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Keywords: School Funding

  • INTERNATIONAL

    Putting a face to the effects of Australia's aid freeze

    • David Holdcroft
    • 12 May 2017
    4 Comments

    Alain is one of around 11,000 people living in this particular camp in the south of Zimbabwe. It seems an unlikely location to talk of the freeze on funding for Australian foreign aid announced in the budget, but it is in places like these, unseen and therefore unknown by the Australian population, that the effects are often felt. Alain is lucky: the camp where he lives has good education. Worldwide however, only 50 per cent of children in forced migrant situations will attend primary school, 22 per cent secondary and a paltry 1 per cent any institution of higher learning.

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  • ENVIRONMENT

    Climate change is the elephant in the budget room

    • Francine Crimmins
    • 11 May 2017
    7 Comments

    When Scott Morrison announced the 2017-18 Budget this week there was one phrase he didn't dare to utter in his meticulously written and rehearsed speech. It's just two short words, climate change, but when used together they conjure a public debate even our minister for the environment gets tongued tied over. Morrison's omission of climate change in the federal budget has set a tone of ignorance to improving energy policy in a meaningful way.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    'Labor-lite' budget's social welfare report card

    • Julie Edwards
    • 10 May 2017
    5 Comments

    'Labor-lite' or not, there are many investments contained in the budget which will work towards a more just society, including the securing of funding for the National Disability Insurance Scheme by raising the Medicare levy, and the needs-based approach to school funding, dubbed 'Gonski 2.0'. But among these commitments that seek to create a more equitable Australia, this budget again seeks to vilify welfare recipients, among the most vulnerable members of our community.

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  • RELIGION

    Finding meaning in a chaotic/changing world

    • Frank Brennan
    • 08 May 2017
    1 Comment

    Our Church is presently a strained, outdated social institution with an exclusively male hierarchy and clergy. But it is also the privileged locus for us to be called to the banquet of the Lord sharing theology and sacrament which have sustained the hearts and minds of similar pilgrims for two millennia. Thank God for Pope Francis who is showing us the way, helping us to find meaning in our changing and chaotic world, putting a fresh spring in the step of all those Catholics holding in tension the prophetic and the practical, the theological and the humanist, the tradition and the contemporary reality.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Seeking a fair go on budget night

    • Frank Brennan
    • 07 May 2017
    7 Comments

    Part of the cost of the double dissolution election last July has been the creation of a Senate with the largest, most diverse group of crossbenchers ever. This will make the passage of any new contested Budget measures difficult, particularly given the Prime Minister’s vulnerability on his right flank, and the Labor Party's propensity to mimic the Opposition tactics adopted previously by Tony Abbott. The government needs to create a clear narrative as to how it will achieve equitable and sustainable growth through this Budget.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    How class shapes art in 21st century Australia

    • Ellena Savage
    • 09 December 2016
    4 Comments

    To be in the running for a scholarship, a student must have had their abilities or potential acknowledged and rewarded within an ideological education system. Where the money comes from - and whom it is given to - informs what kinds of artwork thrives. As Didier Eribon says, 'art, culture and education are part of the mechanisms of differentiation between social classes'. And the institutional frameworks underpinning the production of artwork can lead to pernicious political outcomes.

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  • MEDIA

    Queering the airwaves for TV diversity

    • Adolfo Aranjuez
    • 29 November 2016
    17 Comments

    A recent Screen Australia report determined only 5 per cent of characters in Australian TV dramas could be identified as LGBTQI; less than half the proportion of real-world queer individuals in Australia. Media products are inherently normative, legitimising identities and lived realities through visibility. This is important, given the continuing debates surrounding marriage equality and the pervasiveness of homophobia, the result of which was seen in the suicide of 13-year-old Tyrone Unsworth.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Pathways to real jobs in a changing work landscape

    • Kasy Chambers
    • 18 November 2016
    5 Comments

    Corey has received housing through a St Vincent de Paul's refuge in Canberra and food assistance through Anglicare. Corey did not complete year ten, and has had a number of odd jobs since leaving school. Corey is passionate about gaming, and will often spend hours on the computer, filling in time after losing his job recently. He says he would love to do some training in gaming, but that his Job Network provider didn't have the money to support him in such training.

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  • EDUCATION

    Jostling for justice on school funding's contested ground

    • Michael Furtado
    • 04 November 2016
    12 Comments

    Amid the furore surrounding Minister Birmingham's disclosure of figures showing massive discrepancies in public funding between some independent schools and low-SES schools, some facts need scrutinising. Systemic Catholic schools draw for their enrolment from lower-SES postcodes than independent schools. Postcodes being an indelible predictor of the educational chances of Australians, balancing systemic school funding against that of independent schools is politically and ethically problematic.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    In praise of local councils

    • Fatima Measham
    • 27 October 2016
    7 Comments

    Unless you have lived elsewhere, where taxes and rates rarely manifest as a tangible and permanent benefit, it is easy to take councils for granted. I grew up in a town where potholes are forever, healthcare is ad hoc and libraries are private. The things that I see my local council do as a matter of routine are wild luxuries in other places around the world. Such competencies arguably measure the health of a democracy - it means that most of the money has not been lost to corruption and fraud.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Luckily for Australia, winning really isn't everything

    • Michael McVeigh
    • 22 August 2016
    9 Comments

    Australia appears likely to fall well short of its pre-games medal target. This has led to criticism of the government's funding strategy, which has seen money poured into elite sports where Australia has traditionally been most successful or where medals seemed most likely. This approach inevitably leads people to calculate whether Australia has received 'value for money' for its investments. But it doesn't have much to do with what people actually get out of watching or being part of the Olympics.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Family violence needs whole community response

    • Julie Edwards
    • 30 March 2016
    1 Comment

    The royal commission recommends a 'blitz' on rehousing family violence victims stuck in crisis and transitional housing, as well as individualised funding packages to open up access to private rentals for people fleeing violent relationships. Important though it is, it is not enough simply to support the victims of family violence. We also need to prevent family violence from occurring. This requires a strategy for preventing family violence that involves the whole community.

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