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Wide system changes needed for Australian schools to reach equity goals

Social segregation in Australia's education system is creating barriers for disadvantaged students, according to new research from Murdoch University, and wide systemic change is needed. "" is available in the Australian Journal of Social Issues.

Social segregation in Australia's education system is creating barriers for disadvantaged students, according to new research from Murdoch University, and wide systemic change is needed if Australia is to achieve its goal of creating a high equity system that supports all students to reach their full potential.

In an international context, Australian schools rank among the most socially segregated within the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), with significant effects on student outcomes.

Michael Sciffer, a Ph.D. student from Murdoch University's School of Education, said his research showed the current schooling framework fails to properly identify and meet equity needs, and that urgent changes are needed.

"Minimizing academic achievement gaps between different social groups has been a goal of Australia's schooling system since the federal government began to comprehensively reform school's funding, yet the goal of promoting excellence and equity is far from being achieved," Sciffer said.

"Low SES students typically attend schools with high concentrations of disadvantaged peers, while their non-low SES counterparts are more likely to attend socially diverse schools—but there is nothing in the Measurement Framework for Schooling in Australia specifying how to measure school segregation, school socioeconomic context, nor how they relate to schooling outcomes.

"Australian research has shown that concentrating disadvantaged students in disadvantaged schools makes them much less likely to achieve minimum academic benchmarks.

"The negative effects of attending low SES schools in Australia occur at primary and secondary school levels, and also extend to post-school outcomes.

"Measures need to be developed to capture and report on school segregation and its effects at national, state, and community levels so they can be understood, and so that we can start to give students and schools the assistance they need."

The research recommends the following improvements:

• Enhancing reporting and measurement by improving the National Report on Schooling to include data on school socioeconomic content and segregation.
• Addressing school segregation by implementing policies to reduce the concentration of disadvantaged students in disadvantaged schools.
• Reforming accountability measures to ensure there is a focus on equity and socio-economic composition of schools.
• Focusing on equity in policy.
• Providing targeted support and resources to schools with high levels of disadvantaged students to improve learning outcomes.

"The Better and Fairer Schools Agreement is an opportunity now to implement reforms to measurements and reporting in the Measurement Framework for Schooling in Australia, the National Report on Schooling in Australia and the MySchool website so that we can work towards achieving real equity for our students," Sciffer said.