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The Minister for Education has, once again, shown his ability to use statistics to prop up even the most specious of arguments, says Jane Tullis, Ginninderra candidate for the Community Alliance Party. "This week's announcement of the results of a survey of parents exiting and entering ACT public schools trumpeted loudly the wishes of parents regarding quality schools and quality teaching, but failed to identify the low response rate and the fact that families are still leaving the public system," said Mrs Tullis. According to Mrs Tullis, the Minister has extrapolated from a handful of respondents to approximately 63,000 students across the entire ACT education system, of which some 38,000 are in public schools. The Community Alliance is supportive of public education: placing teachers and students and the communities at the fore, rather than treating them as numbers to be analysed for political gain. "Our approach is one of working with communities to improve outcomes. We hear a lot of good and bad stories from across the entire education sector, and we constantly hear of a bureaucratic reluctance to tackle the hard issues," she said. "This is something we want to redress." "Even this survey, limited as it is, supports what parents were saying loudly during the school closures of 2005 and 2006: it is quality of education that is important to them," she said. "But in 2006 he still listed almost every school smaller than 200 students, plus a few larger ones for good measure, and then proceeded to close some very, very good schools," she said. "It is very telling that he didn't survey families from closed schools, even though that caused a large movement of students from the public sector." According to Mrs Tullis, if the Minister had been serious about education he would have done the groundwork and research to identify how ACT education could be improved without wantonly closing schools. The Community Alliance believes that good policy is based on evidence and feedback gathered before any decision is made, and is committed to seeing this happen in the ACT. Contact: Jane Tullis
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The Community Alliance Party is a dynamic alliance of ACT residents, community groups, and business people. We are seeking to establish balanced government and to make our Capital a better and more affordable place to live. We will achieve this through:
