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Private school funding increased twice as much as public schools’ in decade after Gonski, data shows
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I wonder what happened in that decade that caused this bias against public schools /s
The article summarises things quite well.
Firstly, for the sake of political convenience the Gillard government promised that no private school would lose funding, despite them being overfunded. This meant that rather than redirecting spending to where it was needed, a whole bunch of extra money would need to be found for public schools.
Secondly, the Abbott and Turnbull governments cancelled scheduled increases to public schools and then capped the Commonwealth's future contributions, pushing the burden onto the states.
Then Morrison promised increased funding for private schools but not public schools.
Christian private schools specifically
You’re making it sound as if it wasn’t expected
For those that think minority Labor governments are desirable, this shit show is a prime example of why it is not. The media worked overtime to bring down a weak Labor government.
That promise wasn't minority Labor, that was Labor making a stupid promise so they wouldn't have a public fight over cutting funding to private schools. Then the following decade made the situation catastrophically worse.
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Technically Labor has a majority government as it has 78 seats of 151 in the House of Representatives. This house picks who holds government.
Labor requires the Senate to pass its legislation - become law. It needs the votes of all Green senators and those of 2 independents or alternative the Libs/NP to do this. So it can play the two groups against each other.
So as a Labor supporter I somehow have to apologise for wanting a majority government but you guys sleep like babies through 3 terms of the worst Coalition governments in history? The double standard is astounding.
Good luck to the Greens vote at next election. Looks like to be a bloodbath for you guys.
Even 300k homes promise is knowingly setting the government to fail. Builders can't even manage their current portfolios of homes without the Greens insisting on that may homes being shoe-horned into the market.
But, I expect the Greens already know this, but are just sniping for a sound bite.
No you aren't seeing 1m homes being built with or without the Greens in government. This is an obvious lie to pretty much everyone except the Greens apparently.
Building homes requires builders and materials to build the homes, we don't have enough of either to build 1m homes within the 3 years of a term.
The Greens keep trying to claim they could or would but physics and logistics disagree, common sense really, common for most people apparently.
No, you're seeing the LNP in government and funding cut from health, education, and housing.
Kinda forgetting that the ALP was already on the nose by that stage, hence why they lost enough votes to be pushed into a minority government in the first place. The handling of CPRS didn't reflect well on Labor to a number of people and the spill made it all considerably worse, hence why the big talking point in the media during the time immediately before the 2010 election was "Labor instability".
In short...The media will try to make a shitstorm out of absolutely anything a Labor government does, doesn't do or whatever the media thinks people will believe they might do. Doesn't matter if Labor tries the softy softy approach they're using now or if they go in so hard that even Bandt asks them to slow down, they'll have a media attempting to start a campaign against them regardless.
Well to be fair, it is the states which fund public schools.
EDIT to clarify: the state governments fund 80% of public education, and the federal government funds 20% of both public and private education. Asking for increased funding from the Federal government sounds like bad policy because it shifts responsibility from the states, who should ultimately be responsible for public education.
There is no law or rule that says this needs to be the case. It is simply convention which can (and should) be changed.
I disagree ... splitting the funding between state and federal leads to poor outcomes, as occurs in health.
Rather than having two systems at odds with each other, and which encourage blame shifting, it would be better if only one were responsible.
Sure, education should be properly funded, but increasing federal funding will only lead to confusion.
I guess we’ll never know. Some of life’s great mysteries.
Donations from Catholics to pollies demanding unequal treatment.
Watching Australia effectively privatising education from the ground up is completely infuriating.
Private schools should receive little to no public funding. This is literally why they charge parents tens of thousands per child per year. All this public money being shovelled at private schools has achieved nothing more than these schools becoming massive profit engines. They waste insane amounts of PUBLIC MONEY on Hogwarts libraries or Olympic swimming pools and their principals earn million dollar salaries.
And yet, despite the absurd amount of your taxpayer dollars being stuffed into the pockets of CEO principals and churches that lobby against your rights (despite only 17% of Australians being actively religious) private schools are a giant scam. Because you cannot buy your child a better educational or life outcome by sending them to a private school. It is just that simple.
Decades of evidence shows these schools give no real educational advantage when you control for socio-economic status. Rich, privileged kids do better in school on average, and private schools merely take the credit for what would have happened anyway, in any other school. This is also why kids who attend public schools in wealthy areas do as well or better than kids in the same income brackets attending private schools. You can confirm this yourself using NAPLAN results every year.
Here's just one example discussing this evidence. (One highlight: Seven studies of public and private school results on national and international tests in Australia have been published in the last five years. Six of them show no statistically significant differences between the results of public, Catholic and Independent schools - it does go on to explain why the final study was incredibly flawed.)
If your impulse is to say to yourself 'well who cares if they don't get a better education, I send my kids to private school for the networking!' then what you're really saying is you don't want your children mixing with the poor, which is an incredibly shitty attitude. Regardless, taxpayers should not have to subsidise your elitism.
And ironically, if you're a Christian, supporting the behaviour and elitism of these schools is also distinctly unchristian; would Jesus really have approved of schools that cater only to the rich? That set their fees in the tens of thousands, and pay their principals millions while other children cannot afford shoes? That discriminate against the poor, LGBT students, people who do not adhere their bigotry etc. If you think these schools are representative of actual Christian values, then you're not Christian - you're a modern day Pharisee.
Furthermore, just to be clear, if you still think private schools are better/nicer - imagine what our public schools could become if we actually fund them properly.
TLDR: Funding to private schools should be gutted and that money should be redirected back into public schools where it belongs. Elitist schools in the absence of being showered with truckloads of public money will be absolutely fine, like they were a a decade or so ago, before we enabled them ratcheting their grift up to the stratosphere.
I find most Australians are unaware that the way our government funds private schooling is a huge outlier, globally. In almost every other country, private school get little to no government funding. Are children in the UK, USA, Germany etc, somehow disadvantaged cause they attended public schools? Of course not.
Whenever I tell people that the data is very clear that it makes no difference compared to income and education level of the parents, they always have a story about why it's different for little johnny.
Yeah, he is friends with rich kids and will have a leg up in life when they start their own companies.
That also makes no difference, as the data convincingly demonstrates that little Johnny still does just fine when he goes to ShitWeasel Public.
Basically, if your parents are highly educated, you will always do fine. Income is a close second. Rich kids stay rich regardless of school, and poor kids stay poor.
Exactly. Rich parents just give their kids a job in their company/companies. Education doesn't really matter.
I was poor af but privately educated. Some catholic schools will take on plenty of us "get yourself weetbix for dinner" types. Most of my year group are tradies, council workers, REAs and APS. Nobody came out of there using daddy's money to found a company, except some of the tradies ironically.
Oh yeah, there are a lot of more regular level private schools in reality, was more talking about the super expensive elite ones. Everyone forgets the former exist in these threads.
Why should the taxpayer fund your parents choice to send you to a school based on religion?
Sad fact for me is often private schools have much worse culture than public schools for this reason. I was bullied all through my school days, especially so at the private high school I went to, one of the top in the city. Prided itself on being this almost mini-university in stature while the culture of the students and staff was horrible. A kid left the school cause he was forced out by religious peers for being gay and the school did nothing, being religious itself and subtly letting gay staff go. Insisted on devotion wasting an hour out of our study time, given over to pointless church services that often taught us little and was a boring formality. I remember once getting in trouble for reading a book required for my study during the devotion because I had the gall to actually do something useful with my time.
And the students were all these bratty rich kids and notably the ones bullied (like me whose parents wasted god knows how much money we could've used in the $6000 per semester costs believing the 'prestigious private school' lie these schools market) were the not as well off students, who simply didn't move in the same circles and didn't live in that rich bubble, and were ripe for being shunned as outsiders.
Fuck private schools. I sorely wish I'd gone to the public school across the road, not have a uniform, and be able to mix with students from all walks of life instead of fighting off the sniping and gossip and outright hatred of rich kids because where I came from didn't fit in with their bullshit entitlement and parents who gifted them a porsche for any milestone in life. I wish government wouldn't give these ridiculous money sinks in the education system a dime.
Private school does matter according to the most comprehensive studies available. it predicts +7 enter points on average after adjusting for socio economic status. It’s a huge problem, and this is even more reason funding should be redirected to public schools because we can’t have equality of outcomes if we don’t. https://theconversation.com/private-catholic-schools-do-add-value-to-students-results-42543
That is a rather misleading summary of the article which is very clearly and specifically dealing with ATAR scores for Victorian high school students. It's also telling the author doesn't mention the large disparity in "special accommodations" between private schools and public. Socio-economic is only one axes to correct for.
There are much bigger studies that show minimal difference.
A more accurate summary of your article is that there is some evidence private schools give students higher university entrance exams results. This does not surprise me; however if you look at the results of children at university, and income levels post-graduation, they are much more static.
There's a myth of class mobility in Australia that is largely untrue for most - in both directions - except poor-but-highly-educated immigrants whose second generation children can break out of their inherited demography.
I can’t find anything online but I’ve heard from my friends who go to private schools that below average students get a lot of pressure from teachers to drop down to accredited in order to keep the average ATAR high. Apparently it happens a lot in Brindabella Christian College and Radford.
15 year old’s Pisa reading outcomes aren’t the primary goal of secondary education, university entrance and university success are (at least, that’s what I care about for my kids). On both of these dimensions private schools do better than public schools, even accounting for socio economic status and a range of other factors. That’s because they get more total resourcing. Here is another study showing the same thing. Page 22: https://www.ncsehe.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/Li-and-Dockery-Schools-SES-Final.pdf
I’m genuinely interested, do you have anything I could read showing something Different?
I went to an awful rural public school, and I have the same qualifications and experience as my coworkers who went to “fancy” private schools. I was lucky I could get out of my hometown. The advantage of private or “better” schools is that you’re average or below average, you have a much better chance at positive career outcomes (in my personal anecdotal experience). The average ones where I grew up never left, they didn’t have the support. This divide is not morally sustainable.
I don't have a source on this but have heard a few times that the kids who make it to uni from public schools massively outperform the private school kids.
The reasons I heard include that the private schools "hothouse" students with an aim for nothing other than glossy brochure friendly results to encourage new customers (parents) into the business. So rather than allowing students to follow their passions, the private schools will zero in on the subjects that return the biggest bang for buck in terms of ATAR results, and discourage or even not offer the weaker / riskier subjects.
The students then get intensive spoon feeding so they may be great at maths + physics + chemistry, but let them fend for themselves in an uni environment and they're lost.
The other part of the reason, associated with the above, is that ATARs are the be all and end all, and students aren't truly allowed or encouraged to follow their own paths. They're going to get the marks to be doctors or lawyers or other professionals, end of story. So they get hothoused, get the marks, hate the uni course and have a crisis and drop out at a higher rate than talented public school kids who were more free to forge their own paths without the constant pressure to fulfil the schools' marketing PR image.
What the studies show is that kids from public schools tend to do somewhat (not massively) better at university than kids from private schools who have the same ATAR.
This isn't surprising to me - if you go to a public school and manage to get the same ATAR as a kid who goes to a private school, despite the advantages the latter will have from their much more expensive education, then you probably have more intelligence or work ethic than that kid.
I would have agreed with this 30 years ago, however so much has changed culturally in Australia since then. There are significant numbers of public school students today who receive tutoring and coaching and are still spoonfed.
I mean, if we drop the pretenses and facades, private schools are a business that offer *exactly* this as their primary service, no?
"We'll get your kid into uni, and our name will help with your familiy's future nepotistic endeavours."
Like, perfecting the knowledge/skills is being tested is a surefire way of obtaining stonger exam scores. Providing good habits and methods of reasoning is time consuming and almost assuredly a waste of time compared to rote learning the curriculum.
Slightly controversial opinion but it is cheaper for us to have the private school system in place then simply abolishing it or getting rid of private schools. Per student state schools get around $20k and private schools get around $13k. Whether we like the system or not, getting rid of private schools would result in higher costs which I believe would ultimately lead to less money being able to be given per student.
I wish I could upvote more than once. This is educational poetry.
People refuting this comment are basically that see no evil, hear no evil monkey.
I 100% support elimination of all public funding to private schools. This means more money for underfunded public schools and special needs education.
How does it mean more money for underfunded public schools?
I hugely support more funding for public schools and the education system. And even more so for special education, which is appallingly underfunded.
I also support removing funding from non gov schools that don't need it, and what funds are given, allocate them based on need.
But the public system has huge issues itself - mostly where the need is greatest. Just because some of the non gov schools are also a shit show, doesn't mean they all are. Many of the non gov schools are fantastic and not representative of the elitist crap that plagues a small number of private schools.
So why eliminate funding to all the non gov schools, rather the ones who don't need it, or are doing a bad job? I could understand the argument if the public school system was great overall. We should be focusing on fixing the terrible schools, no matter if gov or non gov.
If all the extra funding private schools get confers zero educational benefit, then both private and public schools are vastly overfunded beyond the point of diminishing returns; we can save taxpayer money by reducing funding to public schools until we begin to establish a difference.
- Libs.
And the private schools like the one I work at which charges no fees, is non-religious and provides special education for kids who can't learn in a traditional classroom environment? We should just close and dump the special needs kids into the public system which has failed people like them for decades? The public system can't do what we do largely due to it being a monolithic system which lacks agility and takes an age to do anything differently.
Private school does matter according to the most comprehensive studies available. it predicts +7 enter points on average after adjusting for socio economic status. It’s a huge problem, and this is even more reason funding should be redirected to public schools because we can’t have equality of outcomes if we don’t. https://theconversation.com/private-catholic-schools-do-add-value-to-students-results-42543
Really well put together, thanks
You make quite the assumption that only rich kids go to private schools. There was a stack of families struggling to pay the bills at the schools my kids went to, my MIL only had 1 meal a day so she could send her kids to private schools.
You're so close to getting it, mate.
Those schools receive very little public funding. Most private/catholic schools are low fee and receive substantially less per student than public schools. The type of school that charges $30-$40k per year receives $2-$4k per student.
The average annual cost is over $30,000 in Sydney.
Government funding for private schools has increased at five times the rate of public school funding.
Many schools receive funding well above their SRS entitlement.
Private schools have received the biggest funding increases over the last decade despite demonstrating the biggest falls in educational quality.
These schools receive far more public funding than they need, require, or even benefit from.
That's for full independent schools, not all private schools. Check your facts. Catholic schools cost an average of $10k per year vs $7k for public schools in those same stats.
Because gov funding of private schools is starting from a much lower level. This is basic maths, if you increase spending from $100 to $150 per student for private that's a 50% increase while a $1,000 to $1,400 increase for public would be a lower rate of increase despite being substantially more money.
Which is coming down by 2029 to match their entitlement.
Again, rate of increase is meaningless. Also SOS is incredibly biased.
Conflating ragged-arse sectarian schools with Headmasters' Conference empires is how the latter make bank.
More insidiously the vast lump sum handed over to the Catholic sector is quite unfairly allocated between their parochial and elite campuses.
5 times the rate ? That’s not always good and can be deceptive based on your argument. Let’s say a Private school gets $1000, and the Public school gets $10,000. Now an increase comes along, the Public school gets an extra $20, but the Private school gets an extra $100, that’s 5 times the rate of the public school, but which one would you rather have ?
I'd like you to keep making up numbers to support your argument, I'm really enjoying it
I'm pretty sure the gap between private and public school funding is only about 4k per student
(funding coming from state and federal gov)
You are right that a low fee private school is generally worse off than a public school though. The tuition fee often doesn't cover the gap private /public funding
I have to ask tho, does the private school tuition fee affect the per student funding from gov?
It's actually significantly more than that.
https://www.acara.edu.au/reporting/national-report-on-schooling-in-australia/school-funding/government-recurrent-expenditure-on-government-and-non-government-schools
$20,939 per student for government vs $12,442 for non government.
Include capital expenditure and you add another $1,942 for government and $235 for non gov.
So a total of $22,881 for government and a total of $12,677 for non government schools, per student.
That's a deliberately misleading figure that includes (for govt schools only) an accounting bookkeeping entry called User Cost of Capital (UCC) valued at
10%(Edit: 8%) of the value of the land & facilities p.a.It makes a kind of general sense if you want to ask yourself, academically, "what is the economic cost of providing public schooling" and you conduct a thought experiment "what if the govt simply sold or leased out all Dept of Education real estate to the private sector and banked the money instead of providing schools?". It's a form of opportunity cost straight from an economics textbook.
But it's not an actual ongoing operating cost of running schools. It's a fictitious figure that doesn't even hit the budget. They literally don't pay a cent of this fake UCC cost. Certainly not for schools that sometimes date back over a century, on land the govt always owned. It's literally not an actual cost except in an abstract economic way.
thanks for the numbers! I must have misremembered what I read a while ago.
a gap of ~10k per student is massive. I would think the vast majority of private schools charge under 10k
“When you control for socio economic advantage”
Lol. That’s what the private schools do!! They control for that.
And not every private school is religious. Sydney Grammar, Ascham, Reddam are examples off the top of my head.
'not every' - it's like 95% or something.
No, they should receive a fair amount of funding based on socioeconomic status. Having a non government school funding system that better addresses funding by need is much more beneficial than only having government funded schools. Non government schools result in more money overall being spent on education. What is needed is a better system to allocate funding, and better controls on where that funding ends up, schools profit and so on.
Your argument is conflating issues of class inequality and education. If you stop and do some research, you will see the problematic examples you give are not representative of most of the other 1000+ non government schools in Australia. A large percentage of parents who send their kids to non government schools have a family income below the median.
The underlying issue here is class/social inequality in Australia. Which absolutely is a huge issue which needs to be addressed. It's not the only part of the issue either - the few problematic private school examples you gave represent a tiny part of all the ways the Government and our society supports inequality.
Really, you are falling for a classic trap used to maintain inequality. Get the public and private schools supporters fighting with each other, so they don't stand together against the very wealthy people and schools which are actually problematic. Those rich schools won't actually be worse off in any real way if they don't get government funding. They just don't want people to start doing anything about class/social inequality.
Treating all private schools the same and removing / severely restricting funding only makes inequality worse. Huge change is needed, but by ignoring the actual issue, you are making it less likely anything will be done about it.
its almost as if the better solution is to implement funding based on socio-economic status of schools like labour tried to 10 years ago :(
You need to realise that the literal definition of private school is "not funded by the state". We can go from there.
'Private school' is a term used by many people in in many different ways.
In Australia, we have government schools and non government schools - the latter are not administered by the government. How and from what level of government they are both funded from varies.
As intended and exactly to plan.
Honestly if I hear one more person launch into the whole argument that “private schools actually save the government money” I’m gonna flip a table
The cost per student between public and private schools is only a few thousand and considering that the private schools charge fees from the parents on top of that as well as able to "select" the most economically efficient students to teach, dumping the problem students to the public schools, it's no wonder they can afford plunge pools for their principals.
we are watching gov slowly destroying this country for good. something needs to be done to stop this insane spending of public funds to private schools.
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lnp is the most bottom. they did nothing for workers. labor did put in medicare, workers comp, annual leave etc.
The same people who argue this would never suggest that the government funds your private travel to save money on public transport…
We already do have private travel. Transurban is a private company responsible for a lot of Sydney transport.
Not sure if that example works. The government does fund the roads for you to "private travel" in both capital and maintenance costs. Also the cost of public transport is largely independent of the number of users. In fact if less people are using it, their revenue goes down, so it is more of an advantage for them to get more people to use it. The opposite is true with schools as more students means higher costs.
It's irrelevant either way though, because the issue is public schools, not private schools. The idea that we need to defund/ban private schools to fix the public system is a lie, literally all we need to do is just give the public system the funding it needs.
The government pays close to half to educate a private school student compared to a public school student. It is significantly less.
But go ahead, flip your table.
It’s like everyone ignores state Govt funding in this equation. You need to add both federal and state to get the govt funding for state schools.
Private schools get fed funding.
Why we have a federal Dept of education involved in all of this when we have state depts of education is just a failure of federation …
No one forgets it, they just don't think the federal government should be disproportionately funding private schools.
Literally ignores this fact in the second part of the sentence
The debate is about government funding of private vs public schools. But you are only focusing on one part of government. Instead of the overall funding the schools get.
Even after you take into account state funding, public school students are still receiving ~50% more than their independent counterparts
[citation needed]
Anything I find says it is nowhere near 'half' and is actually only a little less than public.
From my other comment:
https://www.acara.edu.au/reporting/national-report-on-schooling-in-australia/school-funding/government-recurrent-expenditure-on-government-and-non-government-schools
$20,939 per student for government vs $12,442 for non government.
Include capital expenditure and you add another $1,942 for government and $235 for non gov.
So a total of $22,881 for government and a total of $12,677 for non government schools, per student
Cheers.
Sure, plus they pass all the expensive students onto the public system and make it even more troubled.
Why do they even fund them at all...
I thought that was the whole point of them being ‘private’?
Because if you so t give money to the rich then they scream “CLASS WARFARE!”
Like Abe Simpson, “they didn’t earn it, they don’t need it, but if you miss one payment they will raise hell!”
Because not all private schools are $10,000 a year snob fests. Plenty of them charge roughly as much as public schools to for parental contributions and are independent simply so that they have more control over their curriculum. Those are the schools which typically get the bulk of the money under the Gonski scheme (at least, they're supposed to be).
The REAL issue is that the snobbish private schools have the resources to go after each and every public grant that is available, whilst all the other schools don't.
So they end up skewing the figures because even though they (should) get almost no money on a per student basis, they get all the extra money that the government trots out for sporting facilities and new buildings and such, because they can effort to hire staff who's sole purpose is to get as much grant money as possible. Or because they have the extra money to start programs that will then invite extra government contributions, eg the government says they give funding for schools with environmental sustainability programs, but public schools don't have the cash on hand to start a new program, so only private schools that can afford the extra outlay at first get the extra money.
So it's a bit more complicated than just cutting funding for all independent schools, because there are at least some that legitimately deserve the money, but the system is clearly being gamed by schools that don't deserve it.
Zero private schools charge that little because that amount is zero dollars required in public schools.
I was referring to voluntary contributions https://www.vic.gov.au/school-costs-and-fees
Which pretty much anyone who isn't an asshole or legitimately broke pays, since you're basically taking money from your kid's education otherwise. I'm pretty sure you also have to pay if you want to go to a public school outside of your catchment zone.
So zero.
Zero private schools with that low a fee.
Unless you can provide an example of course.
Bc that’s where they send their kids and they want their kids to have the best
Middle class welfare, the electoral bribe of the Howard years, was very successful in keeping the Coalition in power. That's why.
There's a reason why it comes packaged in Blue.
Why is Australia the only developed country that "needs" the private sector to do this?
Except if all rich and politically connected people were required to send thier kids public, then there would be increased taxes and school funding tabled and voted on in days.
Improving school quality for all.
Because people want to provide schooling in varied ways. So rather than trying to accommodate those varied ways, the Gov lets those groups do it themselves, as long as they meet specific specific rules and regulations, teacher accreditation and so on.
Simplified, the Government says, hey if you want this extra freedom, you have to kick in some of your own money. Keep in mind most non government schools are nothing like the few that always pop up in the news. There are major problems with the system used to allocate funding (and don't even get me started on the political issues), but many non government schools are great for everyone involved, and are not focused on catering to the ultra rich.
Non government schools end up as basically a voluntary tax on parents who want a specific education experience for their children. That tax ranges from almost nothing, through to a lot. The government wins because overall they pay less per student for education, and people are not mad at them for restricting freedoms too much. The people sending kids to non gov schools win because they can pay extra towards what they personally value in education.
It needs to be implemented much better, but having non government schools is not an issue in of itself.
Where it because problematic is because of the class inequality issue - where the wealthier have an undue amount of influence on politics and society. That class inequality results in a tiny fraction of the non government schools being supported by very very wealthy parents, so they have more than enough money even without any funding, and spend it in lavish ways. Like most things in society (actual taxes often included), the cost of private school for the wealthy is a much smaller percentage of their total income/net worth compared to those who are less wealthy. That issue extends all the way down to the least wealthy people.
But it is important to remember those ultra rich schools don't represent the rest of the non government schools. The funding system is broken, and still gives government money to schools for students with parents above a certain socio economic status. That needs to be addressed, but the actual concept of non government schools is not inherently problematic if funding (and other factors) are done well.
You also get the similar issues (though to a lesser extent) at public schools in areas with richer parents. And the same underlying issues when you compare between schools (government and non government) with predominately middle class parents, and those with poorer parents.
The actual issue here is class inequality. Funnily enough, many of the wealthy would much prefer the less wealthy to fight amongst themselves over these issues, rather than having them stand together and actually create change.
Private school fees are a tax... man that's some mental gymnastics right there.
tax deduction if they are structured under a family trust. only rich people get this tax deduction.
"basically a voluntary tax" is an analogy, not an actual tax.
Another analogy that might help your understanding would be to consider school funding like a discount. Government schools give the parents a 100% discount on the education costs. Non government schools give a varied discount, which is less than 100%.
The ultra wealthy don't care about the discount, as it is a tiny fraction of their income. The vast majority of parents sending kids to non government schools do care about the discount, as it is a significant portion of their income.
This same underlying concept is used by some countries when handing out speeding fines. The fines are income / net worth based, because if you fine everyone the same amount (like we do in Australia) then the fine has a much larger impact on less wealthy people.
For non government schools, we need to make change that most impacts those most able to afford it.
I disagree on a fundamental level with thinking about it this way. Education is a human right, this is not an expected expense that is being discounted, education is not a mandatory cost of raising children. Education should be fair, and freely available, with all children receiving the same quality of education regardless of how rich their families are. If parents want to remove their child from this system, and educate them privately, then it should be completely at the expense of the parents. These private schools should be just that, private, and they should be privately funded.
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No, I have not argued that.
The issue with school funding is a symptom of class inequality and removing it does not fix the underlying issue. Class inequality is society wide, and separate action is needed to solve it.
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They do, through public schools, private schools are a private option for patents who don't want a public education.
That's why there should be a school voucher system
Cut it all.
Private schools are a choice. If you want to take advantage of the tax you pay - send them public.
I’m sick of better-off people being able to make decisions about private anything (school, healthcare) and then whining that they still have to pay taxes. Greedy cunts.
This argument doesn't work, because the rich already live in areas with good schools. So banning or defunding private schools doesn't actually change the underlying inequality.
They just need to actually follow the fucking Gonski system and allocate funds based non needs. We've had governments arbitrarily decide that they aren't allowed to fund the public system and instead have just funded the private system whilst leaving the public to the states, but they can just stop doing that and give the money to the public system when needed.
the rich will always whine about paying taxes. their ideal world is to pay no tax and enjoying everything the low n middle class taxes paid for.
Probably forgot to take the second one.
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march bow longing humor yam ludicrous illegal water elastic edge
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Ban all private schools. The countries that did found the rich fucks made sure the public schools were so good they now lead the world
Ditto for private health pls
I've thought about this. I went myself to a state school in a decent neighbourhood, I did a teaching prac at a state school in a low socioeconomic area and the difference between student behaviour was night and day. Considering with the current housing market I can only afford to by in cheaper areas I have considered sending any children we have to low-tier private schools merely to filter out problem students. If you ban private schooling altogether I suspect you'll find state schools in affluent catchment areas will probably be very well managed and donated to and people who can't afford $2 million houses are stuck giving their children a subpar education.
You don't think that hasn't been solved elsewhere? Finland, you know, leaders in educational outcomes, ban cash donations to individual schools. You can donate to the national education budget all you want, it will be equitably distributed.
I like
But where will all the pirates go?!
Unless you also force states to increase their funding for public schools, banning private schools will accomplish nothing.
By all means, reduce private school funding, but making private schools worse won't magically make public schools better. The rich will just move to areas with good public schools and the poors will be just as fucked as they were before.
Yeah. states will be forced to increase funding.
Because all the rich and politically connected people will start demanding it.
You do know public schools are funded as per need not per student right?
Selective schools with well behaved power students get less dollars per student because they need less per student. Small rural schools get a higher per student amount because of the extra expense of teaching smaller communities. Schools with dedicated special needs units get more than schools without.
No, they won't. They won't be forced to do anything, that's the point. The rich and connected people live in suburbs that already have good schools and are funded by voluntary contributions. Seriously, the public schools in the wealthier suburbs are literally more elitist and better funded than the majority of private schools.
Yes, because there definitely isn't any kind of inequality between schools in wealthy areas and in poor areas. They all receive the same amount of funding in the end. For sure.
This.
If you can’t opt out if a system, then you make sure the system if very good.
This is why we should have conscription to the army. If everyone risked having to serve if we went to war, then we wouldn’t end up in bullshit wars.
my dude we had a draft for Vietnam, that is not a good comparison lol
Do you think we would have ended up in Afghanistan or Iraq if the average voter could have been sent there?
You've got the right spirit but fuck thats a terrible take, conscription is fucking monstrous
The ONLY way this is possible to implement is if the government buys out the private schools. The alternative of building the additional public capacity would take decades and likely cost more than buying them out in the long run anyway.
That's fine on the face of it, but the problem is that buying them out would probably cost somewhere in the order of $25 billion, potentially a lot more. To put that in perspective, it would add about $500 to the tax bill of every tax payer annually, which would be a tough pill to swallow.
I would argue it's worth it, but it's a HUGELY risky thing for a polly to suggest.
Edit: Sure down vote me, but at least reply with your magic solution for how to 'Ban all private schools' if you're going to.
The government could just ban private schools outright - but if done without any other action that would leave a massive shortage of schools, and possibly leave the government vulnerable to legal action from the loss of income in those businesses. So that would be bad. ... But that doesn't mean buying them out is the 'only' way. Actions can be taken gradually. The first and most obvious action is to simply decrease the amount of money the government gives the private schools. What to do next would benefit from some expert planning and analysis, but its easy to spit-ball some ideas - such as redirecting that money towards building new schools, or possibly strategically buying out existing private schools.
I personally have no problem with fully self-funded private schools. So after the government funding is cut, I'd be happy enough. But if you really wanted to go on to ban them, I guess the next intermediate step would be to reduce the ways schools can receive and spend their money.
Sure, but that wasn't what the person I was replying to had suggested. Their comment was simply 'Ban all private schools' and my reply was about how that could be achieved.
Even a phased decrease in funding doesn't 'solve' the problem though. What it will do is a result in a gradual shift of a large number of students from the private to the public system, which would need significant new builds to support them.
Some back of the envelope numbers. If you reduced government spending to private schools by 10% of the current amount per year for 5 years (ie after 5 years the funding amount is half what it is today), then cumulatively you'll have saved roughly $9.6 billion over 5 years (Based on the current funding level of $10k per private student per year from the federal government).
Now it's estimated that just to build the infrastructure required for all students in Australia would cost around $40 billion (See the private education review report that took place in 2021), and this is excluding the ongoing maintenance and additional teaching salaries. Even assuming you can build out that infrastructure in 5 years, if more than 25% of students move from private to public schools as a result of you removing half the funding, then the government is worse off from a budgetary position. And again, this is EXCLUDING the costs of the additional teaching staff, it's JUST infrastructure.
Even the most conservative rough numbers of this show that it would require additional funding from the government. I know this is unpopular in this sub, but it truly seems like everyone wants to just bury their heads in the sand and throw around comments like 'Ban all private schools' without even given 2 thoughts as to how that might work out.
This is just funding too. It doesnt include all the grants and benefits that private schools have the ability to apply for but public schools are overworked/understaffed and cant apply for. If you add them it gets even more extreme.
A deal was struck with the Catholic system and other private schools – which were found to be overfunded at the time – to maintain their revenue from government.
I know it was a minority government at the time but goddamn was an opportunity missed. It’s a shame that we don’t value state education as much as places like Finland and Sweden and still put public funds into private schools. Granted the education budget would be massive if they didn’t exist but the top private schools in Australia are freaking loaded with cash. Be interesting to see a private school’s budget how they spend the funds given to them.
So much of the Gillard government was an opportunity missed.
You're underestimating the influence the catholic church has in the Labor party if you think it was because they were a minority government. The Catholics are one one the founding factions of Labor.
Things my public school currently can't afford:
Relief teachers for ~50% of the absences each day. We have to split those classes so every other teacher in that year level gets an extra 4-6 students that day (and no tables or chairs for them)
Proper repairs to our chronic roof leaks. We get the worst areas patched up once a year or so, but every big downpour ends up in maybe 4 classrooms flooded. We have lots of issues with mould. Once I moved a bookshelf and found mushrooms. Some colleagues tried to file a workcover claim for chronic health issues but weren't able to prove it was due to the black mould.
Photocopying. We are told to think very carefully about what we print and to get kids to copy down from the board as much as possible (even though this is largely a waste of their learning time). You need to trade your first born to print in colour.
Getting the drainage issue fixed that causes the area outside my classroom (where my students leave their bags each morning) to be a bog from April to October.
Insulation for any of the 'portable' classrooms that have been there for 10 years.
Replacements for dodgy ACs and heaters. If it's anything more than new batteries in the remote it's not happening.
Professional development. Back when I started my career it was common for to go to professional development sessions where you would learn about research-based approaches to teaching numeracy or managing childhood anxiety or better supporting students with ADHD. This involved the cost of your admission and a CRT to take your classes in your absence. This never happens anymore. Now the only PD happens on curriculum days and is whole-school (so not tailored to your individual needs and the needs of your particular students) and is usually something fluffy like having someone tell you to draw your passion for teaching and then sharing your artwork with everyone else (probably because these kinds of facilitators are useless and cheap)
Proper support for students with disabilities and different learning needs. You only get maybe 1% of students qualifying for the Program for Students with Disabilities that provides $$ for integration aides. But about 10% of kids have something going on- ASD, ADHD, auditory processing issues, dyslexia, conduct disorders. My school used to try to borrow money from other areas of the budget to provide support for the most needy of these kids (and their overstretched teachers) but this is getting harder and harder to do. The result is much poorer educational outcomes for not only these kids but their classmates because they can cause many, many disruptions.
If a teacher is sick then they are funded fully by the department. Sounds like your school is not replacing sick teachers and using the funding elsewhere. I’d be speaking to your union rep about this.
At what point are people not going to understand that the wealthy are in all the positions of power/decision making, and they will make decisions that will benefit them, their friends, and their children.
But it doesn't have to be that way. We can vote for representatives who advocate for less wealthy people. And in Australia we are fortunate enough to have preferential votings - so there is no risk of 'wasting' your vote. We can confidently put major parties way way down the list, and put some better representatives at the top.
This a fucking national disgrace, and it needs much more attention.
We're fortunate to be a wealthy country, but all the wealth is being siphoned to the wealthy.
Lucky we have a progressive Labor government at the reigns at last, surely they will be working hard to rectify the situation (as I'm sure most of their own children don't go to a private school). /s
Private schools and private health insurance should not receive government funding. Simples.
I remember when I found out my local member was sending his kids to catholic schools it pissed me off so bad especially as he really acts like he’s all about equality and fairness. As long as politicians benefit from the system it won’t change
As a volunteer for Primary Ethics, the state of public schools today disgust me.
The Libs and Labor are a fucking disgrace to this once great nation.
We are really heading down the American route.
Public funding should be for schools that accept all public students.
But I guess that the Rhite Whinge policy of starving pupils of a good education has greater benefits to the clique than having a whole bunch of critical thinkers out there, understanding 'money' and the law while harassing politicians and big business owners who do the wrong thing
Private schools shouldnt recieve a single cent of public funding.
If you want to start a private pool, or a privqte library, you shouldnt get funding from the public.
We provide public services for everyone to use. If you want more/better/different pay for it out of your own pocket.
This whole article is a master piece in spin. For all the facts and figures they never once state how much each school (private vs public) get per student from government.
The reason they don’t state that is probably because it appears to be the same.
Private schools used to be cheaper for the state government, so the governments seemed to have a perverse incentive to push people into private schools which actually reduced there spending. Now that has dried up and and the schools are getting the same amount.
The real problem is the lower end private schools will just reject students that are too much work, leaving them for the public system. This is why equal funding doesn’t work as students are not equal.
Also the public system is extremely bloated. I viewed a public school and private school that is only $80/wk the gov website says gov funding is identical.
Yet the private school is basically off the chart better in almost every way. The private school is 100% transparent where every cent goes from everyone’s pay down to the fuel for the buses. Every person involved in school works on site.
The public school however is a black hole of education department insanity. Public schools are now spending $400,000 per year per class, the teacher is lucky to get $70k. Where does the other $300k+ go? It seems to go significantly to the absurd number of white collar administration jobs that public education departments, and the bloated contracts, which private schools don’t have.
If the average punter in australia was asked to pay the $270/wk per student the gov spending on public schools, there would be riots in the streets.
I go to a private school and they really had some of there priorities in the wrong places. My school has a massive pipe organ that I believe was partially funded by the church and the rest payed by the school. I assume some of that came from the government. I have heard it played an entire 11 times, maybe even less than that. Multiple buildings in my school have also received funding from the government going into the 10s or 100s of thousands. That should be going into the public system. My mum is a teacher at a public school and my dad used to teach and boy do they need the money. My moms school and teaching space is full of asbestos and the roofs are leaking. Private schools shouldn’t receive funding from the government.
Why do we as the people not get more of a direct say in this shit beside from just vote better? I still can't understand why that's an acceptable answer coz even if you do vote someone in they can still go ahead and do whatever they want anyways
The state governments are the major culprits. Just look at how little they have increased their funding in percentage terms. WA and NT have actually decreased. Criminal.
Presenting this as "percentage increase" is pointless without the dollar figure.
If private schools previously got $10 and public got $100 the increase would be $3 and $17 respectively....
You are all getting baited by The Guardian.
I agree. The whole debate is far more complex than a couple of graphs. Here in Queensland, independent school enrolments grew from 110k in 2011 to 135k in 2021. I don't see that mentioned anywhere.
Yes, I'm naturally suspicious of context-free data like "percentage increase" or "rate of % increase".
However, as the article also states:
As long as that is true, and private schools are overfunded w.r.t. the SRS and govt schools are underfunded, we should be able to agree that the increases are going in the wrong direction; to the precisely wrong sector. Regardless of percentages, it's arse-backwards at the moment.
98% certainly sounds concerning.
But again, what is the actual recommended figure and how much are they off by?
I'm not trying to say there isn't a problem, It's just that this article gives me no real indication of the scale of what is happening.
There's so much noise in this area (seems to be a new spate of articles because of some recent data release). I was trying to find a recent article that had figures like public schools on average are getting 90% of SRS vs 110% of SRS for private.
Or 80-120. I can't say because I can't find it now. But from memory it's around that 90% vs 110% mark.
The difficulty with the SRS is that it's based on all kinds of factors, it's not a simple "cost per student average".
The reason is quite clear when you think about it. Exactly like telcos, energy companies, supermarkets, couriers, and just about any business, the most efficient place to set up shop is in our major cities. So that's where the private schools overwhelmingly are. And they get to be big. The top private schools in Sydney are easily around 1000 high school kids each. Plenty of available teachers, easy to cover planned & unplanned leave without permanently carrying surplus teachers, and resources like gyms and computer rooms etc can be shared among many students.
But the govt has an obligation to provide education wherever people live, which means running much less efficient, smaller schools in rural & regional areas that the privates won't touch. Because why would they? They're expensive to run for various reasons, you don't get efficiencies of scale, and you don't have a handy readymade market of willing parents.
Everyone ready to be whipped up into a Monday morning internet frenzy?
so when’s the peaceful revolution?
in other news, water is wet
To be fair, that was because PwC told us to do that. Or was it Deloittes?
Mates filling mates pockets. There is no shame in this country.
Time to bring public funding in line with private
This is fucked up. We need to get private schools removed from government funding.
This is why in another 10-20years this country will have a class system to rival the UK. First question you'll be asked is "where'd you go to school"
Just as John Howard desired and Spott Morrison enforced.
Private means owner pays. Fuck me time for a system overhaul and royal commission
Why are private schools being funded? Isn't that why overpaid parents pay them?
This thread is going to be predictable.
The one thing that never comes up is the private primary school in a remote area or the poorest of suburbs where most parents don't pay any fees because they can't are lumped in with the fucking absolute joke private school that charges tens of thousands and gets money for a new polo field.
There's private and there's private.
And people are bitching saying if people mention that the private sector saves the government money they'll lose their minds. Well guess what? They do. If private schools closed tomorrow the government cannot pick up the can on that. Lose your mind if you will but that's the facts.
And I know one family who were facing homelessness and couldn't afford the couple of hundred in fees (after the pensioner discount) and the uniform costs in a metro area at a public school. Best they were offered was a payment plan. They moved to a Catholic school in a more disadvantaged suburb and the school waived the fees all together and supplied them with the uniforms as per strict uniform policy. Bonus assistance finding a house. So yeah.
And anyone who doesn't support a strong public school sector is not appreciating the profound benifits of an educated society. FOR EVERYONE.
But public schools need to get their shit sorted in high schools with absolutely feral students and disempowered teachers. Thread after thread on that.
Another bonus of private schools, depending on your parenting standards, is private schools are quick to expel and look at past history for enrolment. The shit head kid who thinks it's all good to attack or disrespect a teacher and the parents who think that's the teachers fault are FAR less likely to be giving your kid shit at a private school. They fuck them off quick. So there's that.
I think schools should be funded based on need. Private or public.
And the private schools that are charging tens of thousands get nothing. Zero. Buy your own fucking pool. And if you're a wanky private boys school maybe some social equity classes would be a better investment.
That perk for private schools to be selective about enrollments only concentrates disadvantage in underfunded public schools. Which then reinforces the idea that public schools are more dangerous.
Yeah see here's the problem. I made it very clear that unfunded public schools are a problem. The point being they shouldn't be underfunded.
And being selective about allowing violence or antisocial behaviour in a school really shouldn't be a thing. In any school.
You've literally reinforced my point about public schools needing to be tougher on that shit.
I know a Catholic school with loads of people of other faiths, transgender students, special needs kids, etc. And there's a waiting list a mile long. Two other public high schools in walking distance, one being across the road. It's an exodus for students who have copped shit at other schools. And the school rates very well for academic outcomes and has sports teams that are ranked very highly. Fees are the base rate for Catholic schools. So not remotely charging tens of thousands. Not that type of private school.
Why? The Catholic school won't accept disrespect of teachers and is hard line about bullying. Long list of expulsions. Sets the known standard. Meet it or leave. Fuck around and find out.
And over 20% of the school cohort pay ZERO fees.
It's located in the poorest area in that state.
There's private and there's private.
As you say, there's private and there's private, and most people probably don't realise that there's a wide gulf between the Catholic system and the Anglican and other "independent" schools. Historically, the Catholic system has lagged because, well... only the Irish and other immigrants went to those schools.
Not to excuse the current state of affairs, but there's some more context for why the people working in the Catholic system might be averse to funding cuts, deserved or otherwise.
I went to private schools in the north of Adelaide (very poor area) my primary school was the size of 200 in total, my secondary was much larger at around 2000.
I very much agree with your prediction that people don't really understand the difference between private schools in different areas.
In my secondary school we had a special learning program because the school had a statistically higher than normal amount of needing children. The school also funded two counsellors (which thankfully even though the school was Anglican/catholic where not chaplains)
It's very weird to read these threads and see the massive difference between the views of both systems, my secondary school while not perfect lived their values to the fullest my single mum slaved away to send us there, often couldn't pay and needed a lot of support and my school helped every step of the way, providing lunches and uniforms sometimes at cost.
And when I ended up finishing my Year 12 via TAFE the school didn't charge their year 12 fees.
I think both systems should be funded but, in my opinion, funding isn't the problem anymore for schools its quality of education and curriculum.
At my kid's school people donate old uniforms so that low income families can obtain them free. That's a good system because the uniforms are ridiculously expensive and keep changing.
The cost of state school education comes with so many expenses - books, excursions, stationery, computers. Several thousand a year, which is a big impost on low income families with multiple kids.
As you said, payment plans are sometimes the only option. Charities like The Smith Family can help but that's not guaranteed.
But private school is simply not an option for most low income families. Even once you take uniforms out, they charge for everything. Kids need to pay to take part in a lot of extra curricular activities like band or theatre that are free at state schools.
I'm a fan of donating the school uniforms. Makes a big difference to families that can't afford it. And I like the schools that have a strong uniform policy. Less of a fashion show and who's got what.
Glad you mentioned the Smith Family. I have a deduction that helps a few families hopefully. I can do it quietly and it goes into something I think is important.
Those things a free at the standard end of private schools. Even excursions and end of year camps are covered if you aren't able to pay. The Catholic system declares that no child should be disadvantaged by economics. Parents need to make an appointment with the principal and show disadvantage. Pretty sure the perception and lack of awareness is why it's not actioned more often. Don't know about other private educators. Catholic schools are the second largest to the government though.
My child is at uni and did a placement at our local Catholic school and they took 5 kids to Officeworks to pick out their devices for the HSC. $1500 a pop! They were doing the HSC art class and needed laptops that their parents couldn't afford.
Sidenote: was a bit funny when they said the salesperson tried to upsell what they needed based on what the local school principals had advised. It was the principal that he was talking to when he tried to pull that. Lol.
My kids went to public and private. So I have a good understanding of both systems. If I ever get grandkids (no pressure but gees...) I know where I want them to be educated.
And it has nothing to do with networking or doing yachting for school sport. Lol. And it certainly won't be the socially stunting private boys/girls school that charges tens of thousands. Even if you can afford it I'm not sure you end up with well rounded I individuals who have a clue.
My kids went to public and private. So I have a good understanding of both systems. If I ever get grandkids (no pressure but gees...) I know where I want them to be educated.
Where? And why?
My kids have only been public because every private school within a 20km radius is religious and we are not.
We went for an interview at one really well regarded private school and they said religion is low key, but there was morning mass and religious studies, which seemed like a lot to me.
Yeah not religious at all.
I know the Muslim kids didn't have to go to mass but most did. Only because my kid was friends with one Muslim kid. Guessing there were other reasons for not attending but most just went because it got them out of class.
There was a mass for everything. About 5 or six a year. And weekly assemblies started with a prayer and acknowledgement of traditional owners of country as a matter of course. But my kids weren't bothered. They had to do one unit of religion for their HSC which was not a thing at public school but they studied all the major religions for that. I don't think knowing about other people's beliefs, even if you don't have them yourself, is a bad thing. One of my kids did a major essay on Judaism. Another did Islam. Interesting discussions at home but none of us are religious. A couple are probably agnostic but certainly not religious.
But every morning??? It would be a firm pass from me. That's too much. I'd agree with you there.
To answer your question, a moderate private school. For discipline, respect for the uniform, themselves and teachers. And the high number of special needs kids and resources. My kids didn't have special needs but respected and understood the kids that did. Made a difference in their lives when they left school. If they had special needs I would definately send them to mainstream private if they were able to cope with mainstream schooling.
But I would prefer that education be more equitable and see some change. I'd rather feel better about my mind being changed with improved outcomes for the public school system tbh.
Spitting facts.
Public schools do need to get their discipline together.
You see a “school sergeant” role at certain private boys school that looks after discipline and pastoral care and other auxiliary tasks - no teaching load.
Public schools should be funded for a role like that and have a zero tolerance for violence / disruption etc. Take it seriously and expel the bad eggs to medium security education facility. Education is a privilege and if you aren’t going to take advantage of it you shouldn’t be allowed to disrupt it for others.
This is the reputation of the public system that folks have in their minds (reinforced by any who read the AusTeachers sub).
We are preparing our youth for the workplace. To be productive members of society.
Shit won't fly at work. Agree.
I don't know why this is getting downvoted.
I guess people don't like the message, despite the facts.
It's why we have so many issues with education. People want to ignore the realities and revert to implausible simplicities. All public schools are not underfunded and all private schools are not wealthy.
I've had kids in both systems. So my comments are informed by experience.
I knew how it would be received but unless people know the realities and accept them, then we will be having the same conversation that we've had for decades.
Helps no one. We need all schools to be funded adequately. And it saves society cold hard cash by doing so. Even families without kids benefit.
But yeah. Not surprised.
How many private schools fall into this category? Please also name one private school where "most parents don't pay any fees".
Many private primary schools in the outback. In some areas there is only a local private school. And most kids don't pay. I can think of two in the NT and one in SA.
Low SES suburbs in metro areas have low rates of fee paying students, particularly in primary schools.
My area, a few suburbs over, has a private primary school with 50- 60 kids. About a quarter are special needs kids. Each class has at least one teacher's aide. Some two. And most don't pay fees. Their uniforms are supplied. And end of year camp is fundraised for so all kids can attend. Most kids don't pay.
As I'm speaking from what I know I won't be naming the schools. For obvious reasons.
But the info is not hard to fact check yourself. Very easy to google.
Sorry, I don't really understand, why wouldn't you name the schools if it's easily googleable?
No need to be sorry. I'm not going to discuss my local area. Frankly weird that you're interested in where my kids went to school in response to my original comment.
I'm not your research assistant. Particularly if it's easily googleable.
And given that you've narrowed in on these limited talking points out of the entirety of my comments I'm pretty keen to avoid a Reddit moment. If you're that keen the info is there.
And I'm not here to convince you or anyone. It's a statement of fact with some added lived experience of both systems. Anyone can disagree or deny it. Anyone can check it.
But the mythology and slightly over zealous need to cling to the overly simplistic myths about education in this country is why there is such a divide, why it's been that way for decades and why it will remain that way until people are ready to accept the realities.
Have a good day.
Something doesn’t add up here.
The Fixer told me it was a con-ski.
…Surely he wasn’t just straight up lying through his shit eating grin to the Australian people.
The issue here is that the government need private schools. There’s not enough government money to fund public schools for every single Australian child. The funding for private schools is to ensure that they continue to run to take a significant portion of students that would overflow our already overflowing public schools.
Fuck the poors, the dumber they are the richer I get
/s
I am Jack's complete lack of surprise.
My children attend a private school in a lower income area. This decision was made as they have a higher level of attendance/completion than public schools and significantly better grades.
It is not an “elite” private school and no one is getting 1 million as a salary! However we do get gov funding due to the high amount of scholarships that are given out and kids that cannot afford a private education. The gov finding covers these kids and still allows for a high standard of teaching/small class sizes.
I can’t speak to the extreme private schools, but there is a tier below that people seem to overlook when having this discussion that I feel strive to do the best for their students and the community as a whole.
elite or not, that money should be directed to ensuring a higher standard of teaching and facilities in public schools, not private schools.
All thanks to the connected LIBS
All that money and they still do so poorly academically, lol
No shit
Lot of thoughts on education and children from terminally-online childless Redditors up in this post.
The real bullshit is how many people who can afford to tip money into a school and then don’t co tribute anything.
I live in a reasonably affluent area full of complete fucking tight asses who won’t donate a thing to their local public school that their kids go to and use those resources.
Like holy shit, those who can afford to pay should be forced to pay for use of public schools, the government can then redirect some of that funding they’d no longer need to supply to some of the worse off schools.
The amount of people who go from paying 10k+ year on child care down to <500 for school is huge.
Make it a tax deduction or something (which it already is if done as a donation).
Somehow found the worst take here, which is almost impressive.
It isn’t a take on the article, it’s pointing out that the reason there is so much deficit in the public school system is because those who can pay into it, dont, instead they seek a better education for their kids - as is their right - by going to better funded schools.
Logically you can’t just remove funding for private schools without a massive increase in funding of the public system which will inevitably cop the overflow. Rather than having a binary ‘you either pay nothing to you pay everything’, then you find a middle ground by having those who can contribute do so.
Personally I’m of the opinion that if you can afford 25k+ yr fees then you can pay the full amount, but there’s a line between $0 and that upper limit where people want to contribute more but aren’t forced to so they don’t
My family personally donates 500 a yr to our public school but it just seems pointless because of all the other parents who don’t and they can absolutely afford it.
So now we end up with a system where the ‘good’ public schools are just in rich areas where people can afford to buy expensive houses and the schools are really only better because the parents are richer.
Alternate take: education should be free and not dependent on parents donating. All your suggestion would do is ensure a bigger gap between public schools depending on where they are. Schools in higher socio economic areas would be better funded. It's the opposite of what we want.
You and I differ on a pretty core point and there’s no point arguing it. I believe a base level of education should be free (which it is) but I believe people with the means to pay for more should be able to, at a government school and should be able to directly benefit from that.
Given how many Australians complain about tax rates and how many kids go to private schools, I don’t think you can use the word ‘we’, because it doesn’t statistically gel with what actually happens.
I'm not sure what you are advocating for - if people are affluent, then they are paying for local schools through taxes. Are you saying they should donate more money to schools?
That seems inefficient - just increase taxes to have the same effect, right?
People clearly want to pay more for the school their children go to, doing it through taxes means it’s taking money away from other tax payers when they are clearly capable of paying for it themselves.