-- A NATIONAL board of studies with control of a uniform school curriculum is being proposed by the Howard Government in an attempt to wrest back control of schools from "ideologues" in state and territory education departments.
Education Minister Julie Bishop will attack state education bureaucrats and accuse them of hijacking school curriculums, distorting them with "Chairman Mao" type ideologies in a speech to the History Teachers Association of Australia today.
What is she banging on about, the Age says she is, “Firing the latest salvo in the culture wars”; and “In an explosive speech.” What about the left?
But the Victorian Government, Federal Opposition, teachers and principals immediately dismissed the idea of a national curriculum as ill-informed bullying that would not improve educational standards.
Usually when the left squeals/protests, I naturally assume it must be a good thing.
"Some of the themes emerging in school curriculum are straight from Chairman Mao. We are talking serious ideology here," she will say. "Ideologues ... have hijacked school curriculum and are experimenting with the education of our young people from a comfortable position of unaccountability.
Ms Bishop is calling for a national debate on the need for a common national school curriculum, saying there is widespread community concern about the content being taught in schools.
Yes, lets have a national debate, why is the left scared of that [see above they ‘immediately dismissed the idea’], not interested in listening or debating. I thought they were all for meetings and endless waffling, at least they are when it concerns global terrorism and dealing with terrorists.
"How is that we have gone from teaching Latin in Year 12 to teaching remedial English in first-year university?" she says.
"The curriculum must be challenging, aiming for high standards, and not accepting the lowest common denominator.”It seems we are lowering the educational bar to make sure everyone gets over it, not raising it to aspire to excellence."
Ms Bishop's attack comes after The Australian highlighted education bureaucrats who have failed to monitor effectively curriculums and the quality of education and who have become captive to teachers' unions.
Last month, The Australian published the views of professor Ken Wiltshire, Australia's representative on the executive of the UN education body UNESCO and the architect of the Queensland curriculum under the Goss Labor government.
Professor Wiltshire argued that state Labor governments had relinquished control of any system that effectively measured the standard of what was taught in schools and teacher performance.
"Our school curriculums have strayed far from being knowledge-based," he said. "Indeed, knowledge has been replaced by information. It is little wonder that the Howard Government's attempted reforms of schooling have gained traction with the Australian public."
In April, The Australian reported how literary study in Australia had been declared "dead" by Harold Bloom, one of the world's leading authorities on the works of William Shakespeare. After learning that a prestigious Sydney girls school had asked students to apply Marxist, feminist and racial analysis to the play Othello, the internationally renowned critic said: "I find the question sublimely stupid.
Ms Bishop says a national curriculum would be subject to greater public scrutiny and so would be more accountable to the community.
I think this is also another reason the left is squealing, accountability means someone might get to question their pie-in-the-sky theories.
This would also remove the duplication of effort and resources currently spent by states developing individual curriculums. She says the states and territories collectively spend more than $180 million running their boards of studies and curriculum councils to develop very similar curriculums in identical subjects.
Wow, 180 million bucks saved, as a tax payer, go right ahead lady.
"There are currently nine different year 12 certificates across Australia, each backed by separate curriculum developed by eight different education authorities," she says.
"Is it necessary for each state to develop a separate curriculum? "Do we need to have a physics curriculum developed for Queensland, and another, almost identical physics curriculum for Western Australia?
Perhaps gravity and acceleration are different in the alternate universe that leftists seem to inhabit. Click here, to see what leftists can to do Geography.
Education Minister Julie Bishop will attack state education bureaucrats and accuse them of hijacking school curriculums, distorting them with "Chairman Mao" type ideologies in a speech to the History Teachers Association of Australia today.
What is she banging on about, the Age says she is, “Firing the latest salvo in the culture wars”; and “In an explosive speech.” What about the left?
But the Victorian Government, Federal Opposition, teachers and principals immediately dismissed the idea of a national curriculum as ill-informed bullying that would not improve educational standards.
Usually when the left squeals/protests, I naturally assume it must be a good thing.
"Some of the themes emerging in school curriculum are straight from Chairman Mao. We are talking serious ideology here," she will say. "Ideologues ... have hijacked school curriculum and are experimenting with the education of our young people from a comfortable position of unaccountability.
Ms Bishop is calling for a national debate on the need for a common national school curriculum, saying there is widespread community concern about the content being taught in schools.
Yes, lets have a national debate, why is the left scared of that [see above they ‘immediately dismissed the idea’], not interested in listening or debating. I thought they were all for meetings and endless waffling, at least they are when it concerns global terrorism and dealing with terrorists.
"How is that we have gone from teaching Latin in Year 12 to teaching remedial English in first-year university?" she says.
"The curriculum must be challenging, aiming for high standards, and not accepting the lowest common denominator.”It seems we are lowering the educational bar to make sure everyone gets over it, not raising it to aspire to excellence."
Ms Bishop's attack comes after The Australian highlighted education bureaucrats who have failed to monitor effectively curriculums and the quality of education and who have become captive to teachers' unions.
Last month, The Australian published the views of professor Ken Wiltshire, Australia's representative on the executive of the UN education body UNESCO and the architect of the Queensland curriculum under the Goss Labor government.
Professor Wiltshire argued that state Labor governments had relinquished control of any system that effectively measured the standard of what was taught in schools and teacher performance.
"Our school curriculums have strayed far from being knowledge-based," he said. "Indeed, knowledge has been replaced by information. It is little wonder that the Howard Government's attempted reforms of schooling have gained traction with the Australian public."
In April, The Australian reported how literary study in Australia had been declared "dead" by Harold Bloom, one of the world's leading authorities on the works of William Shakespeare. After learning that a prestigious Sydney girls school had asked students to apply Marxist, feminist and racial analysis to the play Othello, the internationally renowned critic said: "I find the question sublimely stupid.
Ms Bishop says a national curriculum would be subject to greater public scrutiny and so would be more accountable to the community.
I think this is also another reason the left is squealing, accountability means someone might get to question their pie-in-the-sky theories.
This would also remove the duplication of effort and resources currently spent by states developing individual curriculums. She says the states and territories collectively spend more than $180 million running their boards of studies and curriculum councils to develop very similar curriculums in identical subjects.
Wow, 180 million bucks saved, as a tax payer, go right ahead lady.
"There are currently nine different year 12 certificates across Australia, each backed by separate curriculum developed by eight different education authorities," she says.
"Is it necessary for each state to develop a separate curriculum? "Do we need to have a physics curriculum developed for Queensland, and another, almost identical physics curriculum for Western Australia?
Perhaps gravity and acceleration are different in the alternate universe that leftists seem to inhabit. Click here, to see what leftists can to do Geography.
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