ABC News reports that Professor Anthony Shaddock has seen cages used before in the education of complex and challenging students. Professor Shaddock, along with an independent panel, is surveying the policies currently in place in Canberra schools, following reports that a 10-year-old autistic boy was kept in a cage in a classroom. The panel is currently receiving community feedback and will report back in October.
New procedures are being introduced in Victoria schools to target the misuse of government funds, following evidence given by Department secretary Gill Callister that the government was still attempting to recover $12.5 million kept in ‘banker’ schools. The IBAC investigation, reported in The Age, has been told of a ‘culture of entitlement’ and several executives within the Department have been accused of diverting public funds to private bank accounts. New measures include increased protection for whistle blowers and greater scrutiny of internal audits.
The West Australian reports that It is becoming increasingly difficult to hire qualified principals, with schools highlighting the increasing complexity of the role and a decreasing pool of candidates. The difficulty in hiring new principals has complicated long term planning for affected schools. WA Primary Principals’ Association president Stephen Breen believes that principals need a greater support network and better training in order to effectively execute their roles.
Following the Federal Government’s release of four school funding alternatives, ABC News reports that NSW Minister for Education Adrian Piccoli reinforced the NSW Government’s support of the Gonski reforms. NSW remains the only state to have fully embraced the model proposed in a 2011 report by David Gonski and a panel of experts.
The Attorney-General of South Australia has stated that the current child protection notification system is ‘groaning under its own weight’, ABC News reports. Under current laws, people such as teachers must report if they have reasonable grounds to suspect a child has faced abuse or neglect. Only 6,500 of the 44,000 notifications sent last financial year were investigated.
A national news provider reports that three Tasmanian schools are teaching children to cook through providing food to people who have fallen on hard times. The program is in partnership with SecondBite, a charity that takes fresh food that would otherwise be wasted and prepares hampers which are delivered to people in need. The program has grown from four students to one hundred students across three schools.
The pressure on the UK education system caused by population growth could be relieved by revising the timing of the school day for different students, The Guardian reports. Introducing shifts for different year levels would require significant changes to the teaching profession, but could enable schools to better address the different needs of students in high density areas. Similar programs are already in place in Egypt, India and select schools in the US and UK.
The Washington Post reports that the Californian Governor has signed a new bill requiring all children that have not been vaccinated and who have not received a medical exemption to be home schooled. Current personal belief exemptions will no longer exist under the new law, which applies to private schools, public schools and day care centres. This law was prompted by an outbreak of measles in Disneyland in December, which highlighted the low vaccination rates in several Californian schools.
A school district in upstate New York has agreed to pay compensation to five current and former Jewish students and to implement new anti-bullying procedures following a lawsuit detailing years of anti-Semitic bullying and harassment. The New York Times states that the district has not admitted fault in the agreement, but will pay the students $4.48 million in compensation.