The school funding debate has dissolved into the sad and unhelpful imbroglio of half-truths that plagued us for three or four decades before we, almost, all settled on a new model. Let’s be clear at the outset about the Independent ...
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Tax apps and deduction tips for teachers
Tax time can be a time of dread for many teachers, as you try to sift through boxes of receipts to work out what deductions you can claim on your tax return. You aren’t alone. The nature of teachers' work means ...
More »Changes to federal funding could hurt students with disability: ISCA
The national lobby group for independent schools has warned that “any sudden and unexpected changes” to Commonwealth funding could hurt schools that cater for students with disability. The Independent Schools Council of Australia (ISCA) said as almost one-fifth of students with ...
More »Tougher uni prerequisites could help arrest maths decline: AMSI
University course prerequisites are one remedy to the decline in Year 12 students taking harder maths subjects, a representative from the Australian Mathematical Sciences Institute has said. AMSI has released data showing that the number of Year 12 students taking on higher-level ...
More »Birmingham vows to fix ‘corrupted’ Gonski model
In 2014, a Victorian Catholic school attracted more than double the Commonwealth funding of a comparable Catholic school in New South Wales. In the same year, one independent school in the ACT received 64 per cent more Commonwealth funding per student ...
More »Local anti-jail programs lack scientific rigor: study
An evaluation of 108 interventions aimed at keeping young people out of jail has found that only 13 target the multiple factors that lead to teens getting into trouble. The remainder target only individual risk factors, such as alcohol and ...
More »USYD professor says he’s debunked Safe Schools Coalition
A University of Sydney child protection and family law expert claimed he's debunked “academically irresponsible” assertions about sexual identity and LGBTI students made by the Safe Schools Coalition. Professor Patrick Parkinson has published a non-peer reviewed paper criticising the Safe Schools Coalition, on the ...
More »Lack of education in poor nations will spread unrest: report
A United Nations-backed coalition of world leaders, Nobel laureates and international business figures has called for a massive expansion of formal education in poor nations, so as to prevent unrest. The Learning Generation: Investing in education for a changing world, ...
More »OECD can’t decide if class sizes matter
It seems the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development can’t decide whether or not class sizes matter in schooling. In its Education At A Glance 2016 report, the OECD stated “at the level of students within a classroom, the relationship ...
More »Opinion: Formal schooling can wait
Over recent decades, in many countries across the world, there has been increasing concern about the disparity in life expectations between children born into relative affluence and those born into more disadvantaged circumstances. This is true between nations, of course, ...
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