More money for education is generally welcomed by everyone. Except, of course, when it contains the magic word voucher, as in in Julie Bishop’s press release:
$457.4 million over four years for the National Literacy and Numeracy Vouchers programme which will provide direct assistance to parents of students who have not achieved minimum standards in reading, writing and mathematics in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 so that they can get additional help for their children;
The Australian Education Union were amongst others who aren’t fans of this scheme, arguing that the money would be better spent directly on schools rather than “unaccountable” private tutors.
While there are broader ideological issues at play here, it’s a pretty fair question: what has the federal government done to establish that paying for after-school private tutors is the most effective way of improving student outcomes?
The scheme is actually an expansion of a 2006 scheme, the Reading Assistance Voucher program, based on an earlier pilot. The evaluation report of that pilot scheme is available.
I suppose the department deserves some credit, at least, for investigating the effectiveness of how they’re spending their money. But it’s a rather unsatisfying document.
The short version is that the extra tuition seemed to help with reading skills, and was liked by parents. That’s a good thing – if not entirely surprising. But what the document fails to address is whether the model delivers value for money. The report hasn’t even tried to show that employing private tutors, working outside schools, with possibly less than ideal coordination with the kid’s schooling, is a better model than giving the schools extra funding and letting the schools and the states sort themselves out. Not to mention the extra administrative costs of a second P-12 education bureaucracy to manage the whole program.
But then again, sending vouchers in the mail with that godawful federal government logo on it reminds parents of where the dough’s coming from. And that, regardless of the actual cost-effectiveness of the program, would seem like an awfully positive feature for a government that’s taken marketing itself using taxpayers funds to a new level.
Thanks for the post, Robert.
I haven’t had time to have a look at the evaluation, but two issues have been raised with regard to the effectiveness of the scheme. First, as the NT education minister pointed out, qualified tutors are simply not available in many of the areas where the outcomes are poorest – he believed that even Darwin would not have the necessary people to do the work. Whereas state schools are everywhere. But the government seems to object to working with the states and territories and further resourcing public education in favour of privatised “solutions”.
Secondly, I understand that many of the vouchers in the pilot weren’t used because the bureaucratic process was too complex – which would be entirely par for the course for the commonwealth government.
Indeed, I think originally the idea of having a big payout for some pet project in the budget that actually never got spent in it’s entirety was an accident.
Since the fortuitous first few, the Government has noticed that they can get away with doing this, budget after budget, election after election. Big write-ups by the press, lots of back slapping among the mps and recipients, then the money takes a glacial age to appear and the administrative hoops are incredible, meanwhile the focus groups have moved on, leaving the government with some handy money to re-allocate to the issue of the day.
There really should be an independent body that analyses whether the money is spent as promised (I know, the media used to do this, but they seem unwilling to bite the hand anymore).
As to vouchers, what a crock. Another way to get a sub-standard, heavily subsidised privatised industry running – c.f. Job Network, Childcare Centre’s, etc.
Look for ABC to become a tutorial provider in the near future – it’s an obvious tie-in – they have all these centres that are shut in the evenings – not earning much money there.
This does sound like a bribe inspired of some half-baked attempt at introducing the notion of vouchers into the education system. I have to say tho’ that I am interested in the voucher idea as a way of introducing individual choice and innovation into education. And in terms of education that’s coming from a position definitely described as left-wing ie universal education, no state subsidies for elite schools. In fact no elite schools in an ideal world.
It’s the ‘Kip McGrath’ scheme. (Similar to ‘Harvey Norman’ plasma TV child-care grant. Note boost to share prices, already.)
Actually, plenty of retired teachers out there tutor for Kip.
Some even with ‘remedial’ skills.
So, not all need be lost.
On ‘value for money’, there is an independent guy in Canberra called the Auditor-General, who occasionally checks on this sort of thing.
I had a browse through the evaluation report. I don’t have special expertise in this area, but I’ll venture a few comments nevertheless.
There seems to be two main parts to the scheme. One is the actual tutoring, the other is the administration of the scheme.
They used “brokers” who had to advertise the scheme, find and check out the tutors, prepare and support them through the process, find the eligible students, match them with the tutors, get the parents/caregivers’ consent, arrange the venues and pay the bills.
There were forms to fill out everywhere and it was cited as a reason some kids missed out. Their parents/caregivers couldn’t face or handle the paperwork!
Queensland and Victoria used private providers as brokers. They found the going tough, especially finding the eligible students, when student data is not available to them for privacy reasons.
The venues used varied: schools, homes, community facilities and other.
Police checks had to be done on the tutors by the AFP who charged $36 for the trouble. It seems some tutors may have paid and got no students. And they needed GST registration.
It seems blindingly evident that there is a need, although some who got tutored had in fact improved enough to make them ineligible while they were waiting.
It seems similarly clear from the evaluation that if schools and school systems were paid more to hire the extra staff, skilled tutors and buy materials (this includes the capacity to perform the ‘broker’ role) the results would be better. Scaling up with the extra funds in this budget make that more true.
But it wouldn’t highlight the badge of Commonwealth funding.
I noticed an article in the paper the other day saying that Qld was going away from the classroom withdrawal mode for remedial work in favour of trying to improve the capacity within the classroom. I wonder what that was all about!
Brian,
Doing some further digging, I came across this amazing and scarcely believable Age report from May 2006:
“In some states such as NSW, the state education department agreed to administer the scheme and tutorial sessions were held at schools. In Victoria, the State Government objected to the use of private vouchers and refused to allow school involvement. Instead a private provider, Progressive Learning, contacted Victorian parents and recruited tutors through advertising.”
It seems the need for private brokers in Victoria stemmed entirely from State Government’s refusal, no doubt at the bidding of the teachers’ union, to allow school involvement. Can anyone defend such conduct? Surely to deny children access to a Commonwealth-funded literacy program is not just stupid and counterproductive, it’s immoral.
BBB
You might say so, BBB, but the Commonwealth program , as with a number of others in schools, is not about seriously addressing problems, it’s about politically interfering directly in the administration of schools for which they have no constitutional responsibility, for political purposes.
Admittedly without digesting either the budget policy detail, nor the reports linked in previous posts, this immediately struck me as a further “privatisation” of a part of the “public” Education sector. Rather than putting the funds into improving service delivery and capability within the public primary schools, we see another effort to “outsource” formerly core services away from the schools into private hands.
Further, from the Prime Minister’s speech yesterday he is prepared to further tie up public funding or restrict it’s flow in order to force STATE schools to conform the his Government’s view of the ideal Education system. I don;t recall any such restrictions being placed on the private schools that received federal Government funding (but please correct me if this is not true).
It is an interesting battleground the Prime Minister has chosen to take on the Opposition. It will be interesting if any polling is done on this specific policy area in coming months, and what that indicates about voter intentions.
Brian,
I take it from that you think it inappropriate for the Commonwealth to fund education. You know, on constitutional grounds.
BBB
What is this bollocks? If we are helping our kids at home with their reading already, do we get to keep the money ourselves?
It’s like a “get out of jail free” card for lazy parents.
Could someone explain to me exactly how it is that the Australian Education Union considers private tutors unaccountable? Surely if they’re not doing their job parents will find someone who can.
In the meantime, the AEU resists any attempt to introduce any form of accountability – or even performance monitoring – for its members.
The issue here is precisely NOT to fund failure anymore. The government schools are antideluvian ideological trainwrecks, which are precisely responsible for such low literacy standards in government schools.
In fact, if it were not for the private schools, the ranking of Australian schoolchildren on international standardized academic tests would be far lower.
I have tutored children from the most troubled housing commission homes in western Sydney to GPS kids in Woollahra. Every single one of them improved significantly.
BBB, the original idea was for the states to collect their own taxes to discharge their functions. Along the way, I think there was a war on at the time, they ceded their taxation powers to the Feds for better or worse.
The Feds now have the stupid and fallacious idea that it is their money and theyb have some responsibility in how it is used, whereas in truth they should simply hand it over. (Spoken like a former state bureaucrat.)
Back in Menzies day the Feds took leadership in the area of science labs for secondary schools. Australia’s response to Sputnik. The states cooperated. Educationally it was the right thing to do, but it set a precedent and they came back again and again with you beaut ideas that were supposed to meet a national need. School libraries follows, first secondary, then primary.
Whitlam’s mob decided that the whole system needed renovation with priorities decided according to need and money came in floods.
Now there are all sorts of conflicting agendas running from libertarian notions of individuality and choice, conservative notions of authority, control and the value of the classics, neoliberal notions of markets and enterprise.
Dawkins was the first federal minister who thought he owned the show. Now every Commonwealth Minister thinks it is his/her duty to interfere. We sorted him out and taught him how to cooperate, but this government has thrown up a series of hard cases. The current one is about as authoritarian as they come.
There’s a potted history of education in Australia here which happened to be on while I was typing. The Feds didn’t fund universities before WW2.
Bismarck you have to realise that many of the parents of the target group are not so hot at literacy themselves. As to choice, the pilot evaluation found that in many cases there wasn’t any. Scaling up to a full implementation isn’t going to improve the situation.
John G, but what did you tutor them in and what does ‘improve significantly’ mean precisely?
But seriously, I understand the target group is the bottom 10%. They would have had 4 years of schooling. The evaluation showed that on average the kids gained between one and two years in reading age. (How much would they have gained anyway?)
I heard an educational psychologist with a special interest in reading talking about the scheme today. He reckoned that the bottom 30% are seriously struggling to the extent that they are in danger of losing contact with the curriculum. He also said that current research findings on reading and school practice were in parallel universes. Teacher education institutions are not much better.
So kids get moved from being completely hopeless to still struggling, while two-thirds of the struggling kids don’t move at all, because the scheme does nothing to improve classroom practice.
So lots of tutors feel warm and fuzzy and most parents feel grateful. But as a scheme to improve reading in schools to meet the needs of students in the modern world it’s looking like a crock of crap.
Bismarck did you read the earlier comments describing how the scheme works? Parents don’t just go out and give the voucher to a tutor of their choice.
In any event, some of the comments here illustrate the tendency to perceive education issues through the lens of our own personal experience, meaning we fail to understand how they are experienced by those directly affected.
Kids who have learning difficulties are likely to come from families where their parent (or parents, if they’re lucky) has low levels of literacy and numeracy. In typical government departmental style, information about the vouchers program will be provided in impenetrable officialese and require complicated forms to be filled out, meaning that a good proportion of the families most seriously affected will never even understand what the program is let alone take advantage of it.
The idea that parents will take an informed interest in the quality of the tutoring that their kids get simply ignores the reality of their situation. Many of them are conditioned to being told what to do by Centrelink. Even if they were in a position to evaluate the effectiveness of the tutoring, which many won’t be, it would never occur to them to demand that their kid be placed with someone else.
The central issue seems to be to find a way to get kids with learning problems to spend more time learning. Why should this have to happen through private tutors? If money’s available for extra teaching, why not offer overtime to school teachers who are prepared to take supplementary classes out of ordinary school hours?
Hahahaha silly me … overtime might mean penalty rates, and having to negotiate with teh union … and now I need to go stand in Miss Bishop’s naughty corner for saying rude words.
Well it probably wouldn’t be a bad idea to give parents the choice of having the school receive the voucher and provide the extra tutoring services.
But I do think that sometimes having someone outside of the school do the tutoring can help. If the student isn’t responding to the teaching techniques used within a school, then more of the same may not help. A different approach from someone external to the school can often help (I certainly benefited from it when I was at school).
Chris
Why indeed!!?? This is a question you need to direct to the AEU and truly vile Pat Byrnes. Perhaps if you worked this out, you might be able to stop the stampede of kids out of the government system.
What stampede?
The proportion of children educated in public schools in Australia has fallen from 70% to 67% in ten years.
Brian
I am absoltely whacked right now, but will give you a considered response in the morning.
Ken the expert I referred to was Dr Kerry Hempenstall on Life Matters this morning if anyone wants to listen to what he said.
Apparently the kit issued for tutors to work with was crap, with poor content and lousy instructional design.
I think Hempenstall was suggesting that not many teachers really know what they are doing in teaching reading in the light of recent research.
I remember hearing a visiting American educator talking on this topic probably last year. In view of what he was saying from large-scale research done over there, I’m inclined to think Hempenstall has a point. I’ve been trying to google him up, but I don’t have a decent lead.
Brian, was Hempenstall referring to another round of the endless phonics/whole language debate?
But look at an example like the ACT where the public school system has a good reputation, but average income is also good and parents are more capable of sending their children to private schools than in other states:
http://www.det.act.gov.au/publicat/pdf/Census_of_ACT_Schools_February_2007.pdf
At primary school, public school attendance is around 60%, but drops
to 50% for high school, where many parents believe that the quality of schooling is more important.
It does go back up to 60% in college years, but looks like there’s a big influx of students from the regional areas for those years which might explain the increase).
Chris, I know there’s been some movement in some places but “stampede” is a hyperbolic and inaccurate term chosen to make an ideological point.
On the so-called stampede to private schools the real situation is that enrolments in both sectors is growing, in government schools by 1.7% in 10 years and in the non-government sector by 22.2%. Retention rates (not good) would be higher in non-government schools.
Of concern, on the face of it, is that staffing ratios are better in non-government schools. It might not seem much but the difference in a secondary school with 1000 kids is three extra teachers. This makes a hellava difference in running special programs and services within a school.
Robert, I’ll get back about whole word teaching in a while.
Robert, this is very much about the phonics v whole word approach. I don’t think there is an argument any more. Hempenstall explains the issue beautifully:
Or this should appeal to an engineer:
The way I see it is this. Many children can read by the time they come to school. In middle-class suburbs of my experience this was around 20-25%. But for a significant minority of students (possibly about 30%) reading does not come easily.
Understanding phonemes is an essential element for the latter group. For the former it can also provide the key to decoding unfamiliar words rather than guessing.
You have to realise that the target group of the voucher program have experienced 4 years of failure. Overcoming the attitudinal problem is part of it, but unblocking the actual process of symbol perception and understanding is a technical problem.
An essential step that seems to be missed in this program is the diagnosis of what the blockages are in the specific case for each child. Then matching them with tutors who are technically able to do something about it will be beyond parents/caregivers, and, I suspect, the brokers too unless they are very skilled in the area.
There are about 235,000 teachers in Australian schools with somewhere near 100,000 of them at the pointy end in primary schools with a direct responsibility in teaching kids to read. There have been estimates that less than 10% of them really know what they are doing in teaching reading to all students, as distinct from teaching the easy 50-70% of them, where they do a pretty good job by international standards.
Tooling up 100,000 teachers and changing their classroom MO, especially when the teacher education institutions don’t know what they are doing, is truly daunting.
This voucher program is a crock of crap because it puts bits of sticking plaster on some of the symptoms, but will only reach a minority of what the target group should be. The worst aspect is that it will give the appearance of of doing something and will always be evaluated to be a success by evaluators who know where their next contract is coming from and hence will be able to find some good in it.
It will actually delay addressing the problem properly.
Hempenstall’s home page is here.
If money’s available for extra teaching, why not offer overtime to school teachers who are prepared to take supplementary classes out of ordinary school hours?
The average 8-9 year old won’t want to do extra academic classes after six hours in school. They’re just too mentally tired by then. Teaching needs to happen in school hours, in schools.
I agree with that suz.
I haven’t gone into what should be done, but I think it will require the injection of real expertise into schools, perhaps on a shared basis, to work with both teachers and kids directly as the circumstances dictate. There may be the need to access outside services and some of these could be from within the system on a district basis.
I’ve been out of the system for 16 years, but it’s my impression that a lot of the classroom support services that were built up in the 70s and 80s were stripped out by the bean counters in the 90s.
Solutions will cost money. There is a stupid meme about that quality can be improved without spending money. Meanwhile Bishop chucks $437m over four years at what is essentially a gimmick.
Well its just anecdotal, but it worked for me. I was lucky enough that the next door neighbour was a primary school teacher and offered to help for free. Just a couple of hours after school, once a week, but it really helped. And in my case it was important that it was external to the school because I really didn’t get along with the teacher (which was one of the problems), and I responded well to a different approach to teaching the same material.
Given the workload students experience in some overseas countries (and I’m not advocating we take that route), there is no reason that many students are capable of having the occasional longer day.
I’m glad it worked for you Chris but think it’s unlikely to work as an educational strategy. A great many schoolchildren already do long days in before and after-care and at after-school activities like sports and music lessons, often to fill in time when both parents are at work. On top of this they have homework – it can be a struggle finding the time for a third-grader to complete their voluminous homework these days let alone do extra schoolwork.
Couldn’t this extra tutoring occur in place of some of the other after school activities, or in the case of homework, it could form part of the exercises that the tutors would cover? In cases where parents are unable to help to their children themselves – and children from families where there are low education levels are much more likely to have problems themselves – then I could see how this one on one help would be most valuable.
Besides, we’re not talking about this being applied to all school children, just the ones that are being left behind. And in those cases I think its fine to temporarily put a higher priority on catching up compared to other activities.
JG, if your hyperbolic wailings here are any guide you tutored your students in tolerating boredom and they improved their tolerance (of boredom).
suz, the value of homework is a perennial but it’s utility, especially in primary school, is being seriously questioned.
Our youngest needed coaching at one stage. He regarded his own time as his own, and resisted all attempts on our part. In the end he cut some kind of a deal with his teacher to get extra help at school and did OK.
On the specific matter at hand, children are required to go to school. They have no choice. One of the reasons they have to go is that they must learn to read. If Hempenstall is right and 30% are struggling then there has been a system failure. The system owes them to fix it and our first assumption should be that this should happen during school time, by one-on-one help if necessary.