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Students are more proficient in technology than their teachers and are accessing information their elders would not have known. They wonder, if they can already function as if they have finished school, then what's the point of school? It's a fair question.
A neoliberal funding policy has undermined the ability of Catholic schools to meet poor children's needs. Instead, Catholic schools have allowed millions of tax dollars to be siphoned off public schools and given to the private sector.
The student teacher is doing his best, trying to teach abstract ideas in a difficult play about a postmodern world. A girl in the front row is discussing her new 'vampire' boyfriend. 'He's in 12B,' she says. 'I can't take my eyes off him.'
A recent report into higher education is caught between discontent and fatalism about what prevents universities from doing better for students from the margins. The system's biggest failure may lie in what the report didn't ask.
Many of the things that impact upon a teacher's efficacy are beyond their control - the quality of a child's homelife, the politicisation of the curriculum. One thing they can control is much they care, though this may bring new teachers little comfort in the months ahead.
These are earnest kids, wanting to succeed. Society has told them that to succeed they must be able to draw a parabola, find the vertex, state the axis of symmetry. This city has two million adults — how many ever heard of an axis of symmetry?
Widespread subject cuts and reductions in staff numbers have eaten away at students' plans and rendered the new breadth component impotent. Horizons seem to be shrinking, which makes it increasingly difficult to 'dream large'.
Theological colleges increasingly need to turn to churches for underwriting, yet church congregations are dwindling, which affects them financially as well. Something has to give ... and in Brisbane, it already has.
Forcing schools to produce information on students' exam performance will never be a reliable strategy for lifting numeracy and literacy. Learning is as much about taking risks and failing as it is about getting the answers right the first time.
Today's teacher has to survive in a world of gimmickry. Students pay better attention to ringtones than to the human voice. In the brave new world of Rudd's Digital Education Revolution, teachers risk being replaced by technicians.
The current higher education review is hindered by a focus on 'productivity' and 'efficient investment'. Universities should be homes of knowledge whose graduates are more than just pegs to plug the holes in Australia's skills set.
Earlier this month, a federal parliamentary committee recommended that teachers should receive higher pay, as an incentive to attract quality recruits and to improve retention. But a new policy could undermine the collective quality of school education.
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