I think Australia might have just gone beyond the UK in terms of information and school accountability.

Looks to be both a great idea and good format - better than the UK's system.

Never thought I'd see the day under state and federal labor!

http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegrap...006009,00.html

Sounds great but I'll eat my hat if it actually happens......

Here, just as in the UK they like to talk BIG about the things they are going to do but never seems to happen, improving Maternity leave strikes me as one of them.

Let's hope I'm wrong because as it stands at the moment there is very little information that parents can look at when it comes to checking out schools.

Thanks for the post.

Sam

I'm pretty confident - this has moved beyond the proposal stage. It's all confirmed by state education ministers and data is being collated for publication later this year.

I prefer to wait and see before passing judgement.

Blimey the AEU will be definitely in knotted knickers for a while! Dont think I would ever have thought it from a federal ALP govt, they were up in arms about it while in opposition.

The AEU will definitely be in knots, we oppose any sort of ranking being included as this is what everyone will focus upon and is not actually a good measure of how the school is doing.

So, still no Ofsted-style inspections, then?

That's the same objection to league tables here in the UK. A particular ranking does not give you an indication of how good teaching is. To give an example, my high achieving school does a really good job getting B, C and D student good passes. Their 'value added' is excellent. However 'value added' for the A students is poor. We are very high on the league tables, but parents might want to think twice about sending an exceptional student there. Then again, we have a very good ethos at the school which is popular with both parents and pupils.

In the UK, Ofsted (Inspection) Reports are publicly available for all schools and colleges. My own opinion is that this gives a broader picture, although the inspection routine itself has failings (e.g. you know in advance when they are coming!!)

What form of reporting would you prefer to see?

So why haven't the AEU suggested anything better years ago?

I do agree to some extent, statistics only show part of the picture but at the moment parents have very little to go on.

Sam

Yet the schools are generally better disciplined and the kids and teachers happier than in British schools.

Be careful what you wish for, as soon as you start a regime of measuring and reporting than schools forget what they're for - and that is teaching, not filling out forms.

I'm not a teacher, but a parent, and I can honestly say that nothing beats going to look at the school, speaking to other parents, etc. League tables, OFSTED reports, etc. mean precious little.

What worries me about this is schools where the population come from a low socio economic area will be labelled as bad schools, the same applies to schools where the average intellegence of the pupils is lower than the State average. Schools and teachers in these could well be labelled as under performing where in fact their results are much better than those given for "better schools". I am one of those who don't believe that test results tell anyone which school is best or has the best teachers.

Australia has shown me that your schooling plays no part in deciding whether you'll have a good work ethic or not. Some things cant be bought.

Statistics have nothing to do with education! You should get everything you need to know from a parent/teacher interview - as long as the teacher doesn't subscribe to all the PC nonsense that goes on today.

How do you come to the conclusion that "the schools are generally better disciplined and the kids and teachers happier than in British schools" ?
Why should it automatically follow that you can only have good teaching when results are not published or scrutinised? If there is no measure how do you determine what is a good school?
I agree that nothing beats going to the school etc but at least league tables, OFSTED reports etc give you are starting point for discussion.