Rankling in the ranking

The OP or Overall Position is the tertiary entrance score measure used in Queensland. It provides a statewide rank order of students based on achievement in recognised subjects studied for the Queensland Senior Certificate.

A scale of one to 25 is used, with those students receiving an OP of 1 considered to be among the top 2 per cent of students in Queensland overall. OPs are used by tertiary institutions such as universities to set quotas, especially in degree programs where there is high demand for places.

This means that the OP is the main determinant of what the minimum acceptable academic standard of achievement is for entry to university programs for those coming direct from Year 12.

Success at school like success at university, however, is about much more than academic achievement. This is made evident in schools where leadership positions are conferred on students whose accomplishments include cultural and community contributions, not solely academic success.

Today's Generation Y is also much more aware of and willing to be involved in community activities to effect social change than previous generations. Some universities, such as the University of Southern Queensland (USQ), is formally recognising this with an award (linked to the USQ graduate attributes), firmly focused on acknowledging individual students involved in activities that have a social dimension, such as volunteering programs.

So, how adequate is the use of a student's academic performance at the end of Year 12, to determine how good a teacher they will make?

Does the OP recognise those essential attributes required of teachers for today's and future schools, such as a committed enthusiasm for teaching and an encouraging mind-set towards children? How do we account for those university applicants, who when provided with the opportunity to complete a teaching program based on criteria other than their academic performance, have gone on to a "successful" teaching career?

Could reliance on a single indicator, namely the OP, mean that potentially excellent future teachers are being excluded from the profession? (A profession that loses up to 25 per cent of its ranks after only five years in the job.)

Some universities already implement broadened selection criteria and many have alternative entry pathway options as part of their equity and access agenda. However, adoption of alternative selection strategies such as interviews is hugely expensive, given the number of students who apply for the number of university places available.

Of course not all students who enter teacher education programs at university, including at USQ, are school leavers; in fact the latter accounts for about 40 per cent of total enrolments in undergraduate degree programs within the USQ Faculty of Education.
There are an increasing number of students who are mature-aged as well as those who enrol in the one-year Graduate Diploma of Learning and Teaching as an end-on teacher education program.

For the majority of mature-aged students, selection includes recognition of prior experience and often an interview and referee reports.

The primary entry selection indicator for school leavers, however, remains school academic performance.

It is interesting that one particular group of Australian universities known as the Australian Technology Network recognised that the engineering profession was potentially missing out on suitable candidates for the profession, because students had not studied the right combination of subjects at school.

In 2007, a test was administered for the first time to identify such candidates and prepare them for study in an engineering program. Of course, aptitude testing of this kind is not new, for example the law and medical professions use tests that focus on skills and attributes considered to be imperative to the profession as a means of entry to university and to identify prospective lawyers, doctors and dentists.

So, what about a test as a means of entry to a teaching degree that complements the current selection processes and reliably measures essential abilities and qualities of an effective teacher? Is it possible to create such a test?

For those who chose to come to USQ in 2007, straight from school to undertake an education degree, the main measure for entry was the OP. Just over 2 per cent of students had an OP between 1 and 5, 20 per cent an OP between 6 and 10, 37 per cent between 11 and 15 and 41 per cent between 16 and 20. At the end of their first year of study the highest academic achievement, known as the Grade Point Average (GPA), went to a student in the OP band of 6 to 10, as did the lowest GPA. There were students who entered their degree program with an OP of 2 who were academically "outperformed" by students who entered with an OP of 16.

This highlights the importance of factors other than academic performance on entry to success, including personal motivation and commitment toward teaching.

Of course students will acquire or develop a whole range of flexible skill sets throughout their time at university, to prepare them as best possible to become quality, beginning teachers.

What is paramount is that universities graduate teachers who have broadly based skills; professional and subject content knowledge and who can support an increasingly diverse learner population. This should be the main emphasis.

It doesn't mean that academic performance as an entry selection criteria isn't important, but it does strongly suggest that the latter be balanced to acknowledge the wealth of research findings that confirm quality teachers possess a variety of characteristics and capabilities - personal as well as professional that impact on their commitment to the profession and their effectiveness in working with young people.

Applicant teachers bring some of these qualities with them to university, others they develop throughout their degree. There should be no compromise on standards achieved at graduation. This is the guarantee that the profession should be able to provide to the Australian public.

Within this context the use of tertiary entrance rankings such as OPs is probably not enough to determine who the next "best" teachers will be.