For the second KYD No. 14 teaser, Ben Eltham examines the school system in Australia and how the Gonski reforms will play out after the federal election. 

To read the rest of Ben’s piece, grab a copy of Issue Fourteen, available online 3rd July!

I come from a teaching family. My parents met at Burwood Teacher’s College in Melbourne in the 1960s. You can still see some of the original buildings today, where, perhaps fittingly, I now work, having recently secured a position at Burwood’s modern incarnation, Deakin University.

My dad went on to a varied career in the public service, as a social work lecturer, an advisor to a state education minister, and later, in the private sector. My mum remained a teacher. Over a remarkable 40-year career, she has taught everywhere from country Victoria to Brixton in London. Now, at the age of 68, she’s about to retire as the principal of a primary school, deep in the tough outer suburbs of Ipswich, in Queensland. She’s implemented a national curriculum, secured millions of dollars of extra funding from the state and Commonwealth, and battled a devastating flood, which submerged half the school’s classrooms in a metre of Bremer River mud.

Ben Eltham is New Matilda’s National Affairs Correspondent. He is a Fellow of the Centre for Policy Development and a Research Fellow at Deakin University’s Centre for Memory, Imagination and Invention.

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