Faculty of Education - Theses
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ItemSkilling the Australian community: futures in public education : young people's perspectives( 1990)Young people were interviewed to ascertain their perceptions of Australia in the next ten years and what skills that they expected that school leavers [i.e. secondary school leavers] will need to have to cope with the future. The findings provided data for a national conference, sponsored by the Commission for the Future and the Australian Teachers' Federation, in Melbourne in April, 1966. The conference explored the demands on education as seen by representatives of six user groups of education, including industry, parents and students. The methodology was basically determined by the nature of the project. The young people reached an "agreed statement" for the project. Their attitude towards the future indicated uncertainty, anxiety and pessimism and that their lives will be increasingly controlled by impersonal technology. The young people believed that there are four main areas of skill development needed by school leavers to cope with the future. The areas are: Intellectual/academic, vocational, social and personal. Some details are provided for each of the skill areas. The young people believed that the development of these skills should be possible through the public education system. Consideration is given to the possibility of implementing student participation and school-work relationships - two of the areas seen as important for the skill development of young people. A scenario of public education in 1998 is provided as a starting point for deeper thought and consideration of the issues raised as a result of the opinions expressed by the young people on the skills needed to cope ten years into the future.
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ItemThe Schools Commission: national policies and administration in Australian schooling( 1992)The Schools Commission was the Australian Federal Government's policy making agency in schooling from 1973 until it was abolished in 1987. The creation of the Commission as an election promise of the incoming Australian Labor Party Government came after three decades of growing support for a national role in supporting schooling. The Interim Committee for the Australian Schools Commission established the funding programs and the main educational values followed by the Commission. The largest program provided recurrent resources to government and non-government schools or school systems, on the basis of need. The needs principle was compromised because funding targets were achieved by government schools earlier than anticipated and because from 1976 to 1982 the Government increased support to wealthier non-government schools in the face of contrary advice from the Commission. In 1985 the Government transferred the general resource programs away from the Commission following the report of the Quality of Education Review Committee, leaving the Commission with only its specific purpose programs which were directed to areas of special educational need. The Schools Commission's educational ideas all reflected well established issues in national schooling policy. They represented a policy elaboration of the two basic ideas that schooling should promote greater equality of opportunity and that it should be progressive and child-centred. Traditions in policy analysis and the sociology of education in Australia, Britain and the U.S.A. reflected changes in and informed the policy making environment of the Schools Commission and comparable international developments. Ultimately, however, an historical policy analysis reveals that broad theorisation fails to capture the dynamics and continuities in policy making. The first main set of policy notions of the Schools Commission concerns schooling and the nation. A close examination of these notions illustrates the development of the Schools Commission's ideas about the national purposes of schooling, schooling for citizenship and democracy, and equal outcomes and opportunities.