Why do we all think it’s ok for poor kids to learn less?
My family lives in a disadvantaged community. According to the Australian Bureau of Statisitcs, we are the 7th most disadvantaged community in New South Wales.
I work at our local youth centre and volunteer at my childrens’ primary school and I am shocked to see the signs of poverty around me: the amount of people missing teeth, struggling with drug addictions, malnourished or obese.
So when the governments new My School website came out, I expected our school to rate poorly. In fact I was more frustrated to see that we were rated against schools in less disadvantaged areas than I was by our rating in the straight comparisons.
I focused on my son’s results. He was in Year 3 last year and he did fine.
It wasn’t until yesterday when I was talking with a friend who’s thinking of pulling his daughter from the school because of the results that it hit me. Why on earth should I expect that our school should be worse off than others?
Why do I nod my head and agree that we should be pitted against similar schools. Do we really think it is ok to say that kids from worse off areas should be doing worse at school? Do we actually think that poorer kids are more stupid? Or less deserving?
My nephew goes to a public school in the Eastern Suburbs of Sydney. His school rated well, as I would expect. The majority of those kids have parents who have done a Uni degree. They can help their kids with their homework, they encourage them to read. So yes, those kids have more support.
But doesn’t that mean that the kids at our school should be compensated with extra teachers, more resources, counseling support, and literacy support for parents? I mean there is so much that could be done. But here is the cruncher.
We are funded exactly the same as my nephew’s school.
The funding for disadvantaged schools, Priority School Funding Program, is calculated every few years by a parent survey checking parent education levels. And while there are loads of parents who would have left school at or before Year 10 at our school, there was a spike of parents who had completed University degrees in the year of the survey so we didn’t receive any extra funding.
Many of those families have since left the school to go to the private system, and the ones that are still there are not particularly involved in the school.
The school is scrounging for money to pay for a few recorders, our home readers date back to the 1970’s and the school counsellor attends one day a week.
So while it is easy to blame the teachers and the principal for our poor results in the My School testings, I think we need to look at the class system we are living within. We like to think we are all equal in Australia, a good go for all. But there is a class system that isn’t easy to move around and poor kids are suffering for it.
Liz Keen is a freelance journalist with more than a decades experience. In that time she’s produced radio documentaries for ABC Radio National’s: Street Stories, All in the Mind, Background Briefing and Life Matters. She also writes for the Sydney Morning Herald and Australian Country Style. For the last 18 months Liz has been coordinating the micro fiction website 12words.com.au. Liz is also on the board of the MicroLoan Foundation, Australia and is active in her community on the Mid North Coast of New South Wales. Read more from Liz at lizkeen.blogspot.com
jennifer Barthe
February 12, 2010 at 2:03 am
Your fight for the underdog
Your fight for the underdog is admirable and the world must always have people who will help the under privileged. However, from many avenues there are scholarships and funding for people who would like to achieve more at school. It is at the end of their toes, but for most of these people it wouldn’t even occur to them to look at their toes let alone bend down to pick it up and take it for themselves. They do not want it.
What you are suggesting is the under-privileged, who likely have genetically a lower intellect level, should have more funds then a person from an average home with an average intellect, or from an affluent home with a superior intellect. Or a melange of this.
Do you think it would be better to focus on the individual who can make a difference to their well-being and that of their community than the masses who are happy in their ignorance? Why are these people under-privileged?
Would a broad form education put them in a better situation? Or should education centres be created based on intellect, skill, affluence and are tailored to a career/apprentiship?