They have created a consultation paper called 'Stregthening DET regional services and support' and have asked for submissions from education professionals.
Below is my submission.
Regional Services Consultation
T. Shaw April 2015
Preamble
When
I first started teaching in the Central Highlands Region in 1987 the Regional Office
was regarded as a valuable resource for teachers. Consultants were freely available
to support teachers and school programs and initiatives and the regional office
itself had resources available for teachers to freely access. The election of
the Kennett Government saw the dramatic downsizing of Regional Offices and the
end to School Support Centres. School Charters and the Curriculum Standards
Framework was introduced. Roles formerly performed by regional staff were
devolved to schools. The notion of ‘self-governing schools was introduced.
Schools were placed in clusters according to their geographical location and
given the responsibility of managing support staff. Rivalries rather than
co-operation and competitiveness between government schools were encouraged. Over
300 government schools were closed through the Quality Provision process.
The
election of the Brack’s Government saw the expansion of the regions and the
management of school support personnel was once again centralised at a regional
level. Attempts were made to genuinely consult with principals and school
communities and the widespread punitive closure of schools was stopped. My
region was re-branded the Grampians Region and schools were aggregated into
networks and given a Regional Network Leader (RNL). Their role was to foster
co-operation between schools, to identify shared trends across the network
(such as poor results in NAPLAN writing tests beyond year 3 and 5) and maximise
support for affordable professional learning to address shared needs. A
National Curriculum (AusVELS and a standardised student report system was
adopted.)
The
election of the Bailleau/Napthine governments saw the merging of regions (from
9 to 4 incorporating urban and non-urban regions). There was a widespread
reduction in services as these larger regions actually meant a reduction in support
staff available to schools rather than an increase. The networks and RNLs were
abandoned and schools were left to the own devises. Support for small and
remote schools declined culminating in a scathing report by the Auditor General
into the increasing gap between urban and rural educational opportunities and
achievements for students in government schools (May 2013). Schools did adapt
to the laisse fair approach to support
and oversight from a regional level with many schools seeing it as an opportunity
to grow and legitimise previously informal collegiate groups and shared
interest networks to meet shared needs. The last four years has seen Gonski
reforms stalled nationally, a flawed and failed performance and development
regime mishandled, the abandoning of Ultranet, TAFE emasculated and promised increases in
funding ‘misappropriated’(In its final year 450 million of Gonski funding did
not reach the schools that it was promised too). The government was perceived
as a ‘do nothing’ government and the region I’m currently part of (South
Western Victoria) has been mostly invisible and ineffective for the last four
years. The Andrew’s Government was elected in 2014 with the promise to make
Victoria the education state.
Recommendations
Regions
need to be de-merged. Not necessarily to their former boundaries but they are
not working at present and will not if they don’t become more relevant and
approachable to their client schools. A region based in Footscray cannot and
does not respond adequately to the needs of schools in Ballarat and Horsham.
The
Region’s main role should be to manage and ensure the equal distribution of
specialist services to schools. Children are presenting at mainstream
government schools with disabilities and impairments which effect their
learning and schools need the support of trained, experienced staff to support
students with physical and emotional disabilities. It is also essential that
rural and remote schools receive equal access to this essential support.
Regions
have a responsibility to facilitate the engagement of principals and teachers
in developing their understanding of modern trends and innovations in
education. One significant impact of the merging of Grampians Region was that
we lost access to the excellent locally managed and resourced Grampians Teacher
Education Network (GTEN) which provided cost effective professional learning
opportunities using local and ‘imported’ experts meeting the needs of teachers
and principals in our region.
Regions have a role in addressing important issues effecting recognised
cohorts of schools. Every data set used by the Auditor General in his report
entitled ‘Access to Education for Rural Students’ May 2014, found ‘that there
is a persistent gap in achievement and outcomes between rural and metropolitan
students’.
This gap has existed for some time but was exacerbated over the last four
years. As a region encompassing large sections of rural Victoria it would have
been reasonable to expect some action to be taken to ‘close the gap’ but
nothing was and is being done.
A
transparent and accountable state education system is the benchmark for a
diverse education system that aims to meet the educational needs of a
prosperous Victoria. The system of checks and balances we have, helps to
eliminate the excesses and hyperbole of the private education sector often more
interested in manufactured tradition and status (Refer Mowbray College and
others) than an equitable education for all. The region has a role in ensuring
the accountability of principals and School Councils to guarantee that the
needs of the student (as a member of a school community and as an individual) is
the number one priority of every school. Regions should oversee a sustainable
and respected performance and development culture and should actively promote
our system in the same way the Catholic Education Office promotes there’s.
Conclusion
An
effective Regional Office should not act simply as a cypher for Central Office
or be so large that it is too slow to react to the needs of the schools in its
care. I believe that our existing unwieldy regional structure should be
dismantled and replaced with smaller regions. Those regions in rural Victoria
need to be led by a dynamic executive that
has the imagination, organisational skills and enthusiasm to tackle the
significant challenges facing rural schools and educators in 21st
century Victoria.
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