Much of the fuss over the My School website and league tables is based on a fear that parents will over-react to information that is only a very partial …

Associate Professor Craig Campbell has form for dubious use of ‘neoliberalism‘ as an explainer. Twelve months ago I took Campbell and his co-authors of School Choice to task for making …

Professor Campbell said he agreed with commentators such as the academic Michael Pusey who have argued that the rise of neo-liberalism has contributed to undermining confidence in public institutions.
The middle …

From the Sunday Age this morning:
A Labor source said the reforms to boost the taxpayer-funded contribution were needed because political parties around the country ”are broke”.
”It’s being put in high-minded …

Julia Gillard wants to to increase the number of low SES students, and to improve their pass and retention rates. The government has now proposed a number of ‘equity’ policies …

Yesterday almost everyone was condemning the South Australian government for requiring blog commenters to use their real names when offering their views on the South Australian election. Now the South …

This morning the major papers have their annual round-up of how much was donated to political parties and who the major donors were in 2008-09.
In my particular concern of political …

At the time of the second intergenerational report, I lamented the rapid increase in family payments. Fortunately the third intergenerational report shows that these have since stabilised.
Indeed, annual per …

As the GFC took hold in late 2008, some people were predicting a trend back to government schools. ‘Parents abandon private schools as downturn bites’ said a SMH headline.
I …

The Grattan Institute has released its first report, an analysis of student progress measures by Ben Jensen. It argues that ‘value-added’ measures – that is, how much students improve between …