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.
According to The Educator, Treasurer Jim Chalmers has handed down Australia’s Federal Budget 2022. The Government laid out a plan to tackle the nation’s teacher shortage, youth mental health crisis and school funding gap. More than $270 million will also be allocated over two years for measures to upgrade school infrastructure across the nation. Schools have been promised an additional 4,036 teaching places, including 1,469 for early education teachers to address growing workforce shortages in the sector. The Government has earmarked more than $200 million in funding to help students bounce back from the mental health and wellbeing impacts of Covid. The Government has also extended the Non-Government School Reform Fund until the end of 2023 to support the delivery of the National Education Reform Agreement and national priorities such as quality teaching, Initial Teacher Education, teacher accreditation and online formative assessments.
According to The Educator, Beth Blackwood, CEO of the Association of Heads of Independent Schools of Australia (AHISA), says that, like principals of schools in other sectors, independent school principals have been particularly concerned by the wellbeing of students. “Helping students re-adjust to the physical school environment after COVID disruptions has been an additional challenge for teachers, especially in those states which experienced prolonged lockdowns,” Blackwood told The Educator. “Even where lockdowns were relatively short, many students have increased anxiety levels because they are living through at some level the impact of a global pandemic, global warming and the threat of an escalating war in Europe.” Blackwood said that, while it isn’t entirely clear what is driving the immediate shortages schools are experiencing, AHISAs data suggests that, at least in the independent sector, there is not a mass exodus of teachers from the profession.
According to the Department of Health and Aged Care, the Albanese Government is providing $40.6 million to Triple P International to help them deliver free, online parenting education and mental health support to Australian parents and carers of children under 12. Half of all adult mental health challenges emerge before the age of 14. However, more than half of Australian children with mental ill-health aren’t getting professional help, and seven out of 10 parents aren’t confident that they could recognise the signs of mental ill-health in their child. The Triple P – Positive Parenting Program will help parents and carers to support the mental health and wellbeing of their children now and into the future. With this program, parents can access self-paced online training, with interactive and easy-to-navigate resources and learning tools, to better support their child’s mental health at key developmental stages, from birth to 11 years.
According to the Australian Financial Review, strict lockdowns that forced schools to shut as a precaution and made families work and learn from home harmed students and should have ended earlier, as more evidence emerged that they were not major transmission hotspots, the Government has been told. The finding is from a report into Australia’s COVID-19 response. The report – based on an independent review and funded by charities – also canvasses Australia’s approach to outbreaks and says that the former Coalition Government’s failure to procure a diversity of vaccines resulted in long, avoidable lockdowns in 2021. It finds that school closures were the correct decision at the start of the pandemic, when little was known about how COVID-19 spread. But forcing kids to learn from home was the wrong move once it became clear that schools were not high-transmission environments, and the decision likely hurt kids’ education, social development and mental health.
ABC News reports that the medicines regulator, the Therapeutics Goods Administration (TGA), is considering whether to put some restrictions on how paracetamol is accessed, due to concerns about its use in self-harm. The commonly used drug – while safe when used correctly – is behind half of all self-poisoning attempts in young Australians and causes up to 50 deaths each year, as well as injuries. A worrying trend of the past decade is increasing rates of intentional self-poisoning with paracetamol. The TGA has been consulting with the community on potential changes to how it's sold and who it's sold to. Earlier in the year, the TGA released a report that made several recommendations, including limiting how many paracetamol tablets or capsules are sold in each pack and how many packs can be bought. The review was ordered by Liberal MP David Coleman when he was the Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention.
The Guardian reports that the psychological dangers of online gaming have not been adequately addressed by Australian authorities, as highlighted by the death of a teenage boy in regional Victoria, a coronial investigation has found. Coroner Paresa Spanos said that the tragedy underscored a lack of resources for recognising and treating gaming disorders. The coroner heard that Oliver, 13, was a well-liked student with a large circle of friends who had not suffered depression before his gaming addiction took hold. In the year before his death in October 2019, the Year 7 student, who had played games such as Roblox, Minecraft and Clash of Clans over several years, became “obsessed”. This addiction led to him becoming “irrational and aggressive at times,” Spanos found. At the time of his death, Oliver’s parents had banned him from using technology due to his behaviour.
According to The Educator, there is a disconnect between young people’s perspectives and how school bullying is treated in practice and policy in Australia, a leading expert has warned. “School bullying attracts significant research and resources globally, yet critical questions are being raised about the long-term impact of these efforts,” says Dr Ben Lohmeyer, a researcher in youth violence and bullying in Flinders University’s College of Education, Psychology and Social Work. “From my research, I’ve found young people are less interested in shaping their experiences into technical definitions and are more interested in the need to prevent harm.” Dr Lohmeyer says that young people are routinely ignored simply because they are young, yet they are the ones that experience the bullying and can provide helpful insights into the behaviour that occurs and how to prevent it.
The Age reports that African-Australian community leaders have called for anti-racism training in Victorian schools after students described experiencing race and religion-based discrimination. Students of African heritage have told researchers that they felt more heavily policed than non-African students, were suspected of cheating if they did well and were encouraged to leave school rather than complete the VCE even if their marks were good. Although many teachers were reportedly supportive, students said that their complaints of racism were often not taken seriously. Nor Shanino, a member of the Andrews Government’s African Communities Action Plan Implementation Committee, commissioned the research report, Racism in Schools: African Australian Students Speak Up, through his not-for-profit organisation, the Ubuntu Project.
According to the NSW Education Standards Authority (NESA), reforms to teacher accreditation requirements are currently underway. The reforms are being implemented in stages with a Public Register of Teachers already available and a new NSW Teacher Accreditation Manual outlining the requirements for all stages of accreditation now available. The next change will be implemented from 29 November 2022, when NESA will become the sole decision maker for all teacher accreditation decisions. This will improve consistency for teachers and create a standardised approach across school systems, sectors and early childhood services. There will be transition arrangements for teachers who have submitted accreditation applications but have not yet received an accreditation decision before 29 November 2022.
According to the NSW Government, students in NSW will soon be able to learn from the highest quality Aboriginal languages syllabus in the country, with the release of a new Aboriginal Languages syllabus. Minister for Education and Early Learning Sarah Mitchell said that NSW is proudly home to more than 35 Aboriginal Language groups and more than 100 dialects of those languages. "This is the first major redevelopment of how Aboriginal languages are taught in our schools in 20 years,” Ms Mitchell said. “For the first time, students who speak an Aboriginal Language or Torres Strait Islander Language at home will be able to progress the study of that language at school.” Importantly, the new Aboriginal Languages Kindergarten to Year 10 syllabus includes guidance for schools on involving Aboriginal communities and knowledge-holders when introducing and teaching the syllabus. “This provides Aboriginal communities greater flexibility around how their languages are taught.”
The Age reports that four new Catholic primary schools, a new school campus, and upgrades to 13 Catholic and low-fee independent schools have been promised by Premier Daniel Andrews in an election funding pledge valued at $717 million over four years. Of the funding, $450 million will go towards building and upgrading Catholic and independent schools across the State, with Catholic schools receiving at least 70 per cent of the investment, in line with their share of students. Andrews said that the Melbourne Archdiocese has promised to match the Catholic school funding by 20 per cent. “A third of families send their kids to low-fee Catholic schools and other low-fee independent schools, and choice has always been a really important part of our education system,” he said. “We know if we step in … that means parents pay lower fees.”
The Queensland Government is introducing tougher measures to hunt down child sex offenders. The new laws will support police efforts to stop reportable offenders using the latest online technology to offend against children. The Child Protection (Offenders Reporting and Offender Prohibition Order) and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2022 (Qld), to be introduced to Queensland Parliament this week, targets technology-based offending. The new measures will seek to prevent and seriously disrupt these practices by expanding police powers to enter the residence of a reportable offender to undertake a digital device inspection; requiring reportable offenders to disclose their use of anonymising software, vault and black hole applications and their media access control (MAC) address; introducing a new offence for failing to comply with a requirement to produce a digital device for a device inspection; and increasing reporting requirements for reportable offenders.
According to the Government of Western Australia, the safety of Western Australian children and the responsibility of organisations to ensure that it is a priority are being highlighted during National Children's Week, which runs from 22-30 October. Children's Week is observed annually across Australia and is dedicated to celebrating children and promoting the Rights of the Child as proclaimed by the United Nations in 1954. It reminds people of the responsibility to advocate for children as citizens and for their right to a positive childhood. Meerilinga Children and Community Foundation has been the convener of Children's Week in Western Australia since 1985 – the first year it was celebrated in Australia. Children's Week coincides with the Child Safe Organisations campaign, which raises awareness and support for organisations that promote children's wellbeing and prevent harm to young people by implementing the National Principles.
According to rnz.co.nz, survivors of abuse at Auckland's Dilworth School have presented a petition calling for mandatory reporting of abuse at the Royal Commission inquiry. Among them was Neil Harding, who said that survivors wanted the proposed legislation called the Dilworth Law. "The petition is asking the Abuse in Care Royal Commission of Inquiry to recommend to the New Zealand Government the implementation of the Dilworth Law," Harding said. "This law would require a person or entity to report to police if a child or young person is at risk of a significant harm. The child or young person has been or is at risk of being physically or sexually abused or ill-treated." The law already exists in New South Wales, he said. "We were astounded to learn that in New Zealand there is currently no such law. If this law had existed and been followed when we were at Dilworth, most of us would never have been sexually abused."
The Guardian reports that a schoolgirl has reportedly been killed by the Iranian security services after she was beaten in her classroom for refusing to sing a pro-regime song when her school was raided. According to the Coordinating Council of Iranian Teachers’ Trade Associations, 16-year-old Asra Panahi died after security forces raided a high school in Ardabil and demanded that a group of girls sing an anthem that praises Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. When they refused, security forces beat the pupils, leading to a number of girls being taken to hospital and others arrested. Panahi reportedly died later in hospital. Schoolgirls have emerged as a powerful force after videos went viral of pupils waving their hijabs in the air, taking down pictures of Iran’s supreme leaders and shouting anti-regime slogans in support of Mahsa Amini, the woman who died after being detained by Iran’s morality police for not wearing her hijab correctly.
The Guardian reports that teaching and classroom assistants (TAs) working in mainstream schools in the UK have described being kicked, punched and spat at by pupils in a new study that explores, for the first time, aggression targeted at support staff, who are predominantly female and low-paid. They told researchers that they had been hit in the face, bitten, had objects thrown at them and received death threats, with incidents reported in primary and secondary schools. Their injuries included cuts, a black eye, a dislocated thumb, a broken finger and torn ligaments, according to the University of Roehampton study. They also described the psychological toll of the incidents, complaining of stress, anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder – forcing some to take time off sick and even to retire early due to ill health.