In the midst of government funding discussions for schools, the question remains whether any reform in school funding is on the cards for the Federal Government. It has been over three years since the Gonski Review was reported as a starting point for a ’needs-based’ funding scheme for schools and yet there is no solution or way forward in sight.
Principles taken from the 2011 Gonski Review have been incorporated into a new report authored by Professors Lyndsay Connors and Jim McMorrow that reveals that the State and Federal governments could have saved $2 billion annually had private school students been educated in the public system.
Professor Connors is the chairman of the Teacher Education Advisory Board and Professor McMorrow is the former Deputy Director-General of the NSW Department of Education, who together produced the report ‘Imperatives in Schools Funding: Equity, Sustainability and Achievement‘ (the Report). The Report was supported by the Australian Council for Education Research (ACER).
Connors and McMorrow agree that we are spending proportionally more on education than ever before with much of the increase going to subsidise the growth of non-government schools. The Report considers that while families have the right to choose where they want to educate their children they are not entitled to have that choice heavily subsidised by the government.
The research revealed that over the period of 1973- 2012:
There is controversy surrounding the Report ,and not just from independent schools challenging suggested reforms.
The Report is incogruent with the findings of the Productivity Commission’s 2015 Report on Government Services which evidenced the average cost of educating a student in the public system for the government in 2012-13 was $15,703 as opposed to $8812 for non-government school students – reportedly saving taxpayers approximately $8.6 billion annually by educating students within the private sector.
Executive Director of the Association of Independent Schools NSW, Dr Geoff Newcombe, is quoted by the Sydney Morning Herald as criticising the findings of both reports as being overly simplistic.
Dr Newcombe commented that the research showed a selective use of data and as such is essentially flawed.
He is quoted as saying ‘in attacking the right of parents to choose a school and to receive government support for their children’s education, the report simply underlines a divisive ideology that contributes nothing to education’. He went on to say ‘how parents use their after-tax dollars is entirely a private matter and it’s hard to argue that spending it on education is a bad thing’.
The research disclosed that 95% of all Australian teachers’ salaries are covered by public funds with the exception of top tier private schools. This is reported as accounting for $8 billion of the $10 billion allocated by state and federal government in 2011 within the ACER report. Newcombe dismisses such research, and subsequent conclusions, as simplistic for disregarding various other areas of school expenditure such as specialised facilities or extra-curricular programs that attract families to non-government or private schools in the first place.
The Gonski Review originally outlined a ‘sector-blind’ reorientation of Federal and State schools funding regardless of their sector. However, the ACER report recalls cumulative political compromises that have left the country with ‘a hybrid school system which is inequitable and unsuited to Australia’s changing social and economic circumstances’, despite Gonski recommendations.
The research paper makes the case for a new schools funding architecture to be developed in the context of the federal system and the authors urge that it should be one with clear priorities in regard to a greater coherence between the provision of public funding and the achievement of educational goals for all children.
The Sydney Morning Herald quotes the NSW Education Minister Adrian Piccoli as urging his colleagues in Canberra to commit to the final two years of Gonski funding.
‘As the first state to sign up to the Gonski agreement, NSW is leading the way when it comes to advocating for funding to be based on the needs of students regardless of whether their school is in the public, independent or Catholic sector,’ he said.
The Report provides an interesting historical insight into the development of school policy by different Governments. The findings of the Report demonstrate that ‘a result of cumulative political compromises, Australian schooling and the funding policies that support it have now evolved into a uniquely Australian hybrid within which public funding supports all schools to a greater or lesser extent.’
Connors and McMorrow conclude the Report by emphasising the importance of ‘putting educational values back into schools funding. There is a need to return to the issue of the basic values that underpin our diverse and legitimate forms of schooling, public and private, and to put intellectual and political effort, mutual respect and goodwill into understanding the differences between them.’