In Australia, poverty has become the original sin of education. How can we talk about fair competition?

According to a recent analysis based on students' calculation and reading and writing test scores, there is a great two-level polarization in Australia's education system. The scores of students in New South Wales and Victoria, where the comprehensive living expenses are the most expensive, are overwhelming, especially those from expensive private schools, who often get excellent grades, while students in South Australia continue to be at the bottom.

There is also a trend that high-quality teachers flow from remote areas to developed cities along the eastern coast, and from public schools to private schools.

In the past two decades, the Australian federal government has continuously increased its funding for private schools, including schools with extremely expensive tuition fees, swimming pools, luxury gardens and performing arts centers. Since then, the country has been further divided, and many middle-class parents have begun to worry about sending their children to local public high schools, fearing that their children will fall behind their peers in elite public schools with high fees or high admission scores.

Take New South Wales as an example. This year, the number of students taking the entrance examination for elite middle schools has set a new record. More than 10 thousand students in this new state took the exam, which may be the most competitive. Due to the limited admission places, the result is likely to disappoint many people. In order to be admitted to the top scholar, many candidates took part in the exam counseling. In Australia, tuition is also quite expensive.

It's getting harder and harder to buy a house around popular public schools in Sydney. House prices near some public schools have soared by a third compared with last year's peak, and most of them have increased by more than 20%.

According to the previously released House Price Report around the school, the house price around the fastest-growing 10 school in Sydney increased by more than 20% in the first 12 months of 20 16, compared with the increase of10% in the whole Sydney area.

It can be seen that in Australia, high-quality educational resources also rely on money to compete: you need to settle in the States and provinces with the highest housing prices and living costs. If you can't send your child to an expensive private school, you must buy or rent an expensive school district and invest a lot of extra-curricular tuition to ensure that your child enters a good public school.

Australia has limited educational resources.

Usually, people's impression of Australian schools is "small class system", with a large area of grass, tile houses and trees, which is very different from that of reinforced concrete teaching buildings in domestic schools. Many parents in China send their children to study in Australia at all costs, just to let them roll on the vast grass and run freely in the sun, but this situation will change.

According to the latest report, a middle school with 14 floors will be built in the suburbs of Sydney, which can accommodate 1200 students and is expected to be officially opened to the public in 2020. This means that the class size will increase and the space for each student to play will decrease. If sports activities are to be moved indoors, garden green space may only be realized on the roof.

Poverty has become the "original sin" of education in Australia. How can we talk about fair competition?

According to the Sydney Morning Herald, this new school will be located in the former site of Cleveland Street Intensive English High School in Surry Hills, and it is one of the five schools with high-rise buildings planned to be built in Greater Sydney.

Poverty has become the "original sin" of education in Australia. How can we talk about fair competition?

In recent years, the school enrollment rate in Sydney has soared. In order to accommodate new students, Sydney needs to build 12 schools every year.

Rob Stokes, director of NSW Education, said that most new schools will have "high-rise buildings", which will help reduce costs and ease the pressure on land occupation. "Where land resources are limited, we can only make buildings develop higher," Stokes said. "It depends on the situation on the ground. Of course, we don't have to build such a tall building outside the city. This is obvious. "

FJMT, the construction company responsible for building the school, said it would learn from the experience of arthur phillip High School in Parramatta. This school in Parramatta is one of the first five high schools announced. It is expected to be completed in 20 19 with a cost of 225 million yuan.

The Department of Education of New South Wales has previously announced a school-building plan for 65,438+00 years costing A $5 billion to meet the challenge of an increase of 265,438+0% in the number of students in the next 65,438+05 years.

Most people's overall impression of Australia is vast and sparsely populated, but in fact, most of Australia's land is not suitable for living, and only narrow coastal areas are suitable for people to settle down. As a result, Australia's land resources are also very limited. Especially in the central area of the Australian capital city.

In addition, thousands of apartments have sprung up in the capital city of Australia's east coast in recent years, especially around public schools. These schools have often changed from single-family houses with only a dozen families to apartment buildings that can accommodate hundreds of people, which means a surge in school-age children. The development of public schools lags far behind the growth of the number of students.

Poverty has become the "original sin" of education in Australia. How can we talk about fair competition?

Take Chatswood, a famous area in China, as an example. Some parents reported that in Chatsworth Public School, 60 girls use one toilet, students take turns to use the playground, and one third of the students go to the middle school across the street.

According to the Sydney Morning Herald, Cheshire Parents and Citizens Association (P & amp； C) It shows that the public schools in Cheshire were originally built to accommodate 800 students, but at present there are 65,438+0,246 students, and the number of students is expected to increase in the future.

From this point of view, with the growth of students, the school's floor area ratio is obviously backward, the urban land price is soaring, and the school can't get the land that can be expanded. Under such circumstances, it will be the future development trend for schools to give up grass shade and develop into the air.

Under this trend, if parents in China want to give their children a green playground where they can run freely, they may have to choose private schools with high tuition and sponsorship fees or urban areas with low population density but poor teaching quality.

Although Australian local schools have to queue up to enter private schools, private schools are still targeting China students who can pay more tuition fees. Recently, 54 Australian private schools in Australia went to Guangzhou and Hong Kong to recruit students last weekend in order to get more profits from tuition fees. These China students attend private schools in Australia, with an average annual tuition fee of 40,000 Australian dollars, which is more than local students 1000 yuan.

From this point of view, Australia's high-quality educational resources are also "more than enough porridge" in all aspects. If parents want to "unlock" Australia's quality education resources, strong capital investment is still the "golden key".

The distribution of educational resources in Australia is also an insurmountable class gap.

At present, there are two different types of schools in Australia, private schools and public schools, which are subsidized by public finance.

All recurrent expenses of public schools come from government financial support (except voluntary contributions), and all students who want to enroll must be admitted.

In Australia, poverty has become the original sin of education. How can we talk about fair competition?

This kind of school serves all students from different socio-economic classes. According to the community social education advantage index, the distribution of students in such schools ranges from 52% below the average value of the community social education advantage index to 48% above the average value of the community social education advantage index.

Australian private schools (including Catholic and other religious schools and independent schools) can also receive regular financial subsidies from the government. The fee level of such schools is not limited by the government's upper limit. Schools can borrow money for project construction, and can repay loans with regular gross income.

Compared with public schools, private schools have a narrower range of students. Only 1 1% of the students in Catholic schools are below the average score of ICSEA, and the proportion in independent schools is as low as 5%.

Through the "My School" website, we will find that private schools currently receive a considerable amount of financial subsidies from the government.

At the same ICSEA level, 9 1% Catholic schools can get 90-99% financial subsidies from public schools. 79% independent schools can get 80-95% financial subsidies from public schools.

Since the publication of the "Gunski Report", the annual growth rate of government expenditure in private schools is 6%, while the annual growth rate of government expenditure in public schools is only 3%.

Despite the guarantee of government subsidies, the fees of most private schools continue to rise.

Many private schools do not even need to rely on government subsidies to ensure the provision of high-quality education. Only by charging high tuition fees and "parents' fees" can we meet the demand.

However, the public school system must fulfill its specific responsibilities and obligations to the government.

Although it is also asking for money from the government, private schools can have selective admission procedures. They can legally refuse students admission, have immunity from anti-discrimination laws (although this happens infrequently), and are not bound by the Freedom of Information Act.

According to OECD's social education gradient, that is, educational performance is related to social and economic status, Australia's social education gradient is steeper than other western countries, which shows that Australia's educational investment has a serious adverse impact on educational output.

Although Australian public schools are responsible for comprehensively improving Australia's educational output, they are also the main institutions for disadvantaged students.

Private schools tend to focus only on high-end students in ICSEA, and there is no rigid requirement for improving the overall educational performance in Australia.

So the overall situation in Australia is getting worse. Although the federal and state governments currently account for a large proportion of education expenditure, Australia's education performance continues to decline.

Do Australians really expect this to happen?

It is obviously not in Australia's national interest to only use public schools to train people with low education level.

Seriously disadvantaged school students not only have the characteristics of low socio-economic status (measured by their parents' income, education and employment), they often face multiple disadvantages.

A suburban public school that mainly accepts immigrants, 80% of the students have a non-English language background. There are even 10 languages. Such students often come to Australia for less than three years and will not stay in a school for too long (because their parents are looking for a job).

In schools in non-capital areas, many students may come from families who have been unemployed for a long time. Many of them can't read, don't even have textbooks, or don't even know how to turn pages from right to left.

These schools are like "emergency wards" in the Australian education system. However, they are often not regarded as "hospital emergency rooms".

Is it worth looking forward to promoting educational equity in Australia?

Recently, the federal government thought it was time to put an end to the years-long struggle between the federal government, state governments and administrative regions for education funds.

Poverty has become the "original sin" of education in Australia. How can we talk about fair competition?

Australian Prime Minister Turnbull announced the review plan for the reform of primary and secondary education funds. According to this plan, the funding for primary and secondary education will increase by 75% in the next 10 year.

Under this plan, primary and secondary schools will receive 242.3 billion Australian dollars in the next 10 year. The federal government's education funding will increase from175 billion Australian dollars this year to 30.6 billion Australian dollars in 2027.

Turnbull said that the allocation of education funds will follow the principle of "on-demand, fairness and clear goals". The government will introduce a new on-demand funding system to determine the funding for schools across the country, and intends to legislate for this funding model, which means that funding will no longer need the approval of the state education director.

Turnbull said that the current education funding model is a "patchwork system" of 27 different funding models. "Some private schools have excess funds, while others are short of funds." This unfair situation is coming to an end.

Federal Education Minister simon birmingham said that there are 24 private schools on the East Coast facing funding cuts. These schools are located in economically affluent areas.

But in fact, this fund is less than the amount proposed by the former Federal Labor Party government and expected by the state governments.

Bill Shorten, leader of the Labor Party, said that this review will make the school get 22 billion yuan less funds than under the Labor Party government.

A spokeswoman for the Labour Party's education affairs called the reform a "political atrocity", and Turnbull just pretended to have saved the on-demand funding plan.

In fact, school funding needs certainty. From a pen to speech therapists and school counselors, every budget may change students' school life.

However, as far as the current situation is concerned, the obstacles faced by the school budget lead to complete uncertainty.

In the budget to be announced by the federal government in May, education expenditure may be as high as several billion Australian dollars, but this figure will only be marked with "*" for reference only.

Negotiations between the state government and the federal government have been postponed and will be held in June. At present, it is obvious that government funding will not increase significantly.

The "Gunski Plan" was originally a plan aimed at increasing the educational funds of governments at all levels, but at present, this goal has been impossible to achieve. However, the "Gonsky Plan" still has a chance as a tool to redistribute education funds.

If all parties must reach a compromise, then first of all, all parties must agree with the fact that some private schools have exceeded the public financial allocation.

Imagine if hospitals adopt the same distribution method. Then private hospitals on the North Shore can not only arrange patients to stay in private suites, but also get millions of government grants every year. In contrast, hospitals in Blacktown have to treat patients in the aisles.

Private schools have not invested public funds in infrastructure. Many economists point out that the funds for textbooks have been cut or invested in other fields. Such as school bands, swimming pools, etc.

Tanya Plibersek, spokeswoman for shadow cabinet education affairs, said: In fact, there is still a funding gap of 30 billion pounds in Australia's education budget.

In other words, the allocation mentioned in the Niu Yi government budget can be said to be 9 Australian dollars. It will not fundamentally change the current unfair distribution of educational resources in Australia. It can only be said that the symbolic significance brought about by it will promote the discussion of equality of funds.

Australia at the Crossroads

Every child, whether they come from a family whose family income is three times higher than the average income in Australia, from a family that has been unemployed for many years, or from a refugee family in a new non-English-speaking country; They should all enjoy educational opportunities and government support, and be able to give full play to their potential.

Poverty has become the "original sin" of education in Australia. How can we talk about fair competition?

So, what is the solution?

Every school (not the whole education system) must evaluate the needs according to the unified standards throughout Australia.

Existing data resources can meet this requirement. All kinds of schools should count the total demand from bottom to top as the sum of their educational needs.

The funds of the federal and state governments need to be summarized, and then the COAG Education Committee of the Australian Government Committee decides to allocate them according to their needs.

The school resource allocation standard drawn up in the Gunski Plan should have done this. However, the current resource allocation standards are obviously not good. Both the federal and state governments must be responsible for public and private schools.

Coag(Australia n Governments) Parliament decides the proportion of total funds that governments at all levels can undertake.

Available funds must be allocated according to needs. In view of the fact that private schools can completely meet the standards of school resources in terms of tuition fees and investment income, a more realistic evaluation system should be established. Give schools with reduced public subsidies enough transition time.

As a condition of obtaining public financial subsidies, the charging level of private schools must reach the upper limit (hierarchical calculation).

Although these funds can temporarily alleviate the "urgent need" of disadvantaged schools. But in the longer term, the strategic planning of the fund is still missing. According to the current education funding system, a considerable number of disadvantaged schools with funding gaps will still give way to other schools. The total expenditure on education will continue to increase, and our social education gradient has not changed at all.

Nothing has been achieved except continuing to provide funds for aristocratic private schools with less than 5% students.

Although it will save a considerable income of 900 million Australian dollars every year, the root cause of the problem has not been solved. Only a strategic distribution system that allocates funds according to needs, regardless of public or private interests, is what Australia really needs.

At present, Australia seems to have reached a crossroads.

Is it to let quality education continue to be a symbol of social status? Or do our political masters boldly choose to proceed from Australia's long-term interests and ensure that education becomes a public welfare undertaking that benefits everyone?

Anxiety of middle-class Chinese parents in Australia

It has long been pointed out that the Western-style quality education we advocate is only an exam-oriented education in a wider scope. Children there need to master more knowledge and skills than we do, and these knowledge and skills need the support of family strength.

In Australia, poverty has become the original sin of education. How can we talk about fair competition?

China's education is to group students through explicit examinations, while western education actually completes social stratification through a relaxed process.

Public schools only provide limited basic education. If you want to become an elite, you must buy it from the market, and those who can't afford it will naturally be eliminated.

After school in Australia at 3 o'clock, most children in China carry schoolbags and take musical instruments to various remedial classes. Most parents in China believe that it is almost impossible for a child who doesn't attend remedial classes, spend a lot of money to learn talents and participate in social activities to enrich his resume.

Australian children can indeed have a happy primary and secondary school, but if they want to become social elites in the future, they need more self-discipline, more extracurricular tutoring and more social resources besides public education.

Paying attention to education is not the paranoia of middle-class parents in Asia, but the necessity of social development;

The barriers to skills and knowledge required for high-paying jobs are increasing, and the progress of technology is also accelerating the reshuffle and differentiation of classes. It is normal for intellectuals to crush the bottom, and maintaining a strong enough learning ability is the key to staying in this class.

In fact, it is easier for Australian parents to give up. In fact, most people in Australia work after graduating from high school, or go to community colleges to learn some applied skills. Another small number of people's interests have been well taken care of, their horizons have been expanded and they have become top students.

For Australians, as long as the elite is strong enough, the whole of Australia can move on. As for their basic skills as supermarket cashiers, truck drivers, workers and farmers, what does it matter?

The anxiety of the Australian Chinese middle class about their children's education stems from the insecurity of their own status, which is a worldwide phenomenon. Middle classes all over the world are insecure, and they are afraid that they will fall behind one day. East Asian societies attach great importance to children's education, such as China, Japan and South Korea. Everyone likes to compare children's grades, and fierce competition magnifies people's anxiety.

This is a typical collective action dilemma. "Kindergarten War", "School Choice War" and "Family Education War", the burden of schoolwork is so heavy that children have no childhood. These problems are all in the eyes of parents. Everyone knows that it is not normal for children to rush to cram school, but no one wants to quit voluntarily. If I quit and others don't quit, won't my children lose?

In addition, for Chinese, there is often a "glass sandwich" in the Australian workplace, and local whites often dominate key positions in the workplace.

Social stratification is becoming more and more exquisite, and education investment is considered as an important way for the middle class to make progress. Most middle-class people in China are eager to create a passage to the upper class or a protective safety net for their children.

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The society develops rapidly, but because of Matthew effect, the stronger the strong, the weaker the weak, and the resources and wealth are only gathered by a few people.

One thing needs to be clarified. Whenever there is a nation, there will be classes, and there will be differences between classes. Because ethnic groups need to distribute benefits. The division of classes is essentially the distribution of power, wealth and wisdom.

The higher the quality of education, the more likely it is to be a luxury, which not every child can enjoy.

We have to face the reality that there are always limited high-quality educational resources in China and Australia.

Poverty has become the "original sin" of education. If you have no money, don't talk about fair competition.