Rally condemns league tables

Issue 

The campaign against league tables continued on May 11 with a protest organised by the Inner City Teachers Association (ICTA) of the NSW Teachers Federation.

Fifty people rallied outside the office of NSW education minister Verity Firth. After the Australian Education Union federal executive’s last-minute decision to lift the ban on the National Assessment Program — Literacy and Numeracy tests, the action showed the campaign against league tables, and the damage they do to school communities, will continue.

Speakers included John Gauci, ICTA secretary, Pat Donohoe, secretary of the Canterbury-Bankstown Teachers Association, and Michael Thomson, Sydney university branch president of the National Tertiary Education Union.

Protesters marched to the office of federal Labor MP Tanya Plibersek, where they also heard from Bob Treasure from the Lower Blue Mountains Teachers Association and ICTA’s Richard Walsham.