The peak teacher union says the government must properly fund schools to implement new individual learning plan

This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

The landmark second Gonski report’s call for a complete overhaul of the way student progress is measured will require a significant increase in school funding, the Australian Education Union has warned.

On Monday the government released the long-awaited review of education excellence in Australian schools, which calls for a shift from year-based learning to a curriculum expressed as “learning progressions”, independent of year or age.

The report advocates for an end to the “industrial model” of mass education, and instead calls for more focus on individual learning progress. The report has been welcomed by the government, which says it will adopt all of its 23 recommendations.

In comments to Guardian Australia, the review panel’s chairman, David Gonski, defended the feasibility of new measures of students’ performance, arguing they would be tailored to individual need and would not require widespread additional testing.

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State education ministers received the report overnight and will meet on Friday with the federal education minister, Simon Birmingham, to discuss it and be briefed by Gonski.

On Monday the New South Wales education minister, Rob Stokes, said he welcomed the report’s finding that the current Naplan regime in particular is “limited by its focus on achievement rather than growth”.

But the peak union for teachers, the AEU, said that while it was pleased with many of the report’s recommendations, it would require a significant injection of new school funding to implement them in practice.

“Given there are a number of recommendations that could deliver positive results, the Turnbull government must resolve the funding shortfall for public schools to ensure that they are at 100% of the Schooling Resource Standard,” union president Correna Haythorpe said.

“We cannot meaningfully talk testing or new assessment frameworks without first addressing funding inequity.

“Taking a test does not improve education outcomes; rather, it identifies where there are student learning needs and then schools can target programs to support their students.

“We know that when schools have the resources they need to give students the individual attention they need, we see improved educational outcomes. This is evident in the many schools that have used Gonski needs-based funding for this purpose.”

The Queensland education minister, Grace Grace, said that while the report was “a step in the right direction”, its focus on individualised learning and assessment would be “staff intensive”.

“Clearly if you are looking at a tailored education program it will require additional staffing and additional funds from the commonwealth to support that model,” she said.

But Gonski said that an online resource to measure student progress and additional testing would be “left in the hands of the teacher”.

“It would be a wonderful tool that allows you as the teacher to determine when students need to be tested,” he said. “It could be that [you] don’t need to do the test at all if it is so clear that you can move to the next progression.”

But more diagnostic tools would help teachers identify “dark spots” in students’ learning, such as whether a student had become adept at “covering up” their inability to read at a particular level.

Gonski said that further assessment would be “private not public”, shared only between teachers, students, parents and carers rather than a new form of mass examination with which to compare schools.

Increased sharing of educational tools would then allow teachers to access information “about how to get students back on their planned trajectory”.

“The aim is for it not to be harder for the teacher but better for the teacher, to share the benefits of their craft better.”

The terms of reference for the second Gonski report specifically excluded the question of education funding. Instead, he was tasked with reviewing how the funding from the government’s so-called Gonski 2.0 bill would be spent.

But the union – and Labor – have continued to argue that the government’s education deal cuts money from the funding trajectory negotiated in agreements with the states by the Gillard government.

“If the Turnbull government thinks that this report and its recommendations will be a distraction from the critical issue of funding, then they are wrong. We remain resolute in our objective of achieving fair funding now for public schools,” Haythorpe said.

Federal Labor and most of the Labor states have followed this line since the report’s release.

While opposition spokeswoman Tanya Plibersek did not immediately object to the report’s recommendations she too sought to push the debate back to funding.

“Only thing I would say to the government is you can’t expect teachers and schools to make these changes while you’re cutting their funding,” she said.

Northern Territory education minister Eva Lawler welcomed the report, saying it “aligns strongly with our own education reform agenda”.

“In the Territory we have some of the most disadvantaged and vulnerable young people and so it is vital that the Commonwealth government works with us to ensure that every child, no matter where they live, is supported to engage with school, to grow and achieve to their full potential,” she said.

