Pyne's Gonski shambles

Last, arguments used to justify school funding since the 1950s are in serious, perhaps terminal trouble. Treasury warnings last year that government spending was rising faster than government income are now echoed across the ideological spectrum. Whatever the upshot of the current political tussle we are headed for hard budgetary times. How will schooling justify its demand for more?

For more than 50 years the claim has been that more funding would allow smaller classes and a more professional teaching profession, and that would in turn bring better and more equal schooling. It has not worked out that way. Per student per year real-terms funding has multiplied at least two and a half times since the mid 1960s. The salaries and status of teachers are no better than they were half a century ago.

While much has improved in schooling there is no evidence to suggest better outcomes or more equality in key areas of learning, and certainly none commensurate with either funding increases or class size reductions.

Gonski encouraged attention to where and how the money is spent, but also maintained a long tradition by insisting that money would be better used only if there was more of it. The question now on the agenda for all concerned, including Gonski's legion of supporters, is whether more can in fact be done with the same, or less.