allocate behaviour resources to Districts throughout New South Wales and be part of the Project for three years. Schools within the project should be organised into clusters, on the basis of locality, and support provided for each cluster to work with an external facilitator or ‘critical friend.’ The facilitator would assist with the process of reflection and analysis and liaise between the schools and relevant external services. Appropriate professional development would need to be aligned with the plans for school change and provided on an individual school and cluster basis. Participating schools would be required to develop and monitor appropriate indicators of indiscipline and misbehaviour and conduct systematic audits of student and staff wellbeing.
The Student Services and Equity Programs division of the DET should have overall responsibility for the Positive Discipline and Student Wellbeing Project. District superintendents should facilitate the formation of clusters of participating schools and Student Welfare and Behaviour consultants within the Districts should offer support to the process. Project schools will be required to form a school- wide Positive Discipline and Student Wellbeing Team to plan and monitor the project. The Team should include the principal or deputy principal, teachers with responsibility for the curriculum and student welfare, students’ representatives, parent representatives, and an appropriate community member (for example, applied social scientist, social worker, youth or community development worker). The DET will maintain a Positive Discipline and Student Wellbeing website (via the proposed Pedagogy Clearing House) and all participating schools will disseminate information about the process and results of change within their schools via the website.
The total cost of the Project, over three years, would be approximately $2,060,000. Of this amount, $1,100,000 would go to the participating schools to employ the external facilitators and pay for casual relief to allow the school management team to meet on a regular basis. An additional sum of $40,000 will go to each of the eight Districts ($960,000 in total) to support specific change strategies resulting from individual school audits and to allow the schools within the cluster to meet and share ideas. It is assumed that school-based professional development activities will be resourced from the increased Professional Development Fund, recommended in Chapter One of the Inquiry’s report, and that the management of the Project at the District level will be covered by existing resources.
81 Recommendation 5.7: That the DET develop a Positive Discipline and Student Wellbeing Project to assist schools with high rates of student misbehaviour and disengagement from learning to develop and monitor school-wide, proactive approaches to discipline and student wellbeing. Estimated total cost … $2,060,000
82 CHAPTER 6 BUILDINGS AND AMENITIES
AIMS OF CHAPTER
To consider buildings and amenities within the New South Wales public education system is to traverse the contrasting perceptions and expectations of different stakeholders. So far as the majority of teachers, students and parents are concerned, the maintenance and refurbishment of the education estate has been neglected and fitfully managed for such an extended period that the tag “povo,”1 aptly describes its standing relative to the private sector. The direct observation of conditions in more than 140 schools2 and the numerous submissions received on this aspect of school life, a sample of which appear below, have left the Inquiry in no doubt about the frequently sub-standard conditions in which teaching and learning are being attempted. On the other hand, the chapter will reveal the international recognition of the need for school buildings and amenities to be of a good standard and supportive of contemporary teaching practices. Further, it will be shown that the building standards adopted by the New South Wales authorities for new and extensively refurbished schools are fundamentally consistent with the international standards. The presumption of the authorities appears to be that a combination of two things, a sustained application of the new standards and the continuance for a decade of current levels of budgetary support, will bring the system to an acceptable standard.
The Inquiry has no reason to doubt that if the aforementioned two conditions are fulfilled, there will be a major improvement to school buildings and amenities. However, that judgement rests on informed surmise rather than any quantification of the backlog of capital works in terms of explicit criteria. The latter measure of unmet needs would be possible using existing data. Essentially, what would be involved would be the aggregation of information about individual projects that have been found to have a degree of merit short of gaining the priority needed to access available funds. The use of such information for budgetary planning purposes would enhance the rational consideration of the portfolio’s claims for asset acquisition and improvement funds at both the state and national levels. In other words, unmet need data could be used for policy purposes and monitoring progress towards the currently stated goal of bringing buildings and facilities up to an acceptable standard. The presentation of some key features of the indicators that are needed will be presented towards the conclusion of the chapter.
BACKGROUND
The ways in which buildings impact upon human life range from their purely functional consequences, to their affect on the aesthetic sensibilities and aspirations of individuals and groups. These qualities are as important, if not more so, to a satisfying and productive life within schools as they are in other human institutions. First, what have been identified in earlier chapters as the primary tasks of public education – teaching and learning – can be enhanced or retarded by the presence or absence of appropriate physical conditions (like a comfortable classroom temperature, a physically safe and clean environment, areas suitable for study and
1 A term devised by some students to denote what they consider to be the poverty stricken state of school buildings and equipment in public schools 2 As at the end of June, 2002
83 play, room designs that support productive pedagogy, basic educational facilities like ‘wet areas,’ and so forth). Then again, the school community’s spirits can be uplifted or depressed by the presence or absence of well designed buildings that are maintained and presented with a view to satisfying the aesthetic needs of those who work and study within them. While it is difficult to isolate the effects of the many interacting factors that contribute to a school’s academic outcomes, there is research evidence that good building quality and maintenance are associated with improved academic results3. On the available evidence, when allowance has been made for other relevant factors, the physical state of a school is one effective predictor of student achievement. Research suggests that the quality of physical space affects self-esteem, peer and student teacher interactions, parental involvement, discipline, attention, motivation and interpersonal relations4.
Moreover, as will be seen from the review of evidence gathered by the present Inquiry, the quality of school buildings and their surrounds can also be a potent symbol of the regard (or otherwise) in which public education is believed to be held by governments and the community. Implicit in the remarks of teachers, students and parents is a set of physical and planning requirements of a well functioning school and education system. After reviewing what the stakeholders have to say, it will be opportune to set their requirements against international school building standards and the planning and financial provision for meeting those standards within New South Wales.
SUBMISSIONS TO INQUIRY
Provision of general resources
A Teachers’ Association in Northern New South Wales surveyed 18 schools in its region and reported the following results to the Inquiry:
Half need more staff toilets, and one has none. Eight have inadequate space in the staff room and two do not have a staff room. Eleven schools need more, or much more provision of wet weather protection for staff and students. Demountable buildings are not being used as originally intended for temporary accommodation. We have 48 demountable buildings, with 39 used as classrooms. These classrooms make up nearly a third of the classrooms in use. One has been on site since 1969, another since 1976.
The written account given of their physical surrounds by the staff of one country primary school warranted a prompt visit by the Inquiry to see whether conditions were as bad as had been claimed. That inspection confirmed the general accuracy of what had been submitted:
Our school was established in the 1870s. It has an enrolment of approximately 600 students who are housed in 22 classrooms, 10 of which are metal demountables and the remaining 12 are wooden. It is difficult to promote principles of social justice when students and teachers
3 Berner, M. M., (1993) “Building Conditions, Parental Involvement and Student Achievement in the District of Columbia Public School System,” Urban Education, 28:23 4 Uline, C. L., (2000) “Decent Facilities and learning: Thirman A Milner Elementary School and Beyond,” Teachers College Record, Vol. 102, No. 2, February, pp.442-460; Agron, J., (1998) “Building schools that enhance learning,” American School and University,” Vol. 71, Issue 3, 275-276
84 are forced to spend day after day in substandard buildings. At least 11 classrooms leak and have done so for some time. In two classrooms at least, water runs down inside the back wall possibly behind the electrical conduit and power point. In another room, leaks in the ceiling resulted in water collecting in the fluorescent light. Leaking rooms have also resulted in many resource books being ruined and children’s books being damaged. At least eight classrooms have inadequate carpet. The carpet either smells due to the leaks or is old, dusty and stained. In one room the carpet is fraying across the room where one rust coloured piece is joined to another maroon coloured piece. At least six classrooms have basic structural problems, such as piers with no footings, piers that are cracked, buckled noticeboards on the back walls, gaps in walls that you can see daylight through. At least eight classrooms have problems with excessive temperatures (37-40 degrees) during the warmer months. There are two toilets for 30 staff.
A Sydney primary school has drawn attention to the absence of basic amenities for its staff and students:
The physical conditions of our school are poor, and due to the lack of funding and consistent maintenance they continue to get worse. Rooms are unclean, paint and plaster are falling from the walls, toilet blocks are dark, damp, cold and horrible, and the basic necessities such as hot water to wash your hands in the staff room are non-existent. As teachers we take pride in the learning environments that we provide for our classes. This is made all that much harder for us due to the lack of maintenance money that is provided.
Many teachers share the foregoing sentiments. The following views of a Sydney high school teacher are representative of those expressed by many of his colleagues:
The state of disrepair of public school buildings, some quite old and others less than a decade old, is scandalous. Torn carpet if carpet exists at all, windows unable to be opened, paint flaking off walls, desks and chairs from the 1950s, assuming that your classroom has enough of both, are wrecked from years of use, there is no air conditioning in rooms that reach 40 degrees in summer discouraging effective teaching and learning. A massive injection of funds from both State and Federal Governments, targeted at school refurbishment, upgrading of facilities and the improvement of school environments is urgently needed… A credible program of building and repair must come into play immediately and over a ten year period.
Both during visits to schools and in the submissions received, the Inquiry has constantly been reminded of the inadequacies of some of the schools’ most basic amenities, especially their toilets. At the insistence of staff, inspections have been made of ill-maintained and under-supplied staff toilets, especially in older schools. A Western Sydney school has written of blocked drains resulting in a build up of water, sewerage problems and pungent odours. A principal of a metropolitan Sydney high school has commented on “… struggling to find $2000 to pay for yet another eruption of a 70 year old sewer system”. A Sydney primary school P&C has described the age of their school facilities - “They are so old that they have chains and kids have to climb up onto the toilets to flush them.”
85 The age of their school and the ravages of time and neglect are felt by some school communities to have disadvantaged them in their pursuit of refurbishment funding. This was certainly the view of parents and teachers at the country public school that made the following submission:
We are in desperate need of proper facilities at our school. Being an older school in a non-metropolitan area it continues to be neglected while newer but smaller schools get access to things we have been lobbying for years to get. We are a fairly large school, having approximately 360 students and yet we still do not have a school hall after 135 years. We have no permanent library, no computer lab and no additional spaces for interview rooms and teaching resources and general storage. Our older classrooms do not have sufficient space for group work and computers. We need to be given a high priority to have our buildings updated.
Parental concern is not confined to the state of buildings but extends to worries about the safety and appearance of school grounds, as illustrated by the following submission from a Sydney P&C group:
Our playgrounds are cracked and dangerous to play on due to ongoing erosion problems and lack of a soft surface area for the children to play sport. Our grassed areas are always ‘out of bounds’ due to drainage problems. There are occupational health and safety issues for parents, students and staff associated with the condition of the grounds.
Staff working conditions
Time and again teachers have taken Inquiry staff aside during school visits to show them their working conditions, especially work rooms where class preparation, marking and other duties are performed. The following comment by a Sydney high school teacher is reproduced because it captures the flavour of many remarks received concerning teachers’ working conditions and also reflects the poor conditions that Inquiry staff has observed in many schools:
The physical conditions teachers are expected to work in are demeaning and downright insulting, and the inadequacies of the resources provided by the employer constitute a disgrace. Why would young, up and coming professionals choose to work where they don’t have their own computer, and where their personal work space to organise the learning of 150-180 students is little bigger than a small broom cupboard? The toilet facilities consist of two cramped, dark and dank, unisex toilet cubicles which have only cold water, and space for one person to wait for a vacant cubicle, or wash their hands under the cold tap… Those who work in the corporate world and enter our staffroom are horrified at what they see: the incredible overcrowding and lack of work and storage space, with three power points for 13 staff and their equipment… Staff are expected to keep detailed student profiles and records, on 150 to 180 different students. To collect, sort and assess work for that many students they are provided with a desk the size of a small kitchen table, with one single shelf bookshelf taking up about a quarter of the already tiny amount of desk space, and one small and one large drawer in the desk. At our school they have also one filing cabinet drawer each. In addition to the above, on this desk and in this single filing cabinet
86 drawer, they must keep copies of all worksheets given to students, all mandatory departmental documents, all school policies and procedures, all their personal reference material and textbooks, copies of all teaching programmes and lessons.
The reference to a workspace approximating a broom closet is not just figurative in all cases. The Inquiry has seen closets of various kinds that are being used as office spaces.
Inadequate maintenance
Teachers and parents have commented upon the ‘false economy’ of not maintaining assets appropriately. One teacher described the process as “demolition by neglect.” A Sydney P&C group whose members impressed the Inquiry during a school visit as being well versed in the management of commercial enterprises, made the following submission:
The maintenance of the school is totally inadequate. Inadequate maintenance is a false economy. The school’s budget shows increasing maintenance costs reflecting the increasing cost of maintaining deteriorating assets. The infrastructure costs are being shifted from the Department to the school’s budget as lack of capital replacement necessitates continual repair of aged infrastructure… This year the school is to receive a global funding budget of approximately $131,000 from the Department. By comparison, the school’s expenditure for terms 1 and 2 on essential administration and maintenance alone totals $107,835 so just on this there will be a funding shortfall. The annual funding for our school covers opening and closing the doors, turning on the lights, providing drinking water and flushing toilets and not much more. Where will the money for the Key Learning Areas and classroom resources come from?
Appropriate teaching spaces
During school visits, classroom teachers have often pointed out that the spaces in which they teach severely restrict the flexibility of their teaching practices. They say that they need ‘breakout’ spaces so that groups of students can work on computers or at other tasks before pooling the benefits of their learning. The Inquiry has seldom found spaces available in the schools to support this kind of progressive pedagogy. Sometimes the lack of space has been of a more drastic kind, as reported in a submission from a Sydney public school:
Because our school has extra staff, that is, seven community language and six ESL teachers, appropriate teaching space which ensures that all children have an equal opportunity to learn, is essential. As a very old school with 960 students (96% NESB), these teaching spaces are at a minimum. Teachers often work with groups on the floor, in very small spaces or in corridors.
87 Cleaning
Numerous complaints have been received about the standard of school cleaning. A Teachers Association held nothing back in stating the importance of this factor: “There is a need for regular carpet cleaning, especially when bleeding, defecation, urination and vomiting occur. Carpet cleaning needs to be done immediately, rather than waiting for school holidays or the weekend.”. A number of the comments received spoke of the disrespect for public education implicit in poor school cleaning. One teacher expressed the following thoughts in a submission:
Inadequate cleaning is one of the most obvious affronts to public education…There are only several minutes per room allocated for cleaning time, which leads to a minimal cleaning job. The desks are not cleaned daily and are often sticky and dirty. When we are encouraging children to present neat, clean work, it undermines our efforts when the room itself is filthy.
Many teachers date the decline in cleaning standards from the commencement of contract cleaning in the schools. The Inquiry considers it would be pointless to make any recommendations that this arrangement be reversed. It believes that the current problems extend well beyond the public school system and have their source in the criteria used to allocate cleaning contracts. The remedy lies in the adoption of a more realistic attitude towards the time taken to perform acceptable cleaning services.
Temperature control
The difficulty of retaining students’ concentration on learning, as well as that of teachers, when classroom temperatures are extreme, has been commented on throughout the state. However, it has been in regions that experience extreme heat and cold where the plea for temperature control has been most strident. The following two submissions illustrate what has been said to the Inquiry. The first is from a primary school that states that all of its classrooms are demountables with no air conditioning:
During November, February and March temperatures regularly range between 38 and 42 degrees centigrade before 11am. With parental approval, the staff provides students with relief from the soaring temperatures by hosing them down. With tanks as our only source of water, this primitive but effective form of relief is limited.
A teacher has described teaching and learning conditions in a primary school in the south of the state:
Classrooms are not cooled or heated appropriately for our climate. In winter, heating is provided by un-flued gas heating so windows have to be left open when temperatures often do not rise over 10C. Teaching in overcoats is essential and our students are cold. Canadian exchange teachers visiting our school in 1998 froze and were appalled at our poor learning and working conditions.
88 Demountable classrooms
Demountables have been the subject of incessant criticism throughout the Inquiry. They are criticised on several grounds: they develop gaps and leaks; in the absence of air conditioning they are too hot; they lack amenities such as wet areas; their insubstantial character detracts from the appearance and confirmed identity of a school; and their alleged ‘temporary’ status is used as a reason for not providing facilities such as covered walkways. Teachers at one high school summed up their dissatisfaction by saying that “We have been living in a village of demountables since the 1970s.” All of the classes in one school in Northern New South Wales have been in demountables since 1995, with the first demountable temporarily installed in 1976. Inquiry staff have inspected the school and seen that there are no covered walkways to any of the demountables or to the administration office and staff room located within the original heritage school building. The authorities say that this school will be rebuilt within two years.
INTERNATIONAL STANDARDS
The OECD Program on Educational Building (PEB) promotes the international exchange and analysis of policy, research and experience in matters related to educational facilities. A recent PEB publication (Designs for Learning: 55 Exemplary Educational Facilities)5 specifies a range of broad criteria by which the merits of newly designed or substantially refurbished schools can be assessed. These criteria can be of service in assessing the planning of school buildings in New South Wales. According to the OECD, the designs must have an eye to meeting the identifiable needs of today, as well as the uncertain needs of the future. For example, structures that incorporate non-load bearing partitions and ample provision for mechanical, electrical and electronic services will be more flexible than traditional forms of construction. The basic educational purposes of schools must be to the fore: the schools “should provide an environment that will support and enhance the learning process, encourage innovation and be a tool for learning…”6. The last mentioned function can include the imaginative use of the school grounds to provide an environment for outdoor learning. In terms of the unifying themes of the present Inquiry’s report, the physical fabric of the school must support effective pedagogy and sustain the innovation that is the life-blood of quality education.
The OECD adds that well designed educational facilities should be a resource to support lifelong education and recreation for all. Particular reference is made to providing communities with out-of-hours access to information technology and facilities like assembly halls, communal areas and sports halls. Schools should also ensure that today’s design decisions do not impose an unnecessary burden on future generations. The configuration of buildings and the choice of cladding materials, are among the design choices that will have a bearing on future environmental and other costs. Provision of a wide mix of size and type of teaching spaces is likely to achieve an efficient level of space management. The placement of the buildings themselves to enclose protected areas, including courtyards and glass-roofed atria, can improve security. Finally, the OECD recognises the importance of aesthetic appeal and providing “Delight that lifts the spirit and affirms to both students and staff
5 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, (2001) Designs for Learning: 55 Exemplary Educational Facilities, Paris, OECD Publications 6 Ibid., p.vii
89 that there is more to education than simply acquiring the skills and knowledge to survive in an increasingly competitive world”7.
The OECD has provided a useful but broad set of design principles for building and maintaining schools. Other authorities have presented more finely grained requirements that more closely match the level of specificity of the submissions received by the Inquiry. These requirements take the form of standards that school administrators should focus on to try and provide teachers with effective workplaces and students with an effective indoor learning environment8. Again, these international standards can be useful in assessing the standards adopted in New South Wales. Teacher workspaces are seen as being a critical element in the success of the academic program of the school. Administrators are urged to consider:
• The importance of a strategically located workspace that facilitates cross- disciplinary interaction,
• Designing a teachers’ staffroom that incorporates spaces for reflection, research and professional collaboration across and within grade levels, and
• Balancing the needs of privacy and collaboration. Designing individual spaces in close proximity to the main workroom or staffroom area promotes easier interaction among staff.
So far as an effective learning environment for students is concerned, for present purposes the specifications are kept to a more general level without focusing on specific needs in special areas. There is general consensus concerning each of the following design elements:
• Space – to accommodate the different styles of learning and teaching, schools need different types of classroom space. Instead of the traditional notions of rows of desks facing a teacher, a classroom should have enough space for numerous activities and be flexible. Classrooms must be able to accommodate seating arrangements as varied as rows, small group clusters, or U shapes, with students moving from one work station to another and teachers moving around the room as facilitators, providing one-to-one or small group instruction. Forum rooms, in lieu of a lecture hall, can provide a suitable format for assembling 50 to 150 students for lecture and interactive dialogue between teachers and students and among the students themselves. Walls must be acoustically treated to provide adequate noise separation between teaching areas.
7 Ibid, p.vii 8 Kennedy, M., (2002) “Creating Ideal Facilities,” American School and University, Vol. 74, Issue 5, 30- 33; Agron, J., (1998) “Building schools that enhance learning,” American School and University, Vol. 71, Issue 3, pp. 275-276; Coburn, J., (1998) “Facilities for the Future,” School Planning and Management, ol. 37, Issue 7, pp.42-43; Biehle, J. T., (2000) “Planning the middle school science classroom,” School Planning and Management, Vol.39, Issue 1, pp.60-61; Butin, D., (2000) “Classrooms,” National Clearinghouse for Educational Facilities, July, www.edfacilities.org; American School and University, (1998) “Design Ideas for Schools of the 21st Century,” American School and University, Vol. 70, January, pp. 18-23, http://vweb.hwwilsonweb.com; Butin, D., (2000) “Teacher Workspaces,” National Clearinghouse for Educational Facilities, June, www.edfacilities, org; De Jong and Associates, (1999) Charleston County School District High School Educational Specifications, Dublin, OH, www.charleston.k12.sc.us/facilities/edspec.html
90 Older classrooms might be combined into larger spaces with adjacent shared teacher preparation rooms and windows linking the separate rooms and generally inviting modern educational strategies such as team teaching or multi-class projects. Computers should be in both classrooms and separate computer laboratories. Portable carts should feature built-in computers. Multimedia systems should replace separate communication items and screens should replace chalkboards or marker boards. The general nature of the learning space should be nearer to a living room, interactive museum, or library - where knowledge is discussed and discovered - rather than a space where information is simply transferred from teacher to student,
• Daylight - it has been found that students perform better in classrooms that have more natural lighting, their attendance is better and their emotional state more positive,
• Clustering - can be used to foster a sense of community, to unite a manageable sized group of teachers and students, and provide a sense of order and cohesiveness to the physical layout of a school,
• Acoustics - the quality of classroom sound affects the performance of students (especially younger ones and those not proficient in English),
• Size - Learning environments need to be 1,400 to 1,500 square feet with moveable walls allowing for larger spaces when needed,
• Technology - wiring for voice, video and data capabilities needs to be accessible to allow for upgrades. Given the rapid advances in wireless communication, consideration needs to be given to both wireless and wired communication,
• Ergonomic/furniture - with computers in widespread use, having the right kinds of desks and chairs becomes more important. Teachers’ desks should have ample, lockable storage space and allow for a computer and modem connection,
• Storage - should be plentiful. While some permanent (affixed) cabinets are necessary, movable modular cabinets are preferable, allowing greater flexibility in classroom activities,
• Maintenance - students and staff perform better when the work area is cleaned and maintained properly,
• Temperature - linked to outside temperature but control over extremes using individualised thermostats,
• Indoor air quality - Mould and other pollutants, including allergy promoting floor coverings and toxic emissions from cleaning fluids and paint, can make children sick and affect their learning and affect the health of staff. Schools can reduce the risk of poor air quality by improving ventilation and exhaust systems, especially in spaces like science classrooms,
• Safety - unless teachers and students feel safe in a school, they will not be able to focus on learning. Entrances should be welcoming but still serve as a control point. Good lighting and clear sight lines can assist,
91 • Accessible work areas - classrooms should be more independent and self- contained, with bathrooms, sinks, storage areas, communication capabilities and teacher work areas or a nearby teacher resource room. Resource areas in general should be within or as near to the classroom as possible,
• Restrooms - restrooms that are poorly maintained and prone to malfunction and vandalism can affect how students and staff members view their school,
• Roofs - a leaking roof allows moisture to seep into a building. Often it cannot be detected until it has extensively damaged walls, ceilings and equipment. Moisture can also lead to the growth of mould. Regular roofing inspections can help prevent problems,
• Community access - forward thinking schools house adult education programs, public libraries, computer training facilities, public meeting rooms,
• Symbolic value and aesthetics - students and staff attending unattractive and poorly maintained schools may feel diminished and less valued.
THE NEW SOUTH WALES PUBLIC EDUCATION ESTATE
Of the almost 2300 public schools in New South Wales, 1100 are heritage listed. In the words of a 1997 New South Wales Parliamentary Report, “The simple and austere layout of these older facilities reflects the limited requirements of their era, which focused on delivering basic education to the school aged population… Few of the modern day demands were placed upon school planners to provide facilities which incorporate design flexibility and high environmental standards.”9. This points to the immensity of the task of maintaining and upgrading these schools for the 21st century. Today, the DET and the Department of Public Works and Services (DPWS) are jointly responsible for the provision of school facilities. Both Departments have complementary roles and responsibilities that focus on: - delivering new school places in developing areas throughout the state - upgrading and adding to existing schools - maintaining existing assets, and - disposing of assets.
There are regular meetings of the School Building Research and Development Group, the members of which possess educational, technical and research expertise. Facility standards for all primary10 and secondary11 schools in New South Wales have been created to respond to the specific educational requirements for individual and group spaces. Since both sets of standards have been published within the past five years, it is appropriate to compare them with the OECD principles and the integrated list of design specifications presented earlier in this chapter. One complication that arises is that both sets of New South Wales standards have been prepared as general educational and technical specifications for planning new buildings. When substantial school upgrading occurs, either in the form of a major or minor works project then, as far as practicable, the standards are being incorporated in the work undertaken.
9 Standing Committee on Public Works, Legislative Assembly of the New South Wales Parliament, (1997) Report. NSW School Facilities, Report No 6, November 10 Primary School Facilities Standard, PS.330.02 Updated: 11.1.’98 11 Secondary School Facilities Standard, HS303; 8/7/99
92 It is necessary to preface the presentation of the standards by again emphasising that the Inquiry is well aware of the difference between the pictures they convey and the contrasting reality that has been directly observed during visits to many schools. However, the standards look to the future rather than the past and in so doing project school infrastructure arrangements that strongly resemble the OECD and international benchmarks already reviewed. Therefore, the local standards should be tabled as a prelude to asking hard questions about what will be needed if they are to become the new reality within our schools.
Primary school standards
The primary standards document includes recommended square metre sizes for all school spaces from staff rooms to storage rooms. It also includes recommended measurements for all types of school furniture. It then outlines general and specific criteria for various learning units, communal facilities, staff facilities and pupil facilities, such as drinking fountains and toilets. The section on what is called the home base, the core of the learning unit, states:
• The home base must accommodate a class of 30-35 students and their teacher and provide an identity for the group. Home bases should be clustered in groups to enable grades to work together;
• The activities undertaken will involve students working in many different media and requiring varied spaces and maximum flexibility. The design should, as far as possible, be responsive to change. Good ventilation is very important. Natural light should be maximized wherever possible;
• Display, both hanging and pinning, should be provided on walls and ceiling wherever possible;
• A square shaped room (60sq.m) is preferred to allow for both formal and informal teaching approaches, with a centrally located whiteboard away from glare sources so that all parts of the room have good visibility;
• Acoustic absorption in the form of a soft floor finish is encouraged;
• Acoustic separation between home bases is necessary to permit independent operation of individual classes;
• A withdrawal space is required to separate small groups from the class in the home base. It could be a room shared by two home bases or an alcove extension of the home base;
• A practical activities area should be provided and considered an extension of the home base. Where used, clusters of two or four home bases could have a shared practical area. The activities of the practical area require water and drainage and washing facilities; power; work benches; specialized equipment such as portable oven and boiling hot plate; easily cleaned surfaces and a floor that is non-slip when wet;
• A personal effects store is necessary. Bags will require shelving for 30 students. Coats will require hooks;
93 • A covered outdoor learning area is recommended. There should be a suitable orientation for year-round use, and it should be protected from winds and have simple landscaping;
• No provision is made for warm water for personal hygiene in toilet units.
Standards for staff rooms
The staff room acts as a common room for all members of staff, both teaching and ancillary. It should engender a relaxed atmosphere; it should be linked to a study annexe that provides a separate space for preparation or study by teachers during release from face to face teaching. Telephones and personal computers are not specified, disabled showers/toilets are. The standard includes specifications for five different sizes of staff room. All require a microwave, a refrigerator/freezer and an urn. Most require a dishwasher. The specifications also cover cupboards, cabinets, chairs, and the like.
Communal facilities
These facilities are to cater for a wide range of activities including groups of children, teachers, parents and the community throughout the year. Emphasis must be placed on providing a utilitarian space that will physically and acoustically cater for activities ranging from formal meetings to school social evenings,
• The communal space should be large enough to allow the whole school to assemble;
• It should include a raised platform to allow for whole class performances and be of unobstructed height to allow for indoor games;
• Suitable acoustics for a range of activities is of the utmost importance;
• It should include ‘brownout’ facilities for daylight screening and good ventilation for large audiences.
General schools facilities standards specify “thermal comfort is essential to everyday functioning of the school”. Ceiling or wall fans may be used for cooling where natural ventilation is adequate. Evaporative cooling is only installed in schools located in extreme climatic conditions defined by the 10% heat stress line. In the same areas, chilled drinking water is also provided. Refrigerated air conditioning is generally only provided for special areas with high internal heat loads. As complained of in some submissions to the Inquiry, gas convection heaters are to be of the flue-less type and permanent natural ventilation is required to remove combustion products. Apart from the effect this requirement has on the effectiveness of the appliance, it would seem advisable to review the suitability of flue-less convection heaters in the light of current controversy concerning their health consequences12.
12 Pilotto, L. S., Douglas, R. M., Attewell, Wilson, S. R., (19097) “Respiratory effects associated with indoor nitrogen dioxide exposure in children”, International Journal of Epidemiology,26: 788-796; Smith B. J., Nitschke, M., Pilotto, L.S., Ruffin, R. E., Pisaniello, D. L., Willson, K., (2000) “Health effects of daily indooe nitrogen dioxide exposure in people with asthma,” Eur. Respir Journal, 16: 879- 885
94 Secondary school standards
The Secondary Schools Facilities Standards, like the primary school document, includes recommended square metre measurements for every unit/facility type, a furniture master plan which includes recommended dimensions for all types of furniture (518 items in total), and design standards for factors such as water, waste, gas, cooling, heating, power and communications. However, the secondary schools document does not include the more general descriptions found in the primary school standards. There are, however, other descriptive sources available13. The guiding philosophy is that the physical structures of new high schools should support productive pedagogies of the current era. Buildings should support diverse learning styles by providing flexible spaces. These spaces should be function-based, not faculty-based, that is, any faculty can use them. Classrooms should have within them or close by, areas where students can research, experiment, access technology, work individually, in groups, or as a whole class depending on educational purposes, under the supervision of teachers.
There are specialist learning units for subjects like science or art, and general learning units for subjects like English and maths. A general learning unit consists of a number of learning spaces that can accommodate whole class groups, in some instances moveable walls enabling larger classrooms to be created for team teaching activities. All classrooms open out onto a large open-plan learning space that provides spill out areas for group work, role-plays and private research. A wet area also is included where experiments and art-based activities can occur. A seminar room provides for small group discussions. All spaces within a learning unit are networked for computer and video terminals and extensive storage is provided. Within science learning areas there is a clear division between the theory and practice of science with a classroom component providing for report writing, research, group work and data logging, while the laboratory is set up for experimental work. Other units cater for specialised areas of learning, including art performance, fitness and physical movement, visual arts, industrial arts, fabric and food studies.
The library is located near the front of the school to facilitate access by a wide range of users within and outside of normal school hours. It contains a computer room, senior study, accommodation for whole class groups, multiple data outlets for research and training, seminar spaces and rooms for recreational reading, and a careers advisor office. A major new design element is the nature of the staff facilities. In new high schools staff members have been combined into large staff studies. Unlike the overcrowded, ill-serviced and generally extremely unpleasant staff studies visited by the Inquiry, the environment is an appropriately professional one. Each teacher’s workstation is equipped with a double data outlet, for access to the network and telephone system. Adequate storage is provided. A utilities area accommodates the staff pigeonholes, printers and fax machines. Adjacent to the staff study is a staff lounge and kitchen. Apart from being a socialising area, the lounge could also be used to support the development of the professional communities and collaborative educational work advocated in Chapter 1 of this report and considered to be vital to the reinvigorating of the teaching profession. The lounge has features that can support training and development activities, including video-conferencing, projection facilities and whiteboards. Interview/meeting rooms are available that, among other uses, could be employed as training and development break out areas. The main printing facility has been relocated to the staff unit.
13 A video, Built to Teach, Designed to Learn, prepared by the Education Facilities Research Group, described the structure and functions of units within newly designed high schools.
95 The Inquiry believes that with minor exceptions, the primary and secondary standards match quite well those emanating from overseas authorities. When they are fully applied, they will overcome the majority of building problems that have been raised with the Inquiry. So much so that it would be a pity if, in the realm of amenity, a small number of items emphasised by teachers (such as warm water for hand washing, and room heaters that do not require that windows be left open), were not to be given the status of design requirements. Meanwhile, the Inquiry has had the opportunity to visit a new secondary school and two refurbished primary schools incorporating the new standards. Despite one or two shortcomings the schools were fine examples of a commitment to quality.
One issue of concern to many parents and teachers not covered by the standards is the view that demountable buildings are inherently unsatisfactory and should either not be used or else minimally employed. The provision of permanent facilities is based on what is called the Core Plus principle. For example, a school may require administration, library, communal and toilet facilities for a projected peak enrolment of 630+. It may also require 21 ‘home bases’ each capable of accommodating a class of 30-35 students, but only 14 permanent home bases will be constructed. The peak enrolment for the school is carried with demountable home bases designed into the total school plan. The rationale for this approach is that, notwithstanding a common belief to the contrary, there is no empirical evidence that subsequent generational peaks will follow a peak in enrolments in a local area.
The first demountable buildings were constructed in 1965 and the last in 1988. The report of the 1997 Standing Committee on Public Works Committee expressed concern about the use of demountable buildings as de facto permanent accommodation in schools around New South Wales14. The (then) Department of School Education envisaged the gradual replacement of demountable buildings by relocatable lightweight buildings. Meanwhile, the Department viewed the demountable refurbishment program as providing the opportunity to address the types of rectifiable problems identified in submissions to the Committee, such as leakages and walkway safety.
The Parliamentary Committee considered in some detail the concept of a relocatable lightweight building that is intended to combine the transportability of the demountables with the design enhancements of a permanent lightweight building. The Committee’s views echoed the numerous complaints received about demountables in submissions to the present Inquiry: there are structural flaws inherent in their design, they convey an impression of impermanence and the second division status of schools, and they are unsuited to climatic extremes. Permanent lightweight facilities, such as the structure known as the Component Design Range (CDR) and the North Coast Kit (NCK) buildings, currently in use, are a very considerable advance over demountables in terms of design, quality and thermal comfort. Since clearly no more demountables should be constructed the problems from this point relate to two things: i. the speed with which the preferred lightweight buildings come on-line - a prospect substantially affected by the level of funding available and the priority attached to replacing demountables, and ii. the improvements that can be made to those demountables that continue to be needed to deal with surges in enrolments.
The present Inquiry concurs with earlier judgements that it would be an inefficient use of the state’s financial resources to construct permanent buildings where, on sound
14 Standing Committee on Public Works, 1997, op. cit., p. 80
96 demographic and planning evidence, a local demand for student places is likely to be temporary. One solution is to refurbish existing demountables in ways that correct existing flaws, including better thermal controls, to make them more acceptable. According to the DET, existing demountables can be refurbished to incorporate air conditioning and a ‘wet area’ for an outlay of approximately $40,000, or less than a fifth of the cost of a new lightweight structure that in a well functioning system would be an authentic temporary building within the Core Plus planning scheme. As demountables are replaced in a substantially refurbished or rebuilt school, they will either be restored or discarded. As part of the 2001/02 Demountable Replacement Program that formed part of the School Improvement Package, $10.2 million was approved for the replacement of 38 demountable classrooms, three demountable administration facilities, 14 demountable libraries and five demountable administration/libraries in 27 schools across the state. In the 2002/03 Major Capital Works Program, $14.1 million has been approved for the Demountable Replacement Program. If this level of expenditure were to be sustained over the coming decade then a reduction in the number of impermanent buildings would be but one area of prospective improvement. Because the level of funding for the improvement of school building assets is crucial, attention will now focus on that issue.
Funding of school capital works
State and territory governments bear primary responsibility for meeting the capital development needs of public schooling. The Commonwealth is a significant but supplementary provider contributing on average 32% to the government sector15. The Commonwealth’s capital funds are pooled with those of the state or territory.
In New South Wales in 2002/03 $300 million will be available for spending on capital projects in schools, an increase of $42.4 million (16.5%) on last year’s allocation16. The allocation is part of a $1.1 billion package over four years that will, it is said, see a significant upgrade in the amenity of New South Wales public schools. The intended investment of around $1 billion over four years is indeed substantial and will see $240 million devoted to the construction of 23 new primary schools and 8 new high schools, as well as considerable expenditures on upgrades to classrooms, libraries and security, and the improvement of facilities for students, teachers and school staff. However, because of the poor condition of many of the existing schools and the affect that is having upon the morale of staff, students and parents, the Inquiry is obliged to view the planned educational expenditures in the light of asset acquisitions by other government policy areas. For example, in 2002-03 the share of state asset acquisitions accounted for by the transport area (33.6%) will be five times that of education (6.7%); the share taken by health (8.0%) will slightly exceed that of education and public order and safety (5.4%) will not be far behind education. Moreover, if budgetary provision in recent years is examined from the same perspective of education’s share of total expenditure on state asset acquisition, then it is clear that the present level is not dramatically higher than in preceding years:
15 Research and Evaluation Branch, (1999) Capital Matters: an evaluation of the Commonwealth’s Capital Grants Programme for schools, Canberra, Department of Employment, Education, Science and Training, p.1 16 NSW Government, (2002) Budget Estimates. Budget Paper No.3 – Vol. 1, 6-6
97 Table 6.1: Education policy area’s share of total state capital/asset acquisition expenditures
YEAR % SHARE
1996-97 6.0
1997-98 4.2
1998-99 5.2
1999-2000 6.0
2000-01 6.0
2001-02 7.0
2002-03 6.7
The point of the above tabulation is not to diminish in any way the importance of the current decision to increase education asset expenditures in absolute terms. Rather, the intention is to balance that financial undertaking against the legacy of under-spending on schools that has resulted in the poor conditions complained of in submissions to this Inquiry and directly observed during visits to the schools. In so many instances the fabric of the public schools is simply unworthy of what is being attempted within them and fails to honour our society’s obligation to its children. Given the expressed desire to remedy that situation, the least that should accompany the present good intentions is a publicly accessible register of tangible progress towards a uniformly acceptable standard. How that can be done is discussed in the concluding two sections of this chapter.
School asset management
Several of the submissions to the Inquiry have called for an effective and transparent asset register within the school system. Behind this request is a belief that such a system would enable existing facilities to be fully utilised and new capital expenditure to be appropriately and equitably targeted. The previously cited 1997 report of the NSW Legislative Assembly Standing Committee on Public Works distinguished two approaches to school infrastructure provision. The first, a ‘deficiency’ or ‘gap’ approach focuses on resources that schools do not have, rather than the resources they do have. This macro approach uses schedules that itemise facilities standards and detail the entitlements of schools of different sizes. This information needs to be complemented by data on actual asset use and innovative resource-use strategies - a localised micro approach. It is claimed that the DET asset management system combines elements of both approaches: it identifies the individual facilities of each school and provides a detailed breakdown of both the size of each classroom and its use. It allows comparison between actual enrolments and maximum school capacity. Weighting different types of school facilities has formed the basis for prioritising bids to address shortfalls. An overriding concern is the extent to which the buildings fall short of current standards. The Director of Properties in 1997 gave the following evidence to the Parliamentary Committee:
98 What I am pushing towards is to publish the process (of priority setting) and a list of the qualifying criteria…Having done that, I would expect the Department to receive submissions from schools, school councils, parents and citizen bodies, local members, local councils and interested citizens…Essentially, I would aim to take those submissions and subject them to measurement using data from the asset management system and provide a fairly quick response: for example, ‘Look, I can see the need, but in terms of state-wide priorities this is so far away from the front, come another time.’17
Today, the DET’s official policy is expressed somewhat more formally. However, the Inquiry believes that the notion of a project having merit but not being able to be funded, deserves more attention than it has received. Understandably, the existing policy focus is on assessing priority claims. The policy states that the upgrading of existing schools is determined on a relative basis, taking into account needs, deficiencies, the equity of existing facilities provided, and community expectations18. Where it is determined that it is necessary to acquire or upgrade an existing asset, capital investment is funded from either the major capital works program for projects over $500,000, or the minor capital works program for projects costed at less than $500,000. Highest priority is given to new schools that are required in growth areas. The provision of basic teaching and learning spaces receives priority over the provision of other kinds of spaces, such as halls and gymnasiums.
Another category of capital investment concerns “upgrades, refurbishments and additions.” These are projects that relieve a long-term reliance on demountables, or occur in schools that require extensive refurbishment because of uneconomic or substantially inappropriate facilities. Certain standards (called first level and second level criteria) are applied to establish distinctions between claimant projects. At the first level the criteria include enrolment growth, extent of permanent facilities in comparison with enrolments, unmet health and safety requirements, the extent to which existing facilities can be made to fill their required purposes, isolation, and the absence of acceptable options. At the second level use is made of the computerised Asset Management System to establish further priorities. The criteria include: calculations of shortfall and over provision of space, total useable floor area expressed as a ratio per student; current and potential usages of all space; and graphic modelling of the proposed development options. Priorities for minor capital works are established using the same principles.
The availability of the foregoing rating data on applications for major and minor capital works raises the possibility of this information being used as a measure of unmet need. The latter calculation could be of great utility in assessing the resources needed to bring our school infrastructure to an acceptable standard. The basic planning questions would include: How many projects of anticipated cost over a specified period have been rejected and for what specific reasons? How many projects have been accepted but are unable to proceed because of a deficiency of funds? The same logic can be applied to the planning of maintenance. Since in New South Wales there is an annual assessment of the condition of schools, with each element being rated against objective standards, it ought to be possible to
17 Standing Committee on Public Works, (1997), op. cit., 47-53 18 NSW Department of Education and Training, (1998) School Assessment Management. Principals Properties Management Manual, Guidelines
99 quantify the broad condition of schools and estimate for policy purposes the size of outstanding maintenance liabilities19. To not do so is to - condemn discussion of the state of our schools to remain in the realm of individual and anecdotal evidence of the kind with which this chapter was introduced; - leave undefined the scale of any shortfall in the provision of appropriate school buildings and/or their maintenance, thus preventing the rational adjudication of competing claims upon the public purse; - reduce the possibility of successfully arguing for increased Commonwealth assistance by way of ‘catch up’ funding for school building or refurbishment available.
Notwithstanding the fact that its assessment management system is poorly understood in the community, the DET has done well in developing a technical system for appraising claims for capital works projects. With a little more work the data generated by the system could be readily adapted for broader policy purposes. A condition assessment of American schools by the General Accounting Office required the surveying of several thousand schools to assess their overall physical condition and the need for major repairs20. A similar approach has been taken in the UK21. The data needed for ongoing assessments of that kind in New South Wales is much more accessible. Appropriately utilised, this information would position the state to better argue the case for expanding the Commonwealth’s participation in state schools’ asset acquisition and maintenance programs.
Recommendation 6.1: That two indicators covering unmet needs with respect to school buildings, and the maintenance of school buildings, be constructed using existing data sources, as described in the text. The indicators should be maintained and published as an annual statistical series and incorporated in submissions for asset acquisition and refurbishment funding. The indicators should be developed either directly or indirectly by the Strategic Research Directorate.
Facilities maintenance
In 1997 a Facilities Maintenance Contract System replaced an earlier system of Cyclic Maintenance. The latter was designed to regularly refurbish school facilities according to a set timetable. Cyclic maintenance was considered to result in over- servicing and to involve excessive administrative red tape22. The replacement system binds contractors to a six year performance-based contract that is annually reviewed. The maintenance provider is selected for each school District after a public tender. The contractor has specified responsibilities to keep schools in certain operating conditions in relation to serviceability, painting, plumbing and electricity infrastructure. It is claimed that the new system provides an inbuilt incentive to maintenance providers to do a good job because they accept
19 Research and Evaluation Branch, (1999) Capital Matters: an evaluation of the Commonwealth’s Capital Grants Programme for schools, Canberra, Department of Employment, Education, Science and Training, pp. 24-34 20 US General Accounting Office, (1995) The Condition of America’s Schools,HEHS 95-61; www.gao.gov/reports.htm 21 Department of Education and Science (UK), (1977) A Study of School Building,London, HMSO 22 Standing Committee on Public Works, (1997), op. cit., pp. 54-55
100 responsibility to repair items that break down at their own expense. Principals, it is said, can prioritise work that is essential to the on-going operation of their school and cut time lags for repairs and refurbishment.
The contractor carries out a condition assessment every year. This involves inspecting all buildings and facilities included in the contract. The contractor uses approved School Facilities Maintenance Standards23 to carry out the condition assessment. When a building element is assessed as unsatisfactory and there are not sufficient funds to replace or repair it that year, the DET is able to determine whether replacement must be deferred until more funds are available. Funding policy considers health, safety, amenity, degradation, functionality and security in determining priorities. Part of the cost of essential urgent repairs must be paid for from school funds. Schools are urged to ensure that the costs of essential urgent repairs do not exceed the school’s global budget maintenance allocation. If urgent repairs cannot be contained within the school’s allocation then the DET will consider applications for extra funding. Public works conducts periodic audits of performance.
Given the apparent rationality of the scheme, the transactions of one school with its maintenance contractor on one day in 2001 have been examined in an effort to gain a better understanding of why so many complaints are made about the contract arrangements.
23 NSW Department of School Education, (1997) School Maintenance Guidelines, NSW Department of School Education and NSW Department of Public Works and Services
101 Table 6.2: Sample of maintenance issues raised and contractor’s responses
MAINTENANCE/REPAIR ISSUE OUTCOME OF INSPECTION
Wall leaks (it has for 12 months) To be repaired at contractor’s cost
Concerns re. leak and power point Power on circuit breaker - not safety problem
Carpet is old, stained and fraying Requires steam cleaning – school issue
One power point only in room Upgrading not part of maintenance contract
No sink/tap/running water- specific room As above
Nearest tap no drainage, water runs Post requires securing - school issue
Cracks in bag room wall Be repaired in next round
Noticeboard buckled from leaks Requires gluing
Carpet in kinder room full of dust - any movement Submitted to DPWS – recommend full renewal causes dust, coughing
Railing at top of landing needs repair, toddler fell School’s responsibility; upgrading required landed on head on concrete
Bad mould under eaves Painted in next round
Leaks in classroom, Current callout
Piers falling over, crack in wall, Report to be submitted to DPWS
Mould on ceiling inside classroom and outside on When roof leak repaired, mould problem will be eaves addressed
Loose windows - can’t close To be repaired at contractor’s cost
Dirty carpet - leaks and “kindergarten accidents” Cleaning issue
Windows in office painted shut Fixed
Mould under eaves (specified room) Paint in next round
Plywood on bag room floor (six months) Refer to DET
Carpet frayed and splitting Repair during next round of maintenance
Parent complains cracked, raised concrete not Ongoing repairs suitable for spina bifida child
Who responsible for “promised” covered The DET. Contractor no information regarding walkways? this.
The current system obviously is designed to encourage the anticipation of maintenance problems rather than waiting until difficulties, property damage and inconvenience occur. Even when the clients of such a system are relatively inexpert in such matters, proactive maintenance is somewhat easier to manage when the assets are new and in good condition than when they are old, or ‘temporary,’ or in a run down condition, a description that aptly describes the primary school that was party to the above transactions. It is true that such a school will, because of the annual assessment, receive its due by way of additional maintenance expenditure. However, at a human level and in the circumstances described, there is so much that needs repairing or replacing that anticipating future problems seems a little remote from the pressures of the day. The deferment of corrective action until the next annual inspection is likely to take second place when, as some of the notified defects indicate, the well-being of children is judged to be at stake. In such
102 circumstances staff and parents naturally look for prompt action despite the outcome of an inspection being “School’s responsibility,” or “Ongoing repairs” - even if remedies must be purchased from an already strained school global budget.
The ultimate solution for the school in question, and numerous others throughout the state of its age and material standard, is to be improved to a point where the quality of school buildings makes the requirements of a rational maintenance system feasible and reasonable. The attainment of that goal is dependent on the level of funding of major and minor school capital works, an issue considered in a previous section. Meanwhile, the serious weakness in an otherwise sensible plan to place school maintenance on an efficient management basis is the failure to weight the maintenance component of global budgets to cover disparities in the urgent needs of different schools. At present, if a school has a large number of urgent requirements the principal can make application for supplementary funds. This way of dealing with the problem is ‘rational’ only to the extent that the real solution to a run down school’s situation is not to continue to patch it up but to refurbish or replace it. It is a view from the center rather than from the position of keeping an inadequately furbished school and demoralised staff and parents moving forward.
A significant improvement could be effected by adoption of the following measure. Of the (approximate) 2300 schools in New South Wales, determine on the evidence of records over the past three years, the schools that have had the greatest number of emergency callouts. Until the relevant data is available for examination it is not possible to know where a gap occurs separating schools with frequent emergency callouts from the others - after 10%, 15%? Given the intended selectivity of the scheme, an upper limit of 20% is envisaged. In any event, the interests of efficient management of the maintenance program and the renewed commitment of staff and parents to their fragile schools would be served by a selective weighting of global budgets to assist run down schools until they are refurbished by the major or minor capital works programs. If the existing eligibility criteria for those programs relate, as might reasonably be expected, to the functionality of school buildings, then the amount expended on the recommended weighting should progressively diminish with the advancement of the ten year school improvement plan.
Recommendation 6.2: That a formula be devised on the basis of schools’ emergency maintenance expenditures over the past three years, for weighting the maintenance component of the global budget of those schools with the greatest need. The extent of the weighting should be sufficient to significantly reduce the need for applications for supplementary funding.
103 CHAPTER 7 RURAL AND REMOTE EDUCATION
This chapter inevitably focuses upon some of the educational disadvantages associated with remoteness from educational opportunities that are concentrated within major urban areas. It is important, therefore, to acknowledge that not all of the comments and submissions received by the Inquiry have dwelt on the negatives surrounding country-based education. One teacher from a southern region of the state declared her commitment to teaching in rural schools and hoped she would be able to pursue a long-term career in the country. “I personally know most students, all staff and a large proportion of the wider community. Rural schools are great places to work and the towns are excellent places to live.” A Committee of citizens from the South-West of NSW believes that public education in a rural community such as theirs enjoys many advantages: “Children become major contributors to the social wealth of their own community through their education. For example, they participate in choirs, ANZAC marches, school musicals and plays, sport, art and craft exhibitions, and community work such as tree planting.”
During visits to country centres, the Inquiry has been constantly reminded of the contribution made by local schools and their staff to communal life. The knowledge and capacities of resident teachers are considered an invaluable part of the social infrastructure. By their formal and informal participation in local committees, events and networks, school staff are said to contribute significantly to local social capital, a concept expanded upon in this chapter. A Chamber of Commerce in a northern region of the state stated in a submission that “Governments need to recognise the importance of small schools to regional NSW. In many rural areas the school is the heart of the community.” The P&C of a country high school elaborated upon this theme:
Members of the school staff form a very important part of the fabric of the community bringing new perspectives and new or updated skills, especially in terms of modern technology. The Department should consider wider community issues when determining the viability of a school within a country community. These issues include, but are not limited to, the impact such a move would have on the quality of life of the students affected, the affect on the economic and social structure of the community and any ‘knock on’ costs which may be borne by the wider community.
Additional educational expenses
Parents, teachers and students in the Inquiry’s country consultations spoke as one about the additional expenses they incurred, compared with their city counterparts, in fulfilling basic educational requirements. For example, a North Coast P&C had this to say:
Due to the our distance from major metropolitan areas and the increasingly low socio-economic background of our families, it is difficult for our students to access museums, technology centres, theatres and other events not available in rural areas. Even the few travelling shows that circulate are costly for our local families and are not of high priority to many…More travelling exhibitions (for example, on trains) need to be
104 provided and subsidised for rural areas to enable equality of education for our students. If government provided just one bus, free of cost, for country schools to share for travel to museums and other activities that are only available in cities, this would increase rural students’ prospects significantly.
Another high school in the state’s north has commented on the fact that its students cannot afford to avail themselves of educational experiences that city students can access at low cost:
Some new HSC courses have compulsory field studies, suggested performances and places of technology that schools like ours cannot afford to access. Travel to universities to attend lectures, seminars or special programs involves special costs and frankly, many possible programs are not taken up for that reason.
Another high school made a similar point:
Access to art galleries, museums and HSC lecture venues have a critical bearing on student performance. Some of the HSC curricula are geared towards attending these venues. There appears to be a real need for financial subsidies to allow students to access these facilities and services.
The answer does not reside simply in the economical hiring of a bus for, as one northern public school stated in a submission:
The isolation makes it imperative but extremely difficult to organise excursions to address these educational issues. Bus hire can be very costly. We have been quoted $500 to transport 30 children for an excursion for a day. Many bus companies refuse to travel dirt roads and self-drive buses cannot be hired by schools, as their insurance will not cover unmade dirt roads. The current DET allocation does not even cover the cost of one excursion to a major centre.
City–country gulf
A community group in the Central West of NSW has located some of the difficulties facing local schools within the general framework of city/country relations:
A strong sense of community has in recent times been accompanied by an increased sense of despondency as it has become apparent that the city-country gulf has widened to include education. There is a general awareness of the lack of opportunity for rural students, compared to those available to their metropolitan counterparts. The inequity of our public education system was brought home to us this year with the loss of our Country Area Program (CAP) funding. The funding was lost because the population of our major centre was officially recorded as exceeding 10,000 and the previous beneficiaries lie within the designated 100km radius of this centre, even though it is not used as a service centre for the communities in question. Among the consequences of the loss of CAP funding are (i) the loss of funding to subsidise school excursions, which can be very expensive travelling from country areas, and (ii) the loss of
105 funding to provide extra staff development and access to keynote speakers.
Professional development
A Teachers Association in the west of the state believes that more funding should be made available for the professional development of staff in isolated communities:
This funding needs to be used for travel and accommodation for professional development activities. Funding could also be used to run professional development activities in our region. It is our recommendation that staff from surrounding schools be encouraged to meet together and to plan and work together for the good of all involved.
Small country schools
At meetings and in submissions to the Inquiry, a number of small country schools, particularly in the west of the state, have vigorously presented the case for improved teacher/student ratios in such schools. One primary school council, with wide community support, has been conducting a campaign in pursuit of the above- mentioned objective:
The present ratio is 1:25 and we feel this needs to be dropped to 1:15 so small schools can provide equal opportunity for all students. There is a need to keep pace with the increasing demands that have been placed upon small schools.
Another primary school located in the same general region was host to a well- attended meeting during a visit by the Inquiry. A submission from the P&C stated:
We feel that one teacher schools where the number of children is just below the ratio for a second teacher needs to be addressed urgently to guarantee the safety and well being of our children. No teacher, no matter how dedicated that person may be, can fulfil the needs of 23 children from seven grades (kinder to year six) without some programs having to be sacrificed.
Bus transport
One of the most frequently made comments during rural school visits and in the submissions received from the same areas has been criticism of subsidised bus transport that takes students past their nearest public school to another one more distant from their home. A central school in the state’s west complained that it is by- passed by students en route to school in a larger town and the resultant contraction in student numbers has eroded its course offerings.
Attracting staff
A high school in the west of the state has urged the provision of more incentives for staff to work in their region. “Teachers need, for example, support to cover transport and accommodation. Staff also need allowances to travel to specialist medical
106 appointments as well as sick leave – travelling to and from such appointments can take 2-3 days” The previously mentioned committee of citizens commented on the lack of incentives for teachers - “…like cheaper housing, HECS rebates and travel expenses.” A Teachers Association in the south of the state believes that valuable leads on how to attract teachers to work in the country might be garnered from the experiences of other professions that have the same difficulty.
Additional issues
Two other issues attracted a great deal of attention but are dealt with briefly here for the reason that their seriousness recently has been acknowledged and attention is being paid to them. One is the fact that the Internet does not work efficiently in many rural regions. Indeed, the prolonged delay in accessing web sites frustrates the work (and temperament) of students and school staff. The Inquiry has had the opportunity to pass on its observations to those in authority and the 2002/03 budget provides for the technical improvement of the system. A second problem is the dislocation of classroom teaching caused by a shortage in many country areas of casual teachers. The Inquiry has directly observed the consequences of this shortage and shared this information with those in authority. The Inquiry has been able to report the disturbing assignment of secondary students to ‘time-killing’ activities in lieu of properly supervised learning. The Inquiry also is aware that at times, because of the difficulty in hiring casual staff, principals and deputy principals cover the staffing gaps to avoid losing faith with school communities. While this action speaks well of the dedication of the staff concerned, it constitutes a further distraction to their primary role as instigators of teaching effectiveness. However, the shortage of casual staff has been the subject of considerable attention of late, a remedial plan having been formulated by the DET, the NSW Teachers Federation, the Primary Principals Association and the NSW Secondary Principals Council. Elements of the plan include temporary teachers or permanent mobile teachers appointed for an agreed time to schools suffering casual teacher shortages, the creation of a special School Staffing Unit to help locate suitable casual teachers, and more extensive advertising offering casual work to teachers. The Inquiry will not expand further on this problem.
EDUCATIONAL DISADVANTAGES FACING RURAL TEACHERS AND STUDENTS
The Inquiry has found compelling the evidence placed before it of the special difficulties and associated costs faced by country teachers in accessing professional development opportunities. That is why, in Chapter 1 of the present report, a per capita professional development allocation of $1,200 a year was recommended for rural teachers – half as much again as that recommended for their city-based counterparts. Nothing further, therefore, will be said on this issue beyond reiterating its importance to almost every aspect of the improvement of the NSW public education system. The links between enhanced professional development and the other recommendations of the Inquiry will be illustrated and underlined in a concluding chapter of the report.
The submissions cited at the beginning of this chapter that testify to the added educational expenditures incurred by country students and their families, illustrate a theme that was ever-present during the Inquiry’s visits to rural and remote areas. Students and their parents acknowledge that distance from city-based cultural and general academic learning opportunities cannot entirely be overcome but they seek some assistance in closing the opportunity gap. One means by which that can be
107 achieved involves financial support in recognition of the added expense of travelling to metropolitan sites. But there is also a perception that in recent times less effort has been made to increase students’ access to learning opportunities by bringing performances, displays, seminars and the like to major country centres, thereby reducing the costs of attendance by rural and isolated students. For example, staff in many schools in the northern half of the state remember successful HSC workshops being staged in the past in Tamworth, with university teachers and other resource people being brought to that centre. It has not been possible for the Inquiry to confirm the details but many teachers have spoken of the well-attended workshops being provided at modest cost to the participants.
Appropriate initiatives of the kind mentioned are more likely to occur if schools have available to them a fund that can support the orderly planning of out-of-region educational experiences and learning. The fund could be useful in reducing the existing inequities without necessarily being so large as to finance substantial excursions each and every year. The fund could also be drawn upon to meet the fee that often needs to be guaranteed in order to attract performances and other learning opportunities to the regions. When it comes to calculating the amount needed to enable these opportunity-equalising opportunities to occur, account must be taken of existing special provisions and the continuing responsibility of parents in both metropolitan and rural areas to contribute where possible to the cost of non- standard elements of their children’s education. After taking these matters into account the Inquiry believes that an additional earmarked allocation, comprising a flat payment of $4,000 per school and $30 per student per annum is warranted in eligible non-metropolitan areas in the form outlined in the following recommendation. The intent is to recognise that a proportion of the educational costs incurred have to do with making services available to a school, regardless of its size, while recognising that the relevant costs will increase in many instances in relation to the number of students.
Recommendation 7.1: That a Country Schools Educational Opportunities Grant be incorporated within school operating budgets for the specific purpose of closing the educational opportunities gap between students in rural and metropolitan schools. The new allocation should be provided to all schools in 18 of the non-urban Education Districts1 on the basis of $4,000 per school plus $30 per student. This component of the operating budget should be administered by the principal on the advice of the school community but will be used strictly for the purpose of increasing educational opportunities and experiences for country students. The funds may be supplemented where necessary and appropriate by parental/carer contributions.
Additional annual cost of proposal: 921 schools x $4,000 = $3, 684,000 PLUS 218,779 students x $30.00 = $$6,563,370…………………Total = $10.2 million
1 Albury, Armidale, Batemans Bay, Bathurst, Broken Hill, Clarence/Coffs, Deniliquin, Dubbo, Griffith, Lismore, Moree, Orange, Port Macquarie, Queanbeyan, Tamworth, Taree, Tweed/Ballina, Wagga Wagga.
108 If additional opportunity-equalising funds were available within country schools what assurance is there that they would be converted into quality learning opportunities?
So far as cultural learning opportunities are concerned, the DET has within its fold a Performing Arts Unit of high repute which, by a variety of means, including brokerage, could be relied upon to provide students with relevant and engaging cultural experiences. The missing element at present is the capacity of country schools to cover the cost of professionally staged performances.
Better known for its staging of School Spectaculars involving as many as 3,000 students, the Performing Arts Unit has 20 arts consultants, each assigned to two school districts. They work in association with 11 Regional Arts Development Officers (RADOs) of Regional Arts NSW and, to a lesser extent, arts consultants within the school district offices who concentrate on curriculum support. The resultant program activities are extensive and varied: dance and drama workshops and presentations, ‘flying squad’ weekend workshops (involving specialist tutors from the performing arts industry and/or experienced classroom drama teachers), drama, visual arts and music camps, debating, public speaking, music and dance events, marching bands, choral, classical and jazz performances, music technology, video production, ARTEXPRESS, and YouthRock band competitions, are some of the programmed activities.
A particular component of the program that is capable of further development if country schools had additional funds at their disposal is called Performances for Schools. It would require organisation, of which the Performing Arts Unit is well capable, for plays matching those set for senior secondary students to go on circuit, for example, playing at existing theatres at Lithgow, Bathurst, Orange and Dubbo, in some instances combining the presentation to students with a separate community session. Comparable arrangements could be made for other parts of the state involving a range of performing arts. The Performing Arts Unit already has an established procedure for accrediting groups with respect to the quality of their work and observance of the DET’s child protection requirements. Obviously not all of the cultural experiences required by country students could be covered via the agency of the Performing Arts Unit but the overall outcome should be country students’ greater access to cultural opportunities at manageable costs.
Recommendation 7.2: That following the recommended allocation of per capita educational ‘opportunity equalising’ funds to country schools, and without any reduction in those schools’ entitlement to the standard services of the Performing Arts Unit, the Unit be requested to develop a Performances for Schools program in collaboration with the country schools along the lines outlined in the text.
SCHOOLS, RURAL COMMUNITIES AND CHANGE
That rural public schools are not merely way stations for a state provided service has been brought home repeatedly to the Inquiry during regional hearings and school meetings. Several of the submissions cited at the opening of this chapter reflected the contributions made by country schools to key intertwined aspects of community life. Mention has been made of cultural, sporting, organisational, informational and environmental contributions, and participation in ceremonial occasions that celebrate the identity and unity of the community. This is not the place for excessive theorising
109 about social matters but it has often been found helpful to draw a broad distinction between the interrelated strands of communal life in terms of (i) the ways in which local commitments, goals and the means of pursuing them come to be determined and given effect, and (ii) the human assets and reserves that are drawn upon to inspire and sustain the vision and effort needed if people are to work together as a community.
Both faces of the community, the first sometimes referred to as the adaptive aspect, the second as the internal aspect, usually need to function well if community life is to be experienced as achieving and satisfying to its members. Indeed, when things are not going well, an unhelpful interplay can develop between the two spheres. For example, the declining fortunes of the local economy, after a period, can act to reduce people’s attachment to their home region and weaken bonds of cooperation between them, thereby further eroding capacities for effective organisation in the economic sphere. Or, the cycle can be initiated in the opposing positive direction. Relearning the ways of cooperation, information sharing and the pooling of resources can strengthen the problem solving abilities of the community.
The DET has fairly recently had the benefit of a paper prepared by one of their Distance and Rural Education consultants that fits well within the above-described community analysis framework2. Although focusing upon vocational education and training, the paper raises more general questions about the community strengthening and capacity building roles of country schools. It therefore touches upon issues that will be further analysed in the next chapter but which require some comment in the present discussion of rural and isolated public education.
The consultancy paper acknowledges the interplay between the rural school as an outpost of a state-wide system (the DET), and local community agencies and cultural influences and concerns. Among the latter concerns at present is a downward trend in world prices for agricultural and mineral commodities, pressures and opportunities associated with technological changes in farming and mining and improved communications, changes in consumer tastes, and government policy changes such as lowering trade barriers, deregulating the financial system and increased regulation to protect the natural environment. Income levels for rural communities are well below the average for Australia, and work increasingly is undertaken on a casual basis with high levels of chronic unemployment. There are reduced levels of services, such as banking and health services.
The majority of the above-mentioned concerns are aspects of what was previously labelled the adaptive side of rural community life but the consultant argues that they have been accompanied by psychological and emotional changes encompassed by the internal pattern of functioning of rural communities3. The notion of a negative feed-back upon a community’s adaptation to externally generated changes lies behind the consultant’s comment that in many cases “An actual decline in population and services is exacerbated by a psychosocial ‘dynamic of decline’ that has the potential to suppress democratic processes and diminish perceptions of collective self-efficacy or capacity.” That is to say, a community’s ability to deal with the kinds of challenges that are now characteristic of NSW rural life is often adversely affected by a loss of individual and collective confidence, a diminished sense of shared
2 Squires, D., (2001) Vocational Education and Training for NSW Schools: Issues and Challenges for Distance and Rural Education, Distance Education and Rural Education, NSW Department of Education and Training 3 Squires, D., (2000) ibid., p.14
110 identity and mutual trust, and a decline in the sharing of information that could facilitate joint action.
Can schools make a significant contribution to community capacity building in the circumstances described? The consultancy paper strongly affirms the role to be played by schools:
The future of the (challenged) communities, and hence of the schools that serve them, is directly related to the ability of schools to harness, develop and nurture human and social capital and engage in productive capacity- building4.
Some of the means by which this potential can be realised include the promotion of activities which involve all constituencies in decision making, developing new avenues for civic engagement, identifying and building on cultural, historic and economic assets, identifying and supporting technology use, shaping vocational education opportunities and training networks, and helping to identify reasonable targets of opportunity for capacity building, such as creating school-based adult programs for needed skills. The latter can, of course, be fulfilled in conjunction with other providers of education and training. Implicit in most of these activities is a good understanding of local goals, plans and desired futures, a willingness to negotiate curriculum issues and engage in community and workplace learning.
Many of the purposes of the consultant’s paper overlap with a very recently released report of the Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation (RIRDC), More than an Education: Leadership for rural school-community partnerships (June 2002).5 Among the objectives of the project was the examination of the extent and nature of the contribution of rural schools to their communities’ development beyond traditional forms of education of young people. The project comprised case studies in five different rural communities in different states. Among the outcomes were the observations that community partnerships (i) provide training that meets the needs of both students and the community generally, (ii) improve school retention, (iii) increase the retention of youth in rural communities, (iv) encourage positive environmental outcomes, and (v) create cultural and recreational benefits from sharing physical and school resources. The researchers rate as potentially even more significant the increased individual and community capacity to influence their futures. Particular note is made of the contribution of VET-in-schools programs to the development of rural community capacity.
In discussing the way in which rural schools help to build individual and community capacity by facilitating productive interactions between the parties, The RIRDC draws a distinction between two types of social capital. The first, knowledge resources relates to the previously mentioned ‘adaptive’ aspect of communal life and refers to “Knowledge of who, when and where to go for advice or resources, and knowledge of how to get things done.” Involved is the strengthening of new or existing networks, identifying the skills and knowledge that are to hand, and facilitating communication and cooperation between the parties. Identity resources include building self-confidence, self-esteem and trust and celebrating success6. In essence, the concepts and processes employed within the rural school-community
4 Ibid., p. 16 5 Kilpatrick, S., Johns, S., Mulford, B., Prescott, L., (2002) More than an Education: Leadership for school-community partnerships, Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation/University of Tasmania, June 6 Ibid, p.ix
111 partnerships documented amount to an extension of community development principles that have been practised for more than fifty years in a variety of community contexts. The important thing is that in a number of our country areas that are sorely challenged by current economic and social trends, schools are seen to be an appropriate hub of collaborative partnerships aimed at strengthening the skill base and associative bonds of their communities to the end of better enabling people to determine their futures. This amounts to an expanded concept of public education and, as with other fields of educational endeavour, it can be provided with varying degrees of effectiveness. The RIRDC project has made a contribution to evaluating the purposefulness of work in this field by developing 12 indicators of effective school-community partnerships and effective leadership:
1. School principals are committed to fostering increased integration between school and community, 2. School has in-depth knowledge of the community and resources available, 3. School actively seeks opportunities to involve all sectors of the community, including ‘boundary crossers’, and those who would not normally have contact with the school, 4. School has a high level of awareness of the value and importance to school- community partnerships of good public relations, 5. School principals display a transformational leadership style which empowers others within the school and community and facilitates the development of a shared vision, 6. School and community have access to and utilise extensive internal and external networks, 7. School and community share a vision for the future, centred on their youth, 8. School and community are open to new ideas, willing to take risks and willing to mould opportunities to match their vision, 9. School and community together play an active, meaningful and purposeful role in school decision making, 10. School and community value the skills of all in contributing to the learning of all, 11. Leadership for school-community partnerships is seen as the collective responsibility of school and community, 12. School and community both view the school as a learning centre for the whole community, which brings together physical, human and social capital resources.
There are NSW schools that have attempted to build partnerships with their communities in the manner described by both the consultant’s paper and the RIRDC report. In particular, the consultant’s paper identifies the background, the principles and the emerging strategies that are contributing to the development of Warialda High School as a community-learning centre. Warialda, located in the North West of the state, has been visited by the Inquiry and it will now be profiled as a prelude to considering what might be done to support the community-strengthening role of schools in rural communities.
The Warialda and Bingara Industry and Education Links Committee (WBIELC) is a unique organisation consisting of teacher, parent, student and community members from two towns 40 kilometres apart. The Committee oversees and facilitates the delivery of vocational education at Warialda High School. The high school has received state and national recognition for its vocational program during 2000 and 2001. Currently 40% of the senior school is involved in part-time traineeships. The school aims to have its graduates achieve the dual accreditation of an HSC and an industry-recognised qualification. Over the past three years the school has enjoyed a one hundred per cent success rate in having graduates gain university entrance, or TAFE continuance or full-time employment.
112 Since achieving this goal, the school and the WBIELC have progressed to the view that Warialda High School needs to take an active role in the education and training of the total communities within its drawing area (Warialda, Bingara, Gravesend, Coolatai, and other centres). The school conducts meetings with Yallaroi and Bingara Shire Councils and adult learning groups. There has been a shift of ownership of the curriculum towards a community service or demand orientation. This has result in strengthening links with TAFE. Currently, courses have broadened and are being delivered from Ballina, Armidale, Inverell, Tamworth, Moree, Coffs Harbour and South Australia TAFE. Classes can be formed largely with student members and supplemented with community members or vice versa.
Associated with these initiatives, morale has lifted in the communities of Warialda and Bingara. The state and national awards received by the school and individual students have underlined the fact that quality education is available and that people from the local area can achieve high levels of success and fulfilment. Further, a positive mentality is forming within the vocational education ranks that obstacles do not block enthusiasm but rather, they invite creative solutions.
Warialda High School is now expected to assume a greater role in community renewal and building a sustainable community. Warialda and Bingara school sites are being seen as campuses for training as well as education to meet broad community needs. Currently meetings are being conducted between the school and Bingara Shire Council to facilitate the introduction of a theatre course, which is the catalyst for exploring the formation of a regional theatre company and the restoration of an art deco theatre. These initiatives are attracting the commendation of regional arts authorities and also have the potential to generate other courses and skills development, tourism and employment, and thereby help the local economy.
Meetings between the school, two shire councils, TAFE and health service representatives have identified the need for mature age and student training in aged care. The appropriate course, deliverer, modes of delivery and work placements are being negotiated. Other negotiations are taking place with education authorities and community agencies outside of the immediate district with a view to forming other productive partnerships, the extension of education and training options and enhanced opportunities that will retain youth within their communities. The school’s involvement in vocational education has increased the relevance of the curriculum for many students and contributed to their retention in the senior school. Their self- esteem has been raised and they leave school with employable skills and a sense of gratitude for the assistance they have been given. The expectation is that some will leave the area to gain further knowledge and skills and at a later date return to the environment that supported them in their youth.
The communities of Warialda and Bingara have been revitalised as individuals see opportunities for their educational needs being met, as they gain satisfaction in investing their time and energy in their youth and their future, and as momentum gathers for other projects and innovations to be considered.
The principal believes that the keys to success to this point have been: - the concept of the school as a learning community, - demand driven curriculum, - local solutions for local problems, - flexible delivery , and - effective partnerships.
113 There has long been discussion of the idea that schools should be learning centres for communities and not just for school-aged children and young people. The difficulty has been to find ways of giving practical effect to this concept beyond the useful but limited stage of involving parents in their children’s schooling. Schools have traditionally separated children and young people from the world of adults and the wider community. Two recent educational changes have challenged this separation. One is the development of vocational education within schooling, along side general education, which has made possible for students the experience of applied learning within workplace or community contexts. The second is the technological change that has given rise to new forms of electronic communication via the computer and the internet. Taken together, these changes have created the opportunity for the rural or regional high school to become the technology hub within the community and a centre of learning for both adults and young people.
Warialda High School’s achievement of re-constituting itself in order directly to serve the educational and training needs of its community, has included both adult members as well as school students. Its initiative reflects: • the urgency of the situation in which many country regions like Warialda-Bingara find themselves, • the enhanced credibility of the school as a potential source of helpful resources and ideas because of the expanded curriculum’s emphasis on vocational skills, • the framing of current economic and related problems and potential solutions as community level concerns, and • the energy and creativity of community leaders including, of course, the high school principal.
The Inquiry believes that the progressive transformation of Warialda High School into a community-learning centre has not been at the cost of undermining the education of its young people. Rather, the flexibility and perceived relevance of course offerings appears to have lifted students’ performance. The record of student attainments in recent years speaks eloquently of the standards being maintained.
Necessity may have been the mother of invention in Warialda-Bingara but she may need a helping hand if the benefits of what has been achieved in that region are to be consolidated, and if comparable rural areas are to experience similar economic and social gains. Relatively low cost pilot projects in four localities are proposed, partly on the grounds that they simply are warranted because of the problems facing many areas in rural NSW, and partly so that effective vocational education and training contributions to solving community problems can be thoroughly documented and disseminated.
The Community Education Centres pilot projects are based upon two main inputs. On the vocational education and training side, there is a need in each of the chosen localities (one of which should be Warialda) to appoint a full time Vocational Education Coordinator. The coordinator will undertake promotional work, employer negotiation and work placements, and contribute to the documenting of challenges, solutions and insights. However, there would also be a distinctly ‘social’ dimension to the projects with an emphasis on engaging the community in problem identification and ownership of programs. In other words, the aim would be - as it has been in Warialda-Bingara - to strengthen community capacities in both the managerial and social cohesion spheres, as discussed earlier in this chapter. This dual emphasis links the arms of government administration represented by the DET and the Strengthening Communities Unit within the NSW Premier’s Department as well as other departments and agencies involved in ‘One Government’ initiatives.
114 The Strengthening Communities Unit is actively involved in pursuing the Government’s place and community renewal policies throughout NSW and ideally would assist with the location and management of the four proposed projects. The creation of community learning centres after the style of Warialda High School would represent a distinctive strategy within the range of approaches to community strengthening being employed by the Government. It is proposed that four community development officers be appointed by the Community Strengthening Unit and attached to the project school(s) in each of the four selected areas. In each case, the Community Development Officer and the Vocational Education Coordinator would be part of a core professional team presided over by the principal, and they would participate in the community management and other relevant structures instituted by the projects.
Recommendation 7.3: That four Community Education Centres pilot projects be created for a period of three years, under the combined auspices of the DET and the Strengthening Communities Unit of the NSW Premier’s Department, on the basis of the guiding principles outlined in this chapter. In each instance, the principal and the recommended two additional staff members (Vocational Education Coordinator and Community Development Officer) should be responsible for maintaining a record of the case study, in accordance with guidelines formulated jointly by the DET and the Community Strengthening Unit. A Project Management Committee should be established at each site that includes representatives from the Community Strengthening Unit, Local Government, relevant NSW Government Departments and agencies, local community organisations, local residents and the host school.
Estimated annual costs: (i) Community development officers $65,000 x 4 $260,000 (ii) Voc. Education Coordinators $70,000 x 4 $280,000 (iii) Travel, other expenses$15,000 x 4 $60,000 Total…$600,000
TEACHER ALLOWANCES AND INCENTIVES
The Inquiry has considered the allowances and incentives for teachers in isolated and rural schools in the light of the reimbursements, subsidies and entitlements of staff of other arms of the state government, for example, the Police Department, and has found the provisions for teachers to be equitable. Accommodation available through the Teacher Housing Authority helps to ensure that rental properties are available to teachers in areas where housing would otherwise be a problem. A 20% rental subsidy is provided by the DET in the most difficult localities. While amenity problems large and small have been raised with the Inquiry, from torn ‘mozzie’ nets to drawers that do not slide and a lack of fuel for heating, the Inquiry believes that these matters lie within the administrative realm and outside of its brief to focus on broader issues of policy.
In addition to the matters covered in this chapter there are other issues relating to rural education that it will be convenient to discuss in remaining chapters of this
115 report that focus upon the topics in question. Hence discussion of the question of how to attract experienced teachers to work in hard-to-staff localities, including some country areas, is deferred to the next chapter dealing with the relationship between schools and their communities, and the impact of social disadvantage. Three other related topics that are taken up in later chapters are (i) aspects of teacher education that bear on the adequate preparation of teachers for effective service in rural and isolated areas, (ii) the entitlements and particular needs of Aboriginal communities, and (iii) the administrative criteria that govern the staffing of small schools.
116 APPENDIX
TERMS OF REFERENCE
Preamble
Public education has for more than 150 years been the defining institution of Australian democracy and its unique values.
This Inquiry is about the future of public education. The system has a proven ability to meet new challenges and changing times. The Inquiry will become part of the dynamic history of public education.
This Inquiry has been initiated by parents and teachers in the interests of our children and is being funded by the NSW Teachers Federation and the Federation of Parents and Citizens Associations.
This Inquiry will be underpinned by the key provision of the Education Act (NSW): "the principal responsibility of the state is the provision of public education".
General Terms
• What are the purposes and values of public education in society? • What are the resources and structures needed to achieve these purposes and values?
Focus Issues
• How should Australian society develop participatory, critically-minded and just citizens? • How do we guarantee that all children in every school have an equal opportunity to learn and fully develop their capacities? • How do we ensure that the principles of social justice are guaranteed within the system and that public education strengthens the influence of these principles across society? • What has been the social and educational impact of State Government policies since 1988 regarding the structure of public education? (e.g. specialist schools, pre-schools, support units, selective schools, college groups, middle schools, TAFE Colleges) • Having regard to the role of TAFE within the public education system, what is the appropriate level and type of interaction and connection between TAFE and public schools? • How does Australian society best respond to the needs of students with particular characteristics within the totality of provision? • What is the educational planning mechanism needed to achieve the purpose and values of public education?
Submissions received to July 2002 771
Location Sydney metropolitan 353 Rural & Regional 365 Other (state or national) 31 Unidentified 22
Source Teachers and other staff 285 Parents & parent orgs 166 Whole school 117 Principals 27 Citizens 71 Local, State and National Organisations and Universities) 48 Students 8 Miscellaneous 49
Schools Visited September 2001 – July 2002 Total 152
Hearings conducted 27 locations