BY JOHN GAUCI
SYDNEY — While the federal Coalition government siphons $700 million from public to private schools through its commonwealth state grants act, the NSW Labor government is planning to sell off Marrickville, Maroubra, Hunters Hill and Vaucluse high schools. Four local primary schools — Erskineville, Redfern, Waterloo and Alexandria — are also to be closed and merged into a single school at Cleveland St High.
The NSW government's document outlining its proposal for school restructuring, Building the Future, couldn't be more inappropriately titled.
Students from Cleveland High, where Aboriginal children make up 60% of enrolments, are expected to go to a new facility called Wingara Secondary College which will only offer vocational courses and classes from years 7-10. Students will be unable to complete their school certificate or Higher School Certificate there and will have to travel to single-sex schools outside the area at Leichhardt or Balmain.
The May edition of Class Action, publication of Promotion of Public Education (POPE), points out that Building the Future doesn't provide any evidence that the school closures, mergers and increased emphasis on selective single-sex schools would result in better educational outcomes.
Building the Future makes general statements such as "there are fewer children in modern families" and "there is a growing demand" for single-sex and selective schools without providing any statistical evidence.
On the contrary, POPE says the trend is for parents to choose co-educational rather than single-sex schools. "Enrolments in government boys' schools have fallen by 4000 since 1990, with only 2000 more students in girls' schools since then, compared to the 6000 increase in comprehensive enrolments since 1990. Yet two single-sex schools are proposed in the reshuffle."
NSW education minister John Aquilina argues that restructuring is needed because of falling enrolments in public schools in these areas. Molesworth responds that the government's figures fail to take into account future population changes. He used the example of Waterloo primary which has been targeted for closure despite new building development being underway in the vicinity of the school.
The proposed restructuring will eat up money which would be better spent on providing adequate teachers and other resources. Currently, hundreds of classes each day are cancelled in schools across Sydney because of unfilled teacher vacancies and the difficulty of getting casual teachers to fill all of the vacancies.
While federal Labor crows about its "Knowledge Nation" policy, NSW Labor is creating a two-tiered education system. The NSW Labor government already allocates a large portion of its education budget to private schools, and the proposed selective schools will be located in the more affluent parts of Sydney.
Public opposition to the school closures and selling off of school property has already resulted in a couple of thousand people attending public meetings organised by parents at Marrickville, Glebe, Dulwich Hill, Leichhardt and Hunters Hill schools.
In response, Aquilina has changed his rhetoric. When the plan was first proposed, he stated that the Building the Future plan was not negotiable. Now he says that it is only a "draft" and there is room for "compromise".
The government's new tactic is being used to play some schools off against others in order to implement the bulk of its plan. Some school principals and parents have fallen for this approach, arguing that their school should be saved by shutting another school down.
This is a big mistake. Building the Future needs to be rejected in its entirety because it is one more government plan to further reduce access to public education.
While only some schools are being targeted for closure and merger in the current plan, if the government gets away with implementing its plan this time, it will make it easier to target other schools in the future. That's why it's important that people living in areas where schools aren't destined for closure or merger — this time — should support the campaign against this round of school closures.
A Save Our Schools group involving rank-and-file teachers, parents and students, mostly from the effected schools, has begun campaigning against the school restructuring.
However, for the campaign to be a Sydney-wide campaign, the NSW Teachers Federation needs to be involved. It ought to be pointing out to teachers across Sydney that if the current school closures aren't fought, it will be easier for the government to close down other schools in the future.
University of Western Sydney education academic Kelvin McQueen says that "[NSW] Teachers Federation would prefer to run dead on the issue, if not for the strong community outcry. Federation officials knew about the proposed closures last October but didn't let it out. Federation officials are too close to the Labor Party and desperately want them re-elected. Federation can be forced to act if the campaign continues to grow bigger and stronger."
The Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union has already promised to ban any demolition of schools or construction on the threatened school sites. This needs to be matched by the NSW Teachers Federation placing bans on any new schools that open as a result of the proposed closures and organising teachers to take strike action against the closures. P&C committees should pass resolutions in support of teachers taking industrial action against the restructuring.
If the Teachers Federation begins to take this sort of action, it will be easier to build the united, Sydney-wide campaign that is necessary to defeat the closures.