Home > Contents > Chapter 4 - Outcome 1: School education

Outcome 1: School education

Section 1 – Description
Section 2 – Our strategic priorities
Section 3 – other activities that broadly support Outcome 1
Section 4 – Summary of the achievements against this Outcome

Outcome 1 – School systems provide their students with high quality foundation skills and learning outcomes

Section 1 – Description

Under the Australian Constitution, State and Territory governments are responsible for providing schooling to all children of school age.

The Commonwealth has a national leadership role in conjunction with State, Territory and non-government school authorities in identifying national standards and priorities for schooling and in setting policy directions for schools to achieve the National Goals for Schooling. The Commonwealth provides significant additional funding to State, Territory and non-government school authorities to support agreed priorities and strategies. The department administers the Commonwealth’s policies and programmes for schools and students.

A statistical overview – schools

In 2001, there were 9596 schools in Australia. Of these, 6942 (72.3 per cent) were government schools and 2654 (27.7 per cent) were non-government schools. Most non-government schools have some religious affiliation with approximately two-thirds of non-government school students enrolled in Catholic schools.

Primary schools made up 69.7 per cent of the total while 15.5 per cent were secondary schools. A further 11 per cent were combined primary and secondary schools and 3.8 per cent were special schools.

A total of 3 268 141 full-time students attended school. Of these, 68.8 per cent attended government schools. The percentage of primary students attending government schools was 72.4 per cent. The percentage of secondary students attending government schools was 63.7 per cent.

National Goals for Schooling

All governments, Commonwealth and State, support the National Goals for Schooling in the 21st Century. The Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs agreed on these goals in 1999. The national goals, which can be found at http://www.dest.gov.au/schools/adelaide/index.htm, provide broad directions to guide schools and education authorities in ensuring that all students have the knowledge, understanding, skills and values needed for a productive and rewarding life in an educated, just and open society. The goals describe the capacities students should have when they leave school. They require that students should attain high standards, including literacy and numeracy, and should participate in vocational learning. The goals also require that schooling be socially just so that the learning outcomes of Indigenous and other educationally disadvantaged students improve to match those of other students.

With their strong focus on student outcomes, the national goals provide a framework for measuring performance in key areas of schooling in a nationally comparable way. The Commonwealth has played a lead role in establishing national goals, benchmarks and measures through the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs.

National reporting of education outcomes

During 2000, Parliament passed legislation to introduce more robust national reporting of education outcomes. This included performance targets for primary literacy and numeracy, as a condition of the Commonwealth’s financial assistance grants for schooling in Australia. National benchmarks are already agreed for primary and lower secondary literacy and numeracy. Performance measures are being put in place in areas such as science, information and communication technology, vocational education and training in schools and the participation and attainment of young people.

Supplementary assistance and funding

The Commonwealth provides supplementary assistance for the recurrent costs of schools and support for improvement of capital infrastructure, particularly for the most educationally disadvantaged students. It also promotes and supports a range of targeted policies and programmes for these students, including students who have not achieved a minimum acceptable standard of literacy or numeracy, students with disabilities, students in rural and remote areas and students with a language background other than English. Funding is also provided to redress the significant gaps between the educational outcomes of Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians.

The department provides funding to the Enterprise and Career Education Foundation. The organisation commenced operations on 8 February 2001 as a public company limited by guarantee and subject to the Corporations Law and the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies (CAC) Act 1997.

National career and transition system

The department is also working closely with States and Territories through the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs to progress the development of a coordinated approach to a national career and transition system. The national career and transition system includes a suite of complementary initiatives managed by the department and funded under Outcome 1 and Outcome 2. The initiatives funded under Outcome 1 include the following:

Career and Transition pilots. These are testing ways of providing enhanced career and transition support to young people aged 13-19 years by improving the quality of career information and advice provided to them. One way this is achieved is through the provision of dedicated Transition Advisers;

Enterprise and Career Education Programme. This programme helps young people to develop their creative capacities and the enterprising skills and attitudes critical for successful transitions through school to further education, training and work; and

Enterprise and Career Education Foundation. The Foundation aims to help young Australians acquire enterprise and career knowledge and experience before they leave school. It achieves this by encouraging and supporting effective school-industry partnerships that link businesses, schools and communities to create a diversity of learning experiences.

Initiatives funded under Outcome 2 that support young people's transitions include the online National Career Information System known as myfuture.edu.au, the experiential career education game series known as The Real Game, the Partnership Outreach Education Model pilots, the Jobs Pathway Programme and the New Apprenticeships Access Programme. More information about these initiatives is contained in Chapter 5 of this Annual Report.

Table 9: Resources invested in Outcome 1: School education.

* Additional Estimates.
** Note: the Departmental Outputs figures do not include resources provided free of charge.
Source: Departmental Statistics.

Comments

Administered

The difference of $174m (three per cent) between the actual for 2001-02 and the budget for Administered Expenses is due mainly to:

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Contribution of Outputs to Outcome 1

Infrastructure funding for the schools system

Under this Output Group, the Commonwealth provides supplementary assistance for the recurrent costs of schools and support for improvement of capital infrastructure, particularly for the most educationally disadvantaged students. This funding underpins students’ effective participation in Australia’s schooling system and the achievement of Commonwealth priorities for schooling.

Assistance for school students with special needs

Under this Output Group, the Commonwealth aims to improve educational outcomes for all students. The focus is on educationally disadvantaged students including students with disabilities, Indigenous students, students from a low socioeconomic background, students with a language background other than English and students who are geographically isolated.

Enhance the quality of teaching and learning.

The Commonwealth priorities for this Output Group include teacher quality, school improvement, drug education, science, languages, civics and citizenship, and history education. Government and community school education priorities can and do change over time and this can change the focus of activities under this Output Group. However, the Commonwealth concentrates on areas of national strategic significance to improve the quality and relevance of foundation skills acquired within the school system.

Details of actual performance against the performance indicators provided for each Output Group can be found at Appendix 9.

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Section 2 – Our strategic priorities

Priority One – Improved learning outcomes for all students through nationally comparable standards and reporting.

All governments want young Australians to have quality schooling so that they develop and learn to the maximum extent possible, as reflected in the National Goals for Schooling.

During 2001-02, the Commonwealth has continued its focus on ensuring that all Australian school children achieve appropriate literacy and numeracy skills in the first years of schooling. The 2001-02 Federal Budget provided an additional $36.9m over the 2001-2003 period for this purpose. This amount included $26.5m for grants to education authorities and $10.4m for strategic national research and initiatives in support of the National Literacy and Numeracy Plan.

In July 2001 the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs, reaffirmed its commitment to the reporting of student achievement against the national literacy and numeracy benchmarks through rigorous State-based testing. It also reaffirmed its commitment to developing meaningful and comprehensible reports to all parents.

National benchmark data for literacy and numeracy is produced through an agreed process involving the Commonwealth, all States and Territories and non-government schools.

Progress has also been made towards the measurement of performance in other key areas of schooling including science and information and communications technology, all within the context of the national goals.

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Performance information for Strategic Priority One

For information on Year 3 and Year 5 student performance against the literacy and numeracy benchmarks see Section 4 of Chapter 3.

• Reporting against national standards and performance measures is consolidated and extended

Student participation and attainment: publication of national measures of participation and attainment of 15-24 year olds commenced in the 2000 Annual National Report on Schooling in Australia. Refinement of the attainment measures is continuing.

Vocational education and training in schools: development and refinement of national measures of student participation and attainment in vocational education and training in schools continued during the year.

Science: work continued on the assessment of student achievement in science at primary school. Meanwhile, the results of the first cycle of the OECD Programme for International Student Assessment were released, showing Australian 15 year-olds performing well in scientific literacy with students from Japan and Korea the only groups significantly outperforming them.

Information and communication technology: preliminary work on mechanisms for the national assessment of information and communication technology skills and knowledge of primary and secondary students was carried out.

Other areas: the approach to national measurement of civics and citizenship education at Years 6 and 10 was agreed. Work also proceeded on national definitions to enable comparative reporting on the outcomes of educationally disadvantaged students. This group includes Indigenous students, students of language background other than English, students of low socioeconomic status, geographically isolated students and students with disabilities.

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Priority Two – Improved learning outcomes for Indigenous students

National Indigenous English Literacy and Numeracy Strategy

A range of initiatives under the National Indigenous English Literacy and Numeracy Strategy to improve the educational outcomes of Indigenous students in literacy and numeracy were implemented during 2001-02. Implementation of these initiatives continues for the 2001 – 2004 quadrennium.

Across the six key elements of the Strategy, the most common strategies being implemented in 2001 were:

• to increase the involvement of Indigenous parents and communities in their children’s education;
• to increase the employment of Indigenous people in the classroom; and
• to improve the quality and amount of professional development available to teachers of Indigenous students.

Progress being achieved under the National Indigenous English Literacy and Numeracy Strategy will be included in the 2001 Annual National Report to Parliament on Indigenous Education and Training.

Indigenous Education Direct Assistance Programmes

Indigenous Education Direct Assistance programmes have been operating since 1990 as a part of the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Education Policy. The Aboriginal Tutorial Assistance Scheme, the Aboriginal Student Support and Parent Awareness programme and the Vocational and Educational Guidance for Aboriginals Scheme have provided much needed direct education support to Indigenous students in the preschool, primary, secondary, TAFE and tertiary education sectors.

The department has continued to deliver the Indigenous Education Strategic Initiatives Programme. During negotiations for the 2001-04 quadrennium, the department was resolute in reaching agreement on measurable and meaningful targets with education providers. This meant that some Indigenous Education Agreements took longer to negotiate than was initially planned, and some were not finalised until the 2001-02 financial year.

Under the Indigenous Education Strategic Initiatives Programme, the department funded a number of national project activities. They include the Dare to Lead project with the Australian Principals’ Association Professional Development Council, mentoring projects and the Books in Homes pilot project. The Programme also funded capital projects such as the secondary boarding school, Woolaning Homeland Christian College.

Indigenous Youth Partnerships Initiatives

The department funds the Enterprise and Career Education Foundation to deliver the Indigenous Youth Partnership Initiative. The $4.2m allocation was made in July 2000 and spans the period to end December 2002. The aim of this initiative is to address young Indigenous people’s relative disadvantage in education, training and employment through a whole of community approach.

By the end of June 2002, twenty projects had been established nation-wide. They included two under a collaborative model with input from this department, the Enterprise and Career Education Foundation, the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations, the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission, the Department of Family and Community Services and the Department of Health and Ageing. These collaborative projects were in Cape York and Newcastle.

Australians Working Together

A key element of the 2001-02 Federal Budget was the announcement of the Australians Working Together package. Included within this initiative was an allocation of $10m to support Indigenous senior secondary students complete Year 12, go on to higher education or vocational education and training or paid employment. There are two elements under this measure:

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Performance information for Strategic Priority Two

For information on Year 12 retention rates of Indigenous students and the proportion of Indigenous students meeting the national literacy and numeracy benchmarks see Section 4 of Chapter 3.

• Indigenous participation and outcomes in other priority areas identified by the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs

The Indigenous Education Strategic Initiatives Programme requires education providers to report against performance indicators selected from the priority areas of the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs. The priority areas are literacy, numeracy, educational outcomes (attendance, grade progression, course completions, senior secondary outcomes, enrolments, Indigenous employment in education and training, professional development for all teachers of Indigenous students, parental and community involvement and culturally inclusive curriculum.

Details on the participation of Indigenous students across the three sectors, school retention rates and literacy and numeracy achievement are at Section 4 of Chapter 3.

The ratio of enrolments in a given grade in a given calendar year to enrolments in the preceding grade in the preceding calendar year is know as the grade progression ratio. Grade progression ratios for Indigenous students from years 8 to 9 and 9 to 10 have improved since 1999. (See Table 10.)

Table: 10. Apparent Grade Progression Rates, 2001 (per cent).

Source: Department of Education, Science and Training, derived from National Schools Statistics Collection 4221.0, Australian Bureau of Statistics.

The grade progression ratio for Indigenous students from Year 8 to Year 9 rose from 92.7 per cent in 1999 to 96.1 per cent in 2001. The grade progression ratio for Indigenous students from Year 9 to 10 rose from 86.3 per cent in 1999 to 89.7 per cent in 2001.

For non-Indigenous students the grade progression ratio between Years 8 to 9 remained relatively stable at 99.8 per cent in 1999 and 2001. The grade progression ratio between Years 9 and 10 for non-Indigenous students was 98.2 per cent in 1999 and 98.6 per cent in 2001.

The gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students grows as students move from Year 9 to Year 10, the most noticeable difference appearing with the transition to non-compulsory schooling in Year 11.

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Priority Three – Enhancing the quality of Australian school education

The Commonwealth’s priority for school education is to enhance the quality of teaching, learning and leadership to ensure that all young people are equipped with the knowledge, skills and values to fully participate in a democratic society and achieve their full potential.

Strengthening teacher quality remains a key mechanism for enhancing the quality of Australian school education. The Commonwealth’s Teachers for the 21st Century initiative seeks to improve teacher quality and increase the number of highly effective schools to maximise student learning outcomes. The initiative is largely being implemented through the Quality Teacher Programme. In 2001-02, $29.4m was provided from the Quality Teacher Programme to update and improve teacher understanding and skills, professional development activities in the national priority areas of literacy and numeracy, mathematics, science, vocational education and information technology. Contractual reports provided by State and Territory government and non-government education authorities advised that 58 000 teacher participants had undertaken Quality Teacher Programme activities during 2001. The reports indicated that those activities had contributed to improving teacher understanding and skills in the priority areas.

A further $1.7m was provided in 2001-02 from the Quality Teacher Programme for strategic projects on research into teacher quality, promoting key issues such as professional standards and strengthening strategic links between the Commonwealth and key stakeholders. Progress on three significant projects during 2001-02 follows:

Effective Programmes for Beginning Teachers, commenced in June 2001 with a draft final report submitted late in 2001-02. The project involves an analysis of the principles and practices that are effective in assisting beginning teachers to make the transition from initial training to teaching in schools;

National Quality Teacher Information Exchange, commenced in June 2001 and will continue into mid-2003. It is intended to identify and disseminate best practice in Commonwealth-funded teacher professional development under the Quality Teacher Programme. By the end of 2001-02, two national workshops had been held, a website had been extensively tested and refined and was ready for release, two newsletters had been distributed to all schools and an annual report on professional development activities had been submitted; and

Investigating Teacher Professional Development and Student Learning Outcomes, commenced in June 2001 and will continue into mid-2003. By the end of 2001-02, a literature review had been submitted and school based trials were underway.

Under the banner of the Government’s Innovation Action Plan Backing Australia’s Ability, the Commonwealth has agreed to review teaching and teacher education. The focus is on improving the supply and demand of teachers in the areas of science, technology and mathematics, and producing policy recommendations on developing a culture of innovation in schools. An independent review committee will commence its work in August 2002. The review will be conducted in consultation with State and Territory governments. It will produce an interim report on Strategies to attract and retain science, technology and mathematics teachers in December 2002 and an Innovation Action Plan for the School Sector by July 2003.

The Commonwealth is committed to the provision of high quality, relevant and engaging education, especially in the priority areas of science and mathematics. These areas are particularly important in enabling students to participate purposefully in the knowledge economy. The following initiatives, unique to each learning area, have been developed.

The National School Science Project was announced in 2001 and is a $2.5m three-year project. It supports a package of initiatives to raise the awareness of science education and improve the resources available to teachers in providing interesting and high quality science programmes to all students; and

The investigation of The Status of Teaching and Learning of Mathematics in Australian Secondary Schools will identify key factors that contribute to the effective teaching of mathematics.

Work has progressed in 2001-02 on the development of a National Quality Schooling Framework. The Framework will be a web-based, non-mandatory tool that will support and encourage school-based research and continuous school improvement. It will also underpin a new national awards scheme for excellence in teaching and school improvement. Schools will be able to use the Framework to identify aspects of school practice that require attention, develop an action plan, apply the Framework tools, collect evidence and evaluate their achievement.

Effective strategies to address drug education and management of drug-related incidents in schools are being progressed. Methods include the conduct of nationally strategic research projects, development of a suite of education resources for schools for both students and teachers and the conduct of Local School-Community Drug Summits.

The National History Project, which began in October 2000, is helping to revitalise the study of history in Australian schools. The National Centre for History Education has been established at Monash University and a centre website is being prepared for a public launch in the second half of 2002. Universities in each State and Territory have developed pilot professional development programmes to support teachers of history. Two post-graduate programmes to provide additional qualifications for teachers of history have been established and will commence in the second university semester of 2002. Two national seminars brought together academic and professional historians and teachers to discuss major issues in the teaching of history in Australian schools.

Civics and citizenship education is supported through the Discovering Democracy programme, which helps students understand the values underpinning Australian democracy.

The Commonwealth Schools Languages Programme supported language education in schools and after-hours ethnic schools through the National Asian Languages and Studies in Australian Schools Strategy and the Languages Other Than English element. In 2001, there were 785 355 students (or more than 24 per cent) studying an Asian language at some level of schooling and 4635 schools were offering a National Asian Languages and Studies in Australian Schools Strategy language programme. Participation rates were highest in the upper primary and lower secondary levels of schooling.

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Performance information for Strategic Priority Three

For information on student learning outcomes and post-school outcomes of school students see Section 4 of Chapter 3.

Priority Four – Improved transitions of young people through school and from school to work and/or further education and training

The department is promoting progress on a national career and transition system through the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs. The Transition from School Taskforce has undertaken considerable work on the development of a cross-jurisdictional approach to a national career and transition system including the development of a national Framework for Career and Transition support. The Transition from School Taskforce is responsible for, among other things, the New Framework for Vocational Education in Schools, the development of a national careers blueprint, standards for career professionals and performance indicators for careers education in school.

This work complements Commonwealth initiatives and its effectiveness will be enhanced by collaborative approaches, including formal partnerships.

In 2001, the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs established a Ministerial Subcommittee on Youth Transitions to examine and respond to the needs of vulnerable young people. The council asked the subcommittee to build on two areas. The first is the work of the Prime Minister’s Youth Pathways Action Plan Taskforce, particularly issues from recommendations 16 to 23 that address vulnerable young people. The second is the Ministerial Council’s Vocational Education and Training in Schools Taskforce. The Ministerial Subcommittee was asked to develop practical options for strengthening transition pathways for young people who are disconnected from families and education or at risk of becoming disconnected.

Key achievements of the Ministerial Subcommittee follow.

A joint Ministerial Declaration, Stepping Forward - improving pathways for all young people has been developed. Commonwealth, State and Territory Ministers for education, employment, training, youth affairs and community services have signed the declaration.

There has been a national stocktake of initiatives supporting young people at risk. The report, called Stepping Forward – sharing what works, is a practical addition to the Declaration. It documents State, Territory and Commonwealth activity (both targeted and foundational) supporting young people in transition. It also addresses the issues for vulnerable young people against recommendations 16 to 23 of the Footprints to the Future report and is published on the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs website at http://www.curriculum.edu.au/mceetya/stepping/index.htm.

A collaborative, cross-disciplinary research programme has been initiated, involving leading national research organisations. The programme, with advice from the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs Transition from School Taskforce, is proposing to undertake two projects to facilitate a more integrated framework for monitoring and reporting young people’s transitions.

Enhancing career and transition support

The Career and Transition pilot programme commenced in April 2002. A total of $3.6m has been committed to 23 projects operating across Australia for 12 months. The programme aims to test and evaluate alternative ways of enhancing the information, support, guidance and advice on career and transition currently being provided to all young people aged 13 to 19 years. The pilots have been designed to enhance, complement and build upon existing career and transition services in local communities. The aim is to develop new strategies for these services to work together more effectively and efficiently so they can deliver timely, accurate and relevant information to young people.

Career information products

The Job Guide provides information on careers, education and training. The Job Guide is written primarily for Year 10 students but provides useful information for all age groups. The department produced and distributed 272 000 printed copies and 30 000 CD-ROM versions of Job Guide 2000 in 2001-02. Job Guide 2000 was distributed through schools for all Year 10 students and can be found on the internet at http://jobguide.dest.gov.au. The occupational data developed through the annual updating of the Job Guide contributes to the occupational information base for myfuture.edu.au, an Internet-based national career information system launched in July 2002. More information about myfuture.edu.au can be found in Chapter 5 of this Annual Report under Priority 3.

Other career information and job search booklets, leaflets and posters were also produced in hard copy and published on the Internet. They provide information to school students and other Australians about employment, education and training options, job search techniques and the world of work.

Enterprise and Career Education

The department provides funding to the Enterprise and Career Education Foundation to encourage effective partnerships that link businesses, schools and communities to create a diversity of learning experiences for young people.

Through a range of activities, the Foundation works to support the reshaping of Australian schooling and to ensure young people make effective transitions from school to work through enterprise learning and informed career choice.

Key activities include creating opportunities for students to learn practical workplace skills recognised by industry and the education system. In the 2001 calendar year students undertook 85 094 structured work placements.

In the 2001-02 Federal Budget, the government provided an additional $9.285m to the Enterprise and Career Education Foundation. The funds were to extend local partnership coordinator arrangements into remote areas of central and northern Australia. Local partnership coordinator activities involve promoting partnerships between industry and education at the local level, and facilitating structured work placements.

As an initial step in this four-year Commonwealth funded programme, the Foundation is planning regional scoping activities, particularly in the Northern Territory, Queensland and Western Australia.

The Enterprise and Career Education Programme supports the development of an enterprising culture in Australian schools. It assists young people to develop the skills, attitudes and attributes to make smooth transitions through and from school to work and/or further education and training. The Enterprise and Career Education Foundation plays a key role in the Programme by assisting industry to develop partnerships with schools and their communities at the local level.

The project, Action Research to Identify Innovative Approaches to, and Best Practice in, Enterprise Education in Australian Schools, began in 2001-02. The 200 primary and secondary schools participating in the project are reviewing, analysing and documenting their enterprise education experiences. This project will provide insight into key issues for implementation and participation in enterprise education.

Between July and August 2001, eight Business Seminars were conducted in each capital city. The seminars promoted the activities under the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs’ New Framework for Vocational Education in Schools and encouraged businesses to become involved, in a practical way, by working with local schools and offering work place training for school students.

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Performance information for Strategic Priority Four

For information on student learning outcomes and post-school outcomes of school students see Section 4 of Chapter 3.

• Number of students participating in vocational education, enterprise and career education activities across all years in schooling

The number of students undertaking vocational education and training in schools programmes in 2001 had grown to 169 809, up from 153 616 students in 2000. School-based New Apprenticeships also grew, with State and Territory government and non-government sectors reporting that 5755 Training Agreements were commenced in 2001. This is an increase from the 4288 school-based New Apprenticeships commencements reported for 2000. In 2001, nearly 95 per cent of schools with senior secondary school programmes were offering vocational education and training.

Table 11: Students participating in vocational education and training in schools and school-based New Apprenticeship commencements, selected years.

Note: na: not available
Source: Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs, Transition from School Taskforce Report, July 2002.

• There are effective transition strategies available for students moving from schooling to education, training or work.

The Commonwealth has a range of programmes aimed at assisting young people to make effective transitions from school to work, including enterprise and career education and the Jobs Pathway programme. Details on specific programme initiatives progressed during 2001-02 are outlined above. Effective transitions will be reflected in the participation of young people in education, training and work. Section 4 of Chapter 3 provides information of the participation of young people in education and training.

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Section 3 – other activities that broadly support Outcome 1

Disability Discrimination Act

Section 31 of the Disability Discrimination Act provides for the Attorney-General to formulate standards, known as disability standards, in relation to a range of areas including the education of persons with disabilities. The primary purpose of the proposed Disability Standards for Education is to clarify and make more explicit the rights of people with disabilities and the obligations of education and training services providers in relation to participation in education and training under the Act. Work on the Standards has been underway since 1995. It has been undertaken by a national collaborative process sponsored by the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs. State and Territory government and non-government education and training jurisdictions, higher education and private vocational education and training providers, the Attorney-General’s Department and members of the disability sector have collaborated on addressing issues relating to the Standards. It is proposed that the work be concluded by end 2002.

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Research and Evaluation

A substantial component of the department’s research and evaluation effort was focused on Outcome 1. This is consistent with a range of government priorities including the effort to improve literacy and numeracy outcomes.

The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), a major OECD assessment of students’ knowledge and skills, is among the larger of these projects. During 2001-02 the first results of the programme were released. It is designed to assess the preparedness for life of young people beyond schooling in reading, mathematical and scientific literacy. Australian students performed extremely well in the PISA 2000. Only Finland outperformed our students in reading literacy. Only Japan outperformed our students in mathematical literacy. Only two countries, Korea and Japan, did significantly better in scientific literacy.

Australia’s involvement in the Third International Mathematics and Science Study continued in 2001-02. This included continuing analysis of video data aimed at assessing the relationship between teaching practice and student performance.

A new Third International Mathematics and Science Study project, Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study 2002-03, commenced in 2001-02. Australian students will undertake the main assessment in the second half of 2002.

The department is funding the following research and development activities to support the implementation of the National Literacy and Numeracy Plan and the literacy and numeracy goal:

• a mapping, review and analysis of Australian research in numeracy learning at the primary school level;

• an analysis of numeracy in the early years;

• development of materials aimed at promoting awareness of the importance of numeracy to parents;

• home, school and community partnerships to support children’s numeracy development;

• a number of strategic numeracy research projects in States and Territories to identify effective numeracy teaching and learning practices;

• a project to investigate the literacy development of boys;

• effective teaching and learning practices leading to improved literacy outcomes in the early years of schooling;

• preparation of teachers to teach English literacy and numeracy in the primary and secondary schools; and

• investigating literacy and numeracy development in the middle years.

The department progressed a project to research, analyse and report on how systemic factors affecting education performance and outcomes of boys can be addressed in schools. It also undertook in-house research into boys’ educational issues and provided a supplementary submission to the Inquiry into Boys’ Education by the House of Representatives Committee on Education and Training.

A literature review was undertaken to identify key effective teaching and learning practices when using information and computer technology in primary or secondary schools. The project looked at how these can be used with disadvantaged students to enrich and enhance their learning outcomes.

The department also undertook research and analysis of issues related to supply and demand of primary and secondary teachers in Australia. This was in collaboration with representatives from State and Territory education departments and the Catholic and Independent Schools Sectors.

Under the department’s Research Fellowship Scheme, Dr Anne Jasman, of the University of Melbourne, undertook major research into the nature and quality of teacher professional development and its impact on student learning outcomes. This research contributed significantly to the understanding of the intersections between these two areas, and will help the department understand how to improve the quality of teaching and schooling.

Work has also been undertaken to investigate gaps in data on early childhood development and ways to improve these gaps. As part of this, the department has helped develop the Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Children which are expected to provide information to aid early childhood policy. We also provided seed funding for the Australian Research Alliance for Children and Youth – a national collaborative project whose purpose is to facilitate the generation and translation of knowledge to enhance the wellbeing and life chances of children and young people.

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Section 4 – Summary of the achievements against this Outcome

Australian students performed extremely well in the Programme for International Student Assessment 2000 that assesses how well young people are prepared for life beyond schooling in reading, mathematical and scientific literacy. Only Finland outperformed our students in reading literacy. Only Japan outperformed our students in mathematical literacy. Only two countries, Korea and Japan, did significantly better in scientific literacy.

Education authorities reported literacy and numeracy outcomes against nationally agreed literacy and numeracy benchmarks through the annual National Report on Schooling. Benchmark data for 2000 for Year 3 and Year 5 reading and numeracy was published in 2002. Importantly, the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs, reaffirmed its commitment to developing meaningful and comprehensible reports to parents on student achievement. During the year work also continued on the assessment of student achievement in science at primary school.

The development of the terms of reference and arrangements for a review of teaching and teacher education were progressed during the year, for announcement in August 2002.

In response to concerns about the achievement of boys, the department progressed research to analyse and report on how systemic factors affecting education performance and outcomes of boys can be addressed in schools.

During 2001-02 the National Indigenous English Literacy and Numeracy Strategy has contributed to greater involvement of Indigenous parents and communities in their children’s education, increased the employment of Indigenous people in the classroom; and applied approaches to improve the quality and amount of professional development on Indigenous education available to teachers of Indigenous students.

Following the findings of the Prime Minister’s Youth Pathways Action Plan Taskforce in its report Footprints to the Future, significant progress has been made toward a coordinated national approach to providing career and transition information and support for young people.

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