Australian Education Union, Victorian Branch
Australian Education Union, Victorian Branch
Australian Education Union, Victorian Branch
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feature<br />
We give a GONSKI<br />
What difference could the Gonski recommendations make to <strong>Victorian</strong> schools?<br />
AEU members headed to Canberra to let their MPs know. Sian Watkins joined them.<br />
PRINCIPALS, teachers and parents are urged<br />
to lobby the Federal Government to enact the<br />
recommendations of the Gonski Review of federal<br />
school funding by year’s end to prevent momentum<br />
for change being derailed by the Coalition and<br />
private-school interests.<br />
About 65% of the Federal Government’s direct<br />
spending on education goes to private schools.<br />
<strong>Victorian</strong> state school parents, principals and<br />
teachers visited Canberra last month as part of an<br />
AEU delegation to remind MPs of the urgent need<br />
to enact the Gonski Review’s proposed overhaul<br />
of school funding. The review recommends that an<br />
extra $5 billion a year be spent on schools, with<br />
most of this extra money going to state schools,<br />
which teach the majority of disadvantaged students.<br />
This extra money equates, roughly, to about<br />
$1500 for every state school student. Michael<br />
Phillips, principal of Ringwood Secondary College,<br />
reckons his school would get an extra $700,000<br />
every year. Legislation before the end of the year<br />
is vital to ensure that the foundations of change<br />
are well underway before next year’s federal<br />
election. AEU federal president Angelo Gavrielatos<br />
said the Tony Abbott-led Coalition would keep the<br />
existing, indefensible funding system should it win<br />
government.<br />
Sydney University’s Dr Jim McMorrow told<br />
delegates that, under existing funding arrangements<br />
introduced by the former Howard government,<br />
federal funding to state schools will decrease by<br />
12% in real terms over the next two years (a cut<br />
of more than $670 million a year). But funding to<br />
private schools will increase by 15% in real terms<br />
(a $1.3bn increase on this year’s non-government<br />
spending).<br />
Dr Morrow said state schools were doing all the<br />
“heavy lifting” and their share of federal funding<br />
would decline further with the approaching end of<br />
National Partnerships funding. It was “time for a<br />
sustained federal commitment to public schools,”<br />
he said.<br />
DELEGATE Michael Phillips, principal of Ringwood<br />
Secondary College, reckons his school would get about<br />
$700,000 extra a year if Gonski’s recommendations were<br />
implemented.<br />
What would he spend the extra money on? “Where do I start?<br />
“More learning support programs and I’d do the ESL program<br />
differently. I’d halve their class sizes. I’d run more stuff for kids that<br />
need extending which is important when you’re competing with the<br />
private schools in the eastern suburbs.<br />
“I’d spend more money on the co-curricular programs like music and sport<br />
— we’ve got nothing when you see what the private schools have got in these areas — and deliver<br />
more PD for staff.”<br />
Phillips said that some refugee students arrived at his school with two years of education in total.<br />
“They only get three years of funded support in high school but they need it for much longer. Gonski<br />
would allow me to support ESL kids right through to Year 12.” ◆<br />
Christine<br />
Milne,<br />
Greens leader<br />
“We are in the middle of a<br />
mining boom with one of the<br />
strongest economies in the<br />
Western world. Now is the time<br />
to fix structural<br />
deficiencies in education<br />
funding.”<br />
18 aeu news | june 2012