Community Alliance Party

Both Labor and Liberal have missed the mark in promising smaller class sizes across the board, when it would be better to target resources to those who need it.

Jane Tullis, Community Alliance Party Candidate for Ginninderra said today, "One of the biggest issues in ACT education is one of equity, and this should be addressed by providing more resources for those students who have fallen behind, increasing the level of welfare and behavioural support, and building more and stronger home-school partnerships."

There is a lot of research on how to improve educational equity, and systems in other countries have managed to do better than our own. OECD data show that it is possible to have high average school outcomes without leaving students from poor or disadvantaged backgrounds behind. Finland is a prime example of this.

"Rather than promising across the board increases in the number of teachers, more could be achieved by increasing the numbers of assistants in classrooms. If elected, the Community Alliance would provide the resources for training to community members and parents who want it to get involved with their local school." said Mrs Tullis.

ACT Labor's election promises demonstrate that there is no shortage of money.

At the high school level, a priority is to increase counsellor numbers and face-to-face teaching time teachers had before the current EBA.

Nonetheless, more than counsellors are required. It takes a community to raise a child, and so a team approach is something the Community Alliance strongly supports. This team would include teachers and parents as equal partners, while providing access to other professions as needed. These would include social workers, counsellors and health professionals. The increase in mental health issues in students in recent years is argument enough for this approach.

Contact: Jane Tullis