The Federal Government’s controversial My School website was launched today. After an initial hiccup, when the site was down this morning, I managed to access it around 10am.
The My School website has been developed by the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA).
The website provides detailed information about all the schools in Australia. It uses a new index of student and school characteristics, developed specifically for the purpose of identifying schools serving similar student populations.
ACARA chairman Barry McGaw says this enables schools’ results on national tests to be understood in a fair and meaningful way, and enables schools seeking to improve their performance to learn from other schools with statistically similar populations.
“By providing extensive information on Australian schools, the My School website introduces a new level of transparency and accountability to the Australian school system,” he said.
The Australian Education Union has opposed the introduction of what it calls “league tables”, which it fears could become a tool to “humiliate and shame” under-performing schools.
Principals also have reservations, suggesting financial data should be included to put the comparisons into proper context.
I fully support information being accessible in the public arena.
The national testing data always has been available. Parents receive information for their children and schools receive comparative data, which they normally share within their school community.
The website brings it all together on a national basis and enables comparisons to be more easily made.
This makes principals accountable, which they say they support. And why shouldn’t they?
The inclusion of a socio-educational index means that schools can be compared with similar schools.
I don’t know how the index was compiled, but I understand it takes into account the economic and academic background of parents.
If the government is serious about improving educational outcomes it will use the data to identify those schools that need extra investment.
As a parent, I can accept Jim and Maggie’s school having lower-than-average results because a remarkable 81 percent of the children come from a low socio-educational background. That’s the highest number for any school in Mount Gambier.
The proportion of indigenous students is also the highest in Mount Gambier at 8 percent.
What the figures don’t reveal, is that Gambier North also has a significant number of children from Burmese refugee families. I suspect that explains the poor result for Year 5 (see the table above).
I was relatively happy with the other results given the issue of disadvantage.
As a parent, I don’t expect the school to necessarily excel in all areas. I do want to know the staff are enthusiastic and dedicated. And I do want to see that the needs of individual children are being met.
Our impression so far is that’s occurring at Gambier North.
I will seek clarification though of the explanation for the Year 5 results.
Unfortunately, state school principals were muzzled today from talking to the media and all enquiries were referred to the Education Department district office. That was ridiculous.
Out of interest, I looked at the results for Hannans Primary in Kalgoorlie, where our children previously attended.
That school has a higher indigenous population (14 percent), but only 25 percent overall in the bottom quarter for socio-economic advantage.
All the Year 7 results were lower in the national testing for Hannans than they were at North Gambier.
Even so, as a parent I would want to hear the explanation before leaping to conclusions. During our time there, staff shortages and turnover were problems across Kalgoorlie. The raw data doesn’t tell you that.
The union is being alarmist in its opposition and should accept that disclosure and accountability are positive attributes.
Parents are smarter than they appear to be taking us for. Most of us will ask the right questions and be fair in our judgments.
The data should be seen as a tool to invest and improve.
These articles might be of interest:
Whilst not normally being one for conspiracy, after watching Torchwood last night on ABC 2, I’m not so sure. In the program the UK Government was planning to use their schools league tables to select the bottom performing 10% to sacrifice to alien invaders! Now I think I can understand why the AEU is so worried. Perhaps parents should not be so naive and accepting of the My School initiative?
I love a good conspiracy theory. That one is right up there among the best!