On eschatology and the 'return to religion'

We begin with Tony Blair's July 2009 Australian visit. Mr Blair converted publicly to Catholicism in 2008. In Australia that year, he argued that the West was facing an internal crisis of confidence, as well as external threats. Blair warned in particular against what he called 'aggressive secularism' and the Western tendency to 'see people of religious faith as people to be pushed to one side'. The Australian's 'editor at large', Paul Kelly, responded enthusiastically. Blair's position represented 'the best argument against the rise of secular intolerance and its distorting of history in the education system by seeking to downgrade or eliminate religion in the West's story'. This stood in contrast to the Australian Labour Party's disastrous' distancing from the Christian tradition. Kelly styled Blair as opposing 'the fashionable Western idea that religion can be suppressed or confined to the private realm' as 'a delusion and dangerous'. The Australian's position is not surprising, given the news paper's long- standing, US-influenced neoconservative position.

Evaluation of the intercultural understanding field trial

In 2011, the Innovation and Next Practice Division (INP) of the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development (DEECD) conducted a field trial on intercultural understanding in partnership with a research and evaluation team from the University of Melbourne and La Trobe University. The field trial was sponsored by the Languages, English as another Language (EAL) and Multicultural Education Division of DEECD.

Widening access to lifelong learning for adults in Ethiopia: opportunities with recognition of prior learning

Socio-economic implication of the lifelong learning for all agenda is enormous. The very idea of lifelong learning frees learning from time and space constraints. It advocates learning to be an activity of a lifetime both within and without the formal education system. The assumption is that lifelong and life-wide learning will promote competitiveness, creativity, employability and social cohesion. Taking it in the context of developing countries such as Ethiopia, lifelong learning as an educational organising principle may play a vital role in supporting efforts to eradicate illiteracy and reduce poverty. Recently, Ethiopia has introduced the third phase of their education sector development programme, which underscores the importance of adult education, and a national strategy for adult education. This paper analyses the two documents to understand the extent to which non-formal and formal education are linked, and thereby to highlight the significance of institutionalising the recognition of prior learning (RPL) to promote lifelong learning for adults and working population.

PISA – Shocks, after shocks and misconceptions

The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) is as a triennial event of ranking compulsory education performance of students in participating countries. The results are published as a leagues table, which attracts much attention from politicians, media, employer groups, academics and other interest groups. Many of the responses and much of interpretation of PISA results are arguably misguided, for they mistake quality of education within performance of education systems. In this paper we are attempting to demystify PISA results by focusing on issues OECD-PISA education concept, test results and its limitations from a quality of education perspective.

Asian immigrant parents’ and New Zealand early childhood teachers’ views of parent-teacher relationships

The growing number of Asian children entering the New Zealand early childhood education system means that teachers cannot ignore the need to develop an understanding of Asian cultures and practices that support working collaboratively with Asian families. This paper examines the views of a small number of Asian immigrant parents and New Zealand early childhood teachers about parent-teacher partnerships in children’s early education and care. The findings point to challenges for both parents and teachers. The paper highlights some major problems or barriers to the achievement of effective partnerships between Asian immigrant parents and New Zealand early childhood teachers, namely parental and teacher confidence, time, and willingness or perception of need to develop a partnership. Some recommendations for improving teacher practices are outlined. It is concluded that given the limitations of this study and yet the issues it has raised, that this is topic which needs to be more systematically researched.

Healthcare costs associated with language difficulties up to 9 years of age: Australian population-based study

PURPOSE: This study aimed to quantify the non-hospital healthcare costs associated with language difficulties within two nationally representative samples of children. METHOD: Data were from three biennial waves (2004-2008) of the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children (B cohort: 0-5 years; K cohort: 4-9 years). Language difficulties were defined as scores ≤ 1.25 SD below the mean on measures of parent-reported communication (0-3 years) and directly assessed vocabulary (4-9 years). Participant data were linked to administrative data on non-hospital healthcare attendances and prescription medications from the universal Australian Medicare subsidized healthcare scheme. RESULT: It was found that healthcare costs over each 2-year age band were higher for children with than without language difficulties at 0-1, 2-3, and 4-5 years, notably 36% higher (mean difference = $AU206, 95% CI = $90, $321) at 4-5 years (B cohort). The slightly higher 2-year healthcare costs for children with language difficulties at 6-7 and 8-9 years were not statistically different from those without language difficulties. Modelled to the corresponding Australian child population, 2-year government costs ranged from $AU1.2-$AU12.1 million (depending on age examined). Six-year healthcare costs increased with the persistence of language difficulties in the K cohort, with total Medicare costs increasing by $192 (95% CI = $74, $311; p = .002) for each additional wave of language difficulties. CONCLUSION: Language difficulties (whether transient or persistent) were associated with substantial excess population healthcare costs in childhood, which are in addition to the known broader costs incurred through the education system. It is unclear whether healthcare costs were specifically due to the assessment and/or treatment of language difficulties, as opposed to conditions that may be co-morbid with or may cause language difficulties.

ANT on the PISA trail: following the statistical pursuit of certainty

The OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) is increasingly depended upon by education policy makers to provide reliable measures of their country’s education system against international benchmarks. PISA attempts to provide efficient, scientific and technical means to develop educational policies which achieve optimal outcomes (Berg &Timmermans, 2000, p. 31). This kind of scientific evidence is seen by policy makers as being free of prejudice and ideology. Science is expected to represent the truth, state universal facts and make predictions.Thus PISA seeks to rank countries’ performances, work out future scenarios and offer policy direction. By what means does PISA gain knowledge and speak with confidence about diverse cultures and distant nations? How does it acquire a ‘voice from nowhere’ (Haraway, 1988; Suchman, 2000), and become a modern-day Oracle that countries might consult for policy advice? Modelled on early actor-network accounts of laboratory life, this ethnography traces how PISA knowledge comes to be made, guided by interview data with two ‘insiders’ in the ‘PISA laboratory’. It traces the translations and the circulating reference that turn PISA into a ‘centre of calculation’. It highlights how human and non-human entities are imbricated in the assembling of scientific facts and argues for a suspension of the divide between ‘science’ and ‘politics’. In the process, the paper offers an empirical instantiation of how some concepts from actor-network theory may be applied in the field of education policy, and ponders the implications of such an understanding for evidence based policy making.

Characterising the Australian engineering workforce and engineering graduate occupational outcomes using national census data

The purpose of undergraduate engineering education is to develop graduates who are capable of commencing professional engineering practice. Professional education should equip graduates with the skills, knowledge and attitudes required for their initial professional practice. It should also enable the capacity to continue the professional development required to refresh knowledge and skills as the graduates mature and the nature of professional engineering work develops. However, it is true that many graduates from professional engineering programs, either immediately or at some later time, pursue a career outside of professional engineering. The reasons for this are widely speculated upon, and are no doubt complex. In this regard, the professional engineering workforce, the undergraduate engineering education system, the links between them, and the occupational outcomes for engineering graduates in Australia are similar to many other developed nations. Using the latest Australian national census data we present a detailed analysis of the makeup of the professional engineering workforce and the occupational outcomes for graduates of undergraduate engineering programs in Australia. The data show that the Australian professional engineering workforce is comprised of people with a wide range of educational qualifications, and, even immediately post-graduation, many Australian engineering graduates pursue non-engineering occupations. This analysis presents important findings for those designing undergraduate engineering curricula that seek to equip students for the best employment outcomes, given the nature of the professional engineering work environment, and the short- and long-term occupations that engineering graduates actually pursue in Australia.

The contribution that alternate, pull-out and externally provided programs within schools make towards student learning, wellbeing and pathways

Research report for Department of Education and Early Childhood Development, Frankston Mornington Peninsula Youth Partnerships & Frankston Mornington Peninsula Local Learning Employment Network. The focus of this review is on programs organised for schools by providers external to the education system for students who are at risk of not completing both compulsory and the non‐compulsory years of schooling and/or who are at risk of low academic achievement. The nature of such risks faced by students and the responses of education institutions to them—and the efficacy of such programs—are also considered.

‘It’s like Spiderman… with great power comes great responsibility’: school autonomy, school context and the audit culture

This paper explores issues of school autonomy within the context of the performative demands of the audit culture. The focus is on a case study of Clementine Academy, a large and highly diverse English secondary school. Specific situated, professional, material and external factors at the school were significant in shaping Clementine’s response to and take-up of the policy of academisation (a key reform within broader government mandates to create an increasingly autonomised education system). Factors such as the school’s intake and history, its ethos and values, its access to human and economic resources and its status and power as an outstanding school supported its confident and ‘morally’ focused take-up of this policy. Clementine’s privileged position in relation to these factors enabled the school to mediate and challenge some of the negative effects of the audit culture. This paper highlights the significance of considering these contextual factors in understanding the different ways in which schools are currently engaging their autonomy to cope with the demands of the audit culture.

The politics of differentiation in schools

In many English-speaking countries, teachers are encouraged to differentiate their classrooms, and in some cases, through various policy mechanisms. This encouragement is often accompanied by threats and sanctions for not making the grade. By exploring the ways in which one education system in Australia has mandated differentiation through an audit of teacher practices, this book provides a timely engagement with the relationship between differentiated classrooms and social justice. It covers tensions, for instance, between providing culturally-appropriate classrooms, including constructing engaging and relevant curricula, and lowering expectations for students who have traditionally been marginalised by schooling. The data for this book has been collected from the same group of teachers over a period of three years, and offers detailed insights into how a particular politics of differentiation has played itself out in the context of a ‘global reform movement’ that has focused on improving student outcomes.