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John
P. Keeves
The Editor
john.keeves@flinders.edu.au
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Concern for Research and an
International Perspective
This special issue of the International
Education Journal has been prepared for publication by the
Flinders University Institute of International Education and
the South Australian Institute of Educational Research to draw
attention to the radical changes being introduced in South
Australia at the terminal secondary school level. These
changes follow on from earlier similar changes that were
introduced for the first 10 years of public education in the
state of South Australia at a time when efforts were being
made towards a common curriculum across Australia together
with a common system of education. These highly specific
changes to schooling in South Australia are being made with
little public debate and little soundly based research
evidence on the effectiveness of the public schooling provided
within the state. Moreover, these changes occur at a time when
there is increasing movement between the Australian states,
particularly towards Queensland and Western Australia, and
increasing attempts are being made to attract students from
countries in Asia to complete their schooling and university
education within South Australia. The effects of globalisation
and movement of people between countries are clearly having a
marked impact on education in South Australia, with the
establishment of a small campus of at least one university
from the United States in Adelaide and the establishment of
commercially based secondary schools to cater for overseas
students. Furthermore, the International Baccalaureate
programs at all levels are flourishing in South Australia with
greater per capita involvement within the state than anywhere
else in the world.
It is commonly stated that South
Australia has an education system that is both innovative and
of high quality, but these statements are made with little
supporting evidence to back such claims that is soundly based,
or that would be accepted outside the state arising from
examination of educational outcomes across the states and
territories of Australia, or across the developed countries of
the world. Indeed, it is our concern that educational research
in South Australia is generally both low in quality and
quantity and has been throughout the period of approximately
75 years when the South Australia Institute of Educational
Research was founded.
Under these circumstances we consider
that it is timely for both Institutes involved in the
preparation of this issue of the International Education
Journal to draw attention in a scholarly way, with a
belief in open and informed debate on such issues, to the
serious lack of an international perspective as well as a
research perspective, in the substantial changes being made to
public education within the state of South Australia.
Concern for Principles in Debate
In the preparation of the published
report “Success for All”, the Review Panel advocated seven
principles that they contended were the foundations for the
proposed reform to senior secondary education in the state of
South Australia and for the development of a new approach for
the South Australian Certificate of Education (SACE).
The new SACE needs to be:
- responsive
to the needs of individual students and groups
of students;
- credible
in terms of the rigour of the learning process,
the standards and methods used to assess students’
learning achievements, and in terms of the reliability of
what the certificate says graduates know and can do;
- inclusive
of all students, all cultures and all study
pathways so that success
for all is the prevailing dominant culture;
- worthwhile
in terms of the benefits perceived by students;
- futures
oriented so that students have the skills and
attributes they need to survive in a globally competitive
world, and also to help shape it;
- connected
to learning that precedes the current SACE
years (particularly Year 10), to work and study
destinations beyond the senior secondary years, to
students’ lives, and to the wider, global community;
- supportive
of quality learning and teaching for all
students.
(Success
for All: SACE Review at a glance, 2006, p. 8)
These principles are admirable and we
have no reason to challenge them. However, the open stating of
them is in marked contrast to a report that does not consider:
- the
different groups of students involved and, in particular,
the needs of able students;
- the
portability of the certificate across Australia and other
developed and developing countries;
- the
alternative pathways being followed by students both in
South Australia and in other countries who work for the
South Australian Certificate of Education;
- the
worth of intellectual challenge, independent effort, both
cognitive and practical skills, and strong value systems
based on universally accepted values;
- the
need to think outside the narrow confines of a state of
only one and a half million people at the present time;
- the
serious shortcomings of a curriculum developed within the
public education system in South Australia for the
teaching and learning of students during the first ten
years of schooling, and the connections that need to be
made to clearly identified pathways for entry into adult
life; and
- the
findings of research into cognitive acceleration and in
the field of neuroscience that is changing the learning
and teaching of students at all levels of secondary
schooling.
Moreover, it can be argued that the
report of the Review Panel is ideologically biased with a
particular agenda and is written in terms that largely ignore
the seven principles listed above.
The image of one certificate for all, in
which all achieve success, fails to consider that dual
functions of a qualification at the end of 12 years of
schooling of both certification and selection. Moreover, the
image of one certificate implies that there is only one
pathway for all students to follow at the end of secondary
education. We would argue that there are several different
pathways that need to be identified and considered, namely:
(a)
to university with or without a brief gap,
(b)
to programs involving the development of high level
skills in the field of technology and ICT,
(c)
to apprenticeship and training programs for the
development of a wide range of skills,
(d)
to work in the labour force involving specific levels
of skill.
In addition, it must be expected that no
pathway terminates at the end of a single further stage, but
leads on to a lifelong program of recurring education and
learning to live and work effectively in a changing world.
Each of these pathways has both common and unique
requirements. One qualification or even the two alternative
qualifications that used to operate in South Australia are no
longer appropriate for the four or more alternative or shared
pathways of the future. What is important is the guidance
required to encourage young people to commence moving along an
initial pathway, but with considerable freedom to move in and
out of different paths as their interests, commitments and
abilities require.
Concerning this Issue of the
International Education Journal
There is no need to summarise or present
information about the Ministerial Review of Senior Secondary
Education in South Australia or about the Final Report of the
Review Panel, Success
for All, since the full Report and an Overview are readily
available on the SACE Review website at http://www.sacereview.sa.gov.au.
All that need be said is that efforts are being made to
implement the findings of the Review Panel, with little if any
debate and with no apparent opposition from the universities
or other parties who are stakeholders. However, the words of
the Prime Minister, the Honourable John Howard, when launching
the Australia Research Alliance for Children and Youth in 2002
are of considerable interest.
One of the things you find in government
is that no amount of goodwill is enough, no amount of good
policy direction is enough, unless you have accurate
information at your disposal. And the use of taxpayer
resources to achieve particular goals can be very frustrating
if in fact the database on which these policies are based and
the objectives pursued are inadequate, or worse inaccurate. (Trewin,
citing Howard, 2006)
The announcement that the Organisation
for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) is proposing
to conduct a testing program to assess the abilities of
undergraduate students in a program of reform to enhance the
quality of higher education in countries that are members of
OECD is a major development in the transition from schooling
to higher education. This proposal is likely to be hotly
debated at both school and university levels. Moreover, this
proposal draws attention to the need for an international and
Australia wide perspective on the many aspects of the
widespread debate that will inevitably emerge.
It is the purpose of this issue of the
Journal to
provide a meaningful data base from which the Report of the
Review Panel Success for All can be viewed and debated before the recommended
policies are implemented.
The lead article is a paper prepared by
Geoff N. Masters, the Chief Executive Officer of the Australian
Council for Educational Research, that is titled: The
Case for an Australian Certificate of Education. This
paper is followed by a commentary by John P. Keeves (Chair of
Flinders University Institute of International Education) and
David D. Curtis (ACER, School of Education, University of
Adelaide), titled: Research
and National Debate on Australian Schooling.
There are four papers that are critiques
of the Report of the Review Panel
Success for All:
- The SACE Review
Panel’s Final Report: Significant
flaws in the statistical analyses of available education data by Kelvin D. Gregory, School of
Education, Flinders University,
- Tailoring
Educational Research to a Desired Goal: The SACE Review
Panel’s Report on Community Views by Kelvin D.
Gregory, School of Education, Flinders University,
- The
Heart of the New SACE by J. Anthony Gibbons, Flinders
University Institute of International Education,
- A
View from Outside the Confines of South Australia by
John P. Keeves, Chair, Flinders University Institute of
International Education
These papers were presented at the FUIIE
and SAIER Spring Seminar Series on the Research
Issues on the Future of Post-Compulsory Secondary Education in
South Australia on Tuesday 29 August and Tuesday 5
September 2006 (see Appendix 1 for publicity statement). Since
Professor Masters was ill and unable to attend on Tuesday 29
August, his paper was read by Dr Ted Sandercock, Chairperson
of SAIER.
The
Editor
Trewin, D. (2006). (Citing J. Howard,
2002) Report on Workshop on Population Wellbeing Data Groups
(Publication. Retrieved 25 October 2006, from National
Statistical Service.
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