Tasmanian premier and education minister David Bartlett's flagship education reforms have become a thorn in his side in the run up to the March 20 state election, with Australian Education Union (AEU) members campaigning for a vote against Labor.
Launched in January 2009, Labor's "Tasmania Tomorrow" policy sought to reverse low student retention rates. But the changes have proved to be an organisational disaster for students and teachers.
The reforms merged Tasmania's secondary colleges with TAFE and created three new organisations: the Tasmanian Academy (pathway to university), Tasmanian Polytechnic (vocational training) and the Skills Institute (training in the workforce). It was claimed students' and industry's needs would be met and retention would improve.
The reforms were not only flawed in their conception, but also mismanaged:
• they divide students by imposing a choice over academic or vocational pathways at the end of grade 10, which serves only to reinforce inequalities in the community;
• the statewide management structure replaced the autonomy of a college, leaving staff disempowered and less able to respond to student needs;
• the new bureaucracy has meant management tasks on shared Polytechnic/Academy campuses are duplicated, leaving fewer resources on the ground;
• the complexities of timetabling a shared campus have actually reduced student course options; and
• on one campus, in the second year of implementation, the reforms left students with no timetables and teachers with no classrooms on the first day of term.
However, the motivation behind the reforms was not improved teaching and learning or better retention. Instead, cost-cutting and privatisation were priorities. For example, rather than provide courses in-house, as TAFE did, the Skills Institute has tendered for external providers at the lowest price, reducing education provision to the pressures of the market economy.
At stop-work meetings in November, 90% of Tasmanian post-year 10 teachers voted to call for a roll-back of Tasmania Tomorrow. Bartlett said he would let the electorate decide.
He has been held to his word. A second round of state-wide stop-work meetings has called Tasmanians to vote to scrap the reforms. Teachers have distributed 60,000 leaflets to press their case.
Teachers and supporters from across the state rallied in Hobart on March 14. The Greens, Socialist Alliance, independent Andrew Wilkie, and also the Liberals, have supported the union positioning their pre-election pledges, leaving Labor isolated on this key election issue.
[Jenny Forward is the Socialist Alliance candidate for Franklin.]<