Transcript - Afternoon Briefing with Patricia Karvelas

PATRICIA KARVELAS, HOST: Elsewhere today in the education space, the Federal Minister for Education, Jason Clare, made a really significant speech saying the heavy lifting to boost year 12 completion rates will need to be done at public schools, and massive change needs to happen. Jason Clare joins us now. Welcome to the program.

JASON CLARE, MINISTER FOR EDUCATION: G'day, PK.

KARVELAS: You are merging a few education agencies to help make state schools catch up to the private sector. How does creating a super bureaucracy help with that?

CLARE: Over the course of the last 12 months, all states and territories have now signed up to agreements to help us fix the funding of public schools right across the country. 

That's worth about an extra $16 billion of Commonwealth investment in our public schools over the next 10 years. And that ratchets up every year. But it's not a blank check. It's tied to real and practical reforms to help to turn around the decline in the number of kids finishing high school. But that's just the first step. 

What we've got to do is make sure that we hit the targets and that we hit the reforms that are in those agreements. And we've got four organisations at the moment that inform and support our school education system. 

There's one called ACARA that maintains the curriculum and runs NAPLAN testing. There's one called AITSL, that sets teaching standards. There's another called AERO, that does the independent research that makes sure that we're using evidence-based practices in the classroom. And then there's a fourth called, ESA, which provides the technology tools for schools. 

What I'm proposing here is that we bring them all under the one roof to improve coordination. But something which is bigger potentially than the sum of its parts, an organisation that can support all states to make sure that we hit those targets and that we turn around that decline in the number of kids finishing high school. But in addition to that, also help us to drive and to oversee the reform, to teaching at universities, to the teaching of teaching students, what's called initial teacher education, to make sure that we're producing teachers out of our universities that are better ready with the skills they need to teach children to read, to write, to manage disruptive classrooms and children with additional needs.

KARVELAS: Minister, you've written to state and territory education ministers to consider a new Teaching and Learning Commission at your next meeting, I think that's in the middle of October.

CLARE: Yeah.

KARVELAS: Just be specific about what the Commission would do. Would it be prescriptive in terms of explicit instruction phonics, like actually, you know, being able to mandate the need for these sorts of approaches in state schools?

CLARE: The role of the Commission is something I want to talk to ministers about. We have an opportunity here, if states and territories think that bringing these organisations together is a good idea, to work on the detailed design of it, to make sure that we get it right. And a number of ministers, but also unions, think tanks, principals, organisations, have told me that they think this is a good idea in principle. And so, the first step is to sit down with ministers and say, “Is this a good idea?” And if so, “what role should it play?” 

Organisations like AERO, at the moment, lead the work in the area you're talking about in terms of phonics, the way we teach children to read. I think the reading wars are over. We know what works in our classroom, and big states like New South Wales and Victoria are leading the way on that right now. But the more research you do, the better, to make sure that we're getting the outcomes that we want. 

We know that at the moment about one in 10 children in our schools are below the minimum standards that we set for the nation through NAPLAN. But it's one in three children from disadvantaged backgrounds, from poor families, that are below that minimum standard. And only 20 per cent of them ever catch up. 80 per cent of kids that are behind when they're 8 are still behind when they're 15. 

And we know that it's in our public schools that most disadvantaged children are taught. That's where the real heavy lifting happens. That's why it's so important to fix the unfairness in funding that we've done through these agreements. But that's why it's equally important that the money is not a blank cheque, that we tie it to the sort of reform that identifies a child when they're really little, that might be behind through a thing like a phonics check and a numeracy check in kindergarten or Prep or Year 1. And then make sure that we put our money where our mouth is, invest the money in the sort of additional support that that child needs. Now, that often involves taking the child out of a classroom of 20 or 25 or 30 into a room with a teacher or a teaching student and one or two other children, what's called small group tutoring or catch-up tutoring. And we know that when you do that in the right way, a child can learn as much in six months as they'd normally learn in 12. So, they catch up.

KARVELAS: And how closely will this be linked and work with the other projects that your government has been working on, through the Health Minister and the NDIS Minister, because we're seeing really an explosion in the number of particularly boys on the NDIS that we're seeing. It is because many of them are on the spectrum and need interventions. At the same time, we've got the Thriving Kids Project that your government wants to do. These things sound to me like they have to be linked, right?

CLARE: Yeah, absolutely. And as you would expect, Mark Butler and I talk a lot about this, work pretty carefully on this. He's thinking about how the Thriving Kids Project intersects with our schools, in particular our primary schools, but even before school, how it intersects with what happens in our early education and care system. That's $16 billion of extra investment into our public schools. I talked about how we're tying that to things like phonics and numeracy checks and small-group tutoring. But that money will also be invested in the sort of mental health supports that are so, so fundamental, particularly in our high schools. But not just in our high schools. It'll fund in some schools, what are called full-service schools, where you might find a doctor, a paediatric nurse, a speech therapist, an occupational therapist, all of the non-teaching staff. That can be fundamental in making sure that children not only attend but are focused on listening and learning and complete school.

KARVELAS: Now, there's another announcement today that's pretty significant coming out of the Victorian Government. It's in relation to treaty, but there is a specific part that I think does pertain very much to the work that you do in Victoria. They want to embed truth-telling in the school curriculum. Do you support that?

CLARE: It's a big announcement in Victoria today, the result of a lot of work over a number of years by the Victorian Government and by Indigenous organisations. I haven't seen the detail of it, Patricia, but I do know that what children are taught in our schools today is very different to what we were taught when we were kids, when very much we were told what happened after Captain Cook arrived. And that's the result of the national curriculum that was set up by Julia Gillard. And I think she made the point when she did that that we're not interested in a black armband or a white blindfold version of history. We want the truth. And so, we set that foundation through the national curriculum. States adopt it, and then they can adapt it. And that's what I understand the Victorian government -

KARVELAS. So, you see it as adaptation. So, in principle, you don't have an issue with the advancement of that truth-telling?

CLARE: No, that's the model that all states have signed up to.

KARVELAS: Ok. Would you like to see other states adopt truth-telling in the education system?

CLARE: I want our children to be taught the truth, but I think all states and territories will have a look at what Victoria is doing. I wouldn't make any announcement about the curriculum on the telly, but I expect that what Ben Carroll, the Victorian Education Minister, will do here is share what Victoria is doing with other states.

KARVELAS: Ok. Just finally, no doubt you're across all of the controversy around Jacinta Nampijinpa Price's comments she made on this program last week. Sussan Ley stopped short of calling for Senator Price to apologise to Indian Australians. But there are a growing list of people who think she should, including the Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese. Do you think that's what she needs to do?

CLARE: Yes, I think that's pretty obvious. And can I give a shout-out to Julian Leeser, a very senior member of the Coalition who I hold in extremely high regard for the comments that he made. Pretty courageous to say it, given the nature of the way politics works. But Julian's right. Jacinta Price should have apologised immediately and still should apologise now.

If only the simple fact of what it means in helping to keep our community together. We're the best country in the world, Patricia. You know that. I know that. And I think you'll agree with me, and most people watching would agree with me, that one of the reasons for that is we're a country made up of people from all around the world, living here together, almost always in harmony. But you can't always count on that. It's up to us as leaders, whether it's in politics or the media, to help to knit our community together. Those sorts of words divide. They make people feel like they're unwelcome or they don't belong. That's why what Julian said was so important. And I just encourage, Jacinta, that it's not too late to say sorry. It never is.

KARVELAS: Thank you for your time, Education Minister.

CLARE: Thanks very much, PK.