[Greens-Media] Gillard's high stakes testing creating school and parent NAPLAN dilemma

[John Kaye]

Gillard's high stakes testing creating school and parent NAPLAN dilemma

Media release: 17 May 2010

By persisting with her plan to publish school average NAPLAN test scores, Federal Education Minister Julia Gillard has placed schools and parents in an impossible position, according to Greens NSW MP John Kaye. 

Commenting on a story in today's Australian ('To sit or not to sit NAPLAN: a testing question', 17 May 2010, http://bit.ly/aus100517), Dr Kaye said: "NSW school principals are being forced to choose between protecting their school's reputation and encouraging students with learning difficulties and disabilities to sit for the diagnostic tests. 

"This is one of the pointy ends of the 'my school' website.

"Julia Gillard is advancing her political ambitions at the expense of schools and parents of children with special needs. 

"If the Deputy Prime Minister listened to the Australian Education Union, teachers and principals, she would abandon publishing averages.

"Julia Gillard's obsession with mean scores is unfairly causing special needs students to be seen as a burden on the school's reputation.

"Graphs of the spread of student outcomes would not only make it much more difficult to develop damaging league tables and other misleading comparisons of schools.

"More detailed information would also help visitors to the 'my school' website separate the scores of children of different abilities. 

"By raising the stakes on NAPLAN scores from diagnostic to assessment, Julia Gillard has also put parents in a bind.

"Withholding their children from the tests might put at risk information about some students' learning needs, while allowing them to sit could undermine their confidence.

"NSW Education Minister Verity Firth has made the situation worse in this state by her mishandling of the recent dispute with teachers and her dogged support for publishing average test scores.

"It is time she stood up to her federal colleague and demanded that the 'my school' website replace averages with the spread of outcomes," Dr Kaye said. 

For more information:	John Kaye 0407 195 455