The information in the Weekly Wrap is aggregated from other news sources to provide you with news that is relevant to the education sector across Australia and worldwide. Each paragraph is a summary of the subject matter covered in the particular news article. The information does not necessarily reflect the views of CompliSpace.
The Australian reports that schools should be the last institutions to close during a pandemic and the first to reopen, according to a group of prominent Australians that’s calling for a youth body to advise the Albanese Government and ensure children’s interests are not placed behind adults’. In what the University of Sydney says is the first independent report into Australia’s performance as a society over the first two-and-a-half years of the pandemic, a taskforce of business, academic and community leaders says government responses to crises “were at times inconsistent, messy and counter-productive”, and a new round of national reform is needed. The University’s Open Society, Common Purpose taskforce, has found that children have not received the attention they should have during COVID-19 and were excluded from public policy decisions despite being some of those most affected by government interventions.
According to The Australian, card games, knowledge hubs and “brain breaks” are just some techniques being rolled out by teachers to develop social skills in young children returning to the classroom after another year of disjointed schooling. Of particular concern are children who experienced the pandemic in the foundation years of preschool through to Year 2. Research shows that there is an explosion of neurological activity in the brain and learning that sets children up for life in these key years. In areas that experienced harsher lockdown measures, there are reports of an increase in children with challenging and emotional behaviours. Director of Wellbeing for Catholic Education in Western Sydney Greg Elliott said teachers were “explicitly taking time and space to focus on social and emotional learning”, with concerns there could be a cohort of children who might need “wrap-around services” at school due to the impact of COVID-19 on learning and development.
According to the Australian Financial Review, private school enrolments increased by more than 7500 students across NSW during 2021, in a trend which independent and Catholic school experts say is being experienced across the country in the wake of lockdowns and learning from home. Data from the Association of Independent Schools of NSW revealed that government schools in the state lost about 8000 students during 2021, with student numbers declining by about 1 per cent as Catholic and independent school numbers rose. An additional 2300 students went into the Catholic system, equating to a rise of 1.05 per cent, while independent school headcounts rose by more than 7500 students, or 3.5 per cent. The Association believes the flight to independent schools would have been more pronounced if they were not subject to caps from local councils on how many students they can enrol, while state school numbers are uncapped.
According to news.com.au, the symptoms of a Victorian student who died while on an overseas trip were chalked up to “homesickness” despite the 15-year-old’s severe physical deterioration. Blackburn High School student Timothy Fehring died in 2019 after an infection in his lungs and blood likely caused his heart to shut down. Principal Joanna Alexander said recently that the ratio of two teachers to 17 students on the trip was in line with 2019 requirements but had since been increased. A coroner’s report found that staff were wrong in thinking that Tim’s complaints were not sufficiently serious to justify him being excused from a walking tour a day before his death, but also that they complied with medical advice and were not in a position to prevent Tim’s death. It recommended that the Department of Education and Training increase the staff to student ratios on international trips, giving teachers more flexibility in dealing with student illness while managing the other students.
The Age reports that Victorian schools are using everything from carbon dioxide monitors to extra jackets and remote learning to manage the risks and disruption of COVID-19 outbreaks. Education Minister Jason Clare has called a roundtable discussion for 12 August to address the national teacher workforce shortage. Meanwhile, Catholic Regional College principal Brendan Watson said alongside air purifiers, the school spent $40,000 on more than 50 carbon dioxide monitors for its Sydenham classrooms. He said if carbon dioxide is too high, “there’s more likelihood there’ll be COVID in the air”. Independent Education Union Victoria deputy general secretary David Brear said some Catholic secondary schools were resorting to partial remote learning. Catholic Education Commission Victoria executive director Jim Miles said schools were using a range of measures to provide safe learning environments, including ventilation and outdoor learning spaces “where practicable”.
The Age reports that Victoria’s top public health official pressed for a return to working from home as the state entered its third Covid winter. The most recent advice of Acting Chief Health Officer Ben Cowie strongly recommended that, where practical, employers and universities should facilitate remote work and study until the end of August. The Cowie advice, provided to newly sworn-in Health Minister Mary-Anne Thomas over two weeks ago, advocated for current mask mandates to be substantially broadened as part of an urgent strengthening of the public health response before the present wave of infections built to threatening levels. If the full Cowie advice was adopted, masks would be compulsory for all high school students and primary school students aged eight and older, and staff in early education and primary and secondary schools, among others. Instead, the Victorian Government has left it to individual schools to encourage their students to wear masks.
According to The Courier Mail, calls have been made for Queensland students to undergo mandatory bag checks and pocket searches in a desperate bid to stop “out of control” e-cigarettes plaguing schools. It comes after a study revealed that more than a third of primary school staff members have pupils who use an e-cigarette or similar device, dubbed a vape, and that one in six students received their vape from a parent or guardian. Teachers’ Professional Association of Queensland secretary Tracy Tully said vaping was an “out of control” issue in State and private schools and called for strict measures to be enforced. While e-cigarettes are banned in Queensland schools, the long-serving former principal called for bag checks and pocket searches to be introduced as part of a larger crackdown. University of Queensland exercise physiologist Dean Mills said the crackdown calls had merit as e-cigarettes contained harmful chemicals that could cause chronic and lasting lung damage.
ABC News reports that the South Australian Government will review the "interactions" four agencies had with the Adelaide mother of a six-year-old girl who died after suspected neglect. South Australian Police Deputy Commissioner Linda Williams said Charlie died recently after being rushed to the Lyell McEwen Hospital in the early hours of the morning. Acting Premier Susan Close said the Government would conduct a review because four agencies – the Department for Human Services, SA Housing Authority, Department for Education and Department for Child Protection – had been involved with the family. Child Protection Minister Katrine Hildyard said she understood how frustrating it would be for South Australians, given the number of coronial inquiries and reviews that had been conducted into the child protection system. "Child protection is incredibly complex, it is a system that has to do better," she said.
ABC News reports that a Perth boy who was accessing educational support at a suburban high school was left unattended on a bus at the depot for close to five hours recently. The school bus returned to its depot at 9am, where the Year 7 student was left alone on board the bus until 1:40pm. Perth's Public Transport Authority (PTA) said the boy had food and water while in the parked vehicle. He was allegedly found when the bus driver returned to the vehicle to begin his afternoon route. In a statement, the PTA said it had strict rules regarding the operation of its school bus service, which require the driver to search the bus at the end of each trip. The PTA is investigating the incident but said it was clear that the requirements were not met. "Leaving children unattended on school buses is a serious breach of contract and the PTA will not accept any excuse for failing to keep children safe," the statement read. A bus driver and bus aide have been stood down until further notice.
The Western Australian Department of Education has partnered with Catholic Education Western Australia and the Association of Independent Schools Western Australia to release a COVID-19 letter similar to that of NSW and Victoria. The letter refers to advice, as endorsed by National Cabinet as part of a nationally consistent approach, that wearing masks indoors is strongly encouraged and that the three bodies fully support this across the three school systems. The letter asks that children wear a mask to school to keep schools as safe as possible. Staff have also been strongly encouraged to wear a mask while at school. The letter also discusses ways to reduce transmission, the distribution of 20 free Rapid Antigen Tests (RATs) for each student, and the importance of testing.
According to npr.org, Pope Francis has issued an historic apology for the Catholic Church's cooperation with Canada's "catastrophic" policy of indigenous residential schools, saying the forced assimilation of Native peoples into Christian society destroyed their cultures, severed families and marginalised generations in ways still being felt today. "I humbly beg forgiveness for the evil committed by so many Christians against the indigenous peoples," Francis said near the site of the former Ermineskin Indian Residential School, now largely torn down. More than 150,000 indigenous children in Canada were forced to attend state-funded Christian schools from the 19th century until the 1970s in an effort to isolate them from the influence of their homes and culture. The Canadian Government has admitted that physical and sexual abuse was rampant at the schools, with students beaten for speaking their native languages.
According to The Washington Post, the Biden administration issued new school discipline guidelines recently aimed at cutting back on high rates of suspension and expulsion for students with disabilities by clarifying rules that the nation’s schools are required to follow. Federal officials called the guidance “the most comprehensive ever released” on the civil rights of students with disabilities and said it would help as schools continue to try to rebound from more than two years of pandemic learning. “This work is especially urgent now, as our schools and our students and families continue to heal from the pandemic,” said Education Secretary Miguel Cardona. “Exclusionary discipline, such as out-of-school suspensions, can exacerbate these challenges, increasing stress that might lead to a greater sense of social isolation and diminished academic achievement,” he said.
According to the New Zealand Herald, the New Zealand Government has issued a strongly worded "recommendation" to schools to enforce mask-wearing for the first four weeks of Term 3. But it has stopped short of making masks compulsory, instead leaving it to each school board to make the call themselves. COVID-19 has killed or hastened the deaths of at least 1252 people in New Zealand, most of them this year. While daily case numbers have dropped, it's not clear how much the school holidays slowed transmission – and whether case numbers will rise again as students return to the classroom. A newsletter sent to all schools said that both the Education and Health Ministries were recommending that students in Years 4 and up should wear masks for the next four weeks while indoors and where it won't have a "significant impact on teaching and learning".