Gillard ups the stakes again in My School battle

By Ry Crozier on Feb 8, 2010 12:47 PM
Filed under Software

Political football.

The Federal Government has stepped up pressure on the education union to support the controversial My School website by dangling an $11 million additional funding carrot in front of disadvantaged schools.

Education Minister Julia Gillard claimed today that 110 "lower performing literacy and numeracy schools" to benefit from the funding injection would have "missed out... if the My School data wasn't available".

"[These schools]... would have fallen through the cracks," Gillard said.

"It is amazing that an education union would reject additional funding for education simply because they object to giving parents more information about their local schools."

Union president Angelo Gavrielatos said Gillard was trying to "cover the flaws in the My School website by misrepresenting the union's position on school funding."

He said the union had welcomed the new funding, although he said the amount was "inadequate" to address the issues.

"What we questioned is why this $11 million could only be allocated after the My School website went live," Gavrielatos said.

"There is a wealth of data on school performance and student background collected by state and territory governments.

"Already much of the $2 billion [previously] promised [to schools] by the Federal Government is being distributed on the basis of that data.

"The only difference the My School website has made is to introduce an index which produces like school comparisons which are clearly misleading and wrong."

The Government has been locked in a long-term battle with the union over the My School website, which surfaces data from national tests of students and uses an index to enable parents to compare "like" schools.

The union wants to stop the website being used for the creation of "league tables" which it said were used to name and shame underperforming schools.

It has threatened that teachers will boycott the next round of national tests that feed data to the My School website if the Government doesn't back down.

Gillard has countered by "not ruling anything out" when it comes to disciplinary or legal action if the teachers make good on their threat.

The index methodology underpinning the site has also been heavily criticised for anomalies that make some of Australia's richest and poorest schools "statistically similar" to one another.

Gillard ups the stakes again in My School battle

8 comments in this discussion

"rycrozier: "comparisons between "statistically similar" schools is flawed" Agreed, We didn't take any notice of that particular data because there was no adequate explanation of what it meant. ..."

By Sams

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Comments: 8

srmdrummer Feb 8, 2010 1:16 PM	Putting aside, for a moment the rubbish that is the data used for comparison, the fact that Gillard is using funding as a rationale is laughable. Is she seriously insisting that My School was necessary to achieve some measure of which schools are in need of extra financial support? Government data could just as easily have been collected/collated and NOT made public on a website and the same end achieved. Nevermind the fact the data itself is a flawed, narrow measure of school 'performance', her argument is even worse!
Sams Feb 8, 2010 2:34 PM	I haven't formed any strong opinion on this, but I did think the site was useful when we went to compare the three state primary schools that are near us. As long as you keep in mind that there are other measures of a schools' worth, I'm not too concerned. With our daughter being of Ethiopian decent, we are particularly interested in school attitudes and record with regard to race, cultures, language, and so on. You could equally argue that exams are a flawed, narrow measure of student's performance --- and I would agree. However, when I was a lecturer at QUT, I still used them as a fraction of the total assessment, because despite being flawed and incomplete, there is no better alternative for some aspects of learning without being able to read students' minds. Particularly when you have 200 students!
Daveh Feb 8, 2010 3:14 PM	The only thing i find interesting is the lack of direction that the government is providing. Is their any wonder that the AEU is worried and complaining. The government has announced sweeping reforms which have amounted to a lot said and one website. Perhaps the real issue is that the government hasn't come out with a long term plan with goals and an approach. Big Fail commonwealth government.
laman Feb 8, 2010 5:59 PM	If the data presented by MySchool web site is wrong, then the Union should assist in making it right. Only underperforming schools are claiming that the data is wrong. To be honest, if the schools are underperforming , why can't they be named. Why are people so afraid of the facts? If they think tests need to be done for every school year, speak out. If they think any other measurable areas should also be included, speak out. Don't tell me about all the creative thinking etc which is not countable. I am not saying creative or leadership education is rubbish, all I am saying is that we need something measurable.
rycrozier Feb 8, 2010 9:57 PM	@laman, I don't think the union is saying the data is wrong. There is a suggestion that the index created by the Government to make comparisons between "statistically similar" schools is flawed. Not entirely baseless one might suspect. The weighting of the index might be wrong. I believe it is being reviewed...
legless Feb 8, 2010 10:14 PM	laman: obviously the schools that appear to be performing to par or above aren't going to complain as the results make them look good. d'oh. The data is probably reasonably accurate but the algorithm is the problem. We know the method used to measure "hits" was messed up and probably intentional to make the site look like people were flocking there. Who knows what else is wrong. None of these government websites has done any good at all, and after costing millions of dollars, they've all been shut down. MySchool will likely end up in the bin too. There will be a whole new reason for kids to be bullied now. "My school is so much better than your school, you loser." Great plan. It's simple. If you want government schools to perform better, stop funding private schools with public money.
Digger11 Feb 9, 2010 7:58 AM	Well, I think it is a great website. I now a family who is moving to Adelaide in 2 weeks and they have used it to select a good school. All of the whining seems to come from people who have trouble with hearing and readigng the truth. i.e. unions, bludging teachers, and the whinging lefties. Must admit, there is no need to appease these groups (as the govt. has realised) as they will never be happy. p.s. @legless - I doubt bullying would come from this - it is usually the kids form the poorer schools that try to bully the richer kids anyway (at least it was that way on the bus I used to catch to high school).
Sams Feb 9, 2010 10:15 AM	rycrozier: "comparisons between "statistically similar" schools is flawed" Agreed, We didn't take any notice of that particular data because there was no adequate explanation of what it meant. From a technical, usability, and, I suspect, accessibility perspective, the site scores poorly though, and I shudder to think how much money was spent on it.