The gap between student performance at Australia's richest and poorest schools has widened in the three years since the Gonski report into education was delivered, a new report has found.
The report, written by members of the Need to Succeed Alliance, which champions public education, found the gap widened from 32 to 37 per cent between 2010 and the end of 2013 – with the wealthiest schools performing better and the poorest schools performing markedly worse.
The study was based on an analysis of every Australian school's NAPLAN test results published on the Federal Government's MySchool website.
The study found that on the whole, all student performance was stagnating or worsening, and secondary students' results were worse than those in primary schools.
That came as no surprise to Karen Money, principal at William Ruthven Secondary College in Reservoir, in Melbourne's north.
Seventy-five per cent of Ms Money's students come from non-English speaking backgrounds, and the school has a higher than average number of low-income families.
"If you have students that don't have help from mum and dad at home because they can't speak English ... then those students do need more intensive English support and help at school. And that takes time and money," Ms Money said.
"So from that perspective, you can see why, if that resourcing for those students isn't there, why the gap starts to get wider."
The Gonski report recommended a $5 billion funding boost across all schools, with extra loadings for disadvantaged kids.
But Federal Education Minister Christopher Pyne has said the Government will only fund the first four of the recommended six years of Gonski money.
The states are also yet to sign up to all of the reforms.
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