Growth, competition and stratification in Melbourne's Government Schools

1
Growth, competition and stratification in
Melbourne's Government Schools
Daniel Edwards Centre for Population and Urban
Research Monash University, Melbourne, Australia
Abstract The past half century has seen
considerable growth in the number of secondary
school students enrolled in Australia. As public
patronage of secondary schools grew, enrolments
increased faster than the robust population
growth rate of the 1960s. This boom in enrolments
was facilitated in the main by the government
school sector, which expanded and adapted to the
needs of families during this time. However, by
the late 1970s, the economic paradigm in
Australia had changed and with this change came a
shift in funding priorities of government,
increased competition for university places and a
move away from a communitarian view of schools
towards an individualistic perspective. This
resulted in the growth of academically reputable
non-government schools in Australia, which from
the mid 1970s have enjoyed increased government
funding and growing enrolments. In an effort to
curb this enrolment trend, government schools
began to specialise many moving away from a
curriculum with an academic focus, towards a
vocational approach. While many schools have
enjoyed success as a result of specialisation,
the options for students in the government school
sector have become limited by the geographical
region in which they live. Many students no
longer have access to government schools which
have a clear academic focus. The Australian
state of Victoria, of which Melbourne is the
capital city, has been used here as a case study
of enrolment and funding changes, and the effects
these changes have had on the government school
sector. The findings show that in large
metropolitan areas such as Melbourne, a
stratification of government school
specialisation has occurred. Schools with
improving academic outcomes are almost
exclusively located in affluent suburbs, while
schools showing increased vocational emphasis are
scattered in the less affluent suburbs of the
west and north. This reduces the capacity of
young people to use the education system for
upward social mobility and entrenches
socioeconomic divisions.

• The Boom
• Population growth and school enrolment growth
  post WWII
• The Australian population experienced a boom
  following the Second World War, courtesy of a
  rising birth rate and high migration levels.
  There was also an increase in prosperity in
  Australia as a result of industrial development
  and developments in primary production (Keeves
  1990). This rise in population and improvement
  in general wellbeing fuelled new ideas about the
  value of education it became accepted that 12
  years of formal education were important, and
  that girls should be given the same educational
  attention as boys. As a consequence, there was a
  massive increase in enrolments in Australian
  schools, most notably in the secondary school
  years (the final six year levels of schooling).
• Victoria, the second most populous state in
  Australia, is used here to illustrate this growth
  in school enrolments. Figure 1 shows growth in
  secondary school enrolments and school-aged
  population in Victoria between the mid-1960s and
  2001. While both increased substantially, the
  escalation in school enrolments was far larger
  than the growth in the secondary school-aged
  population during this time. Between 1966 and
  1986 there was a 43 per cent increase in
  secondary school enrolments in Victoria, a net
  gain to the education system of 111,093 students.
  By comparison, the population of 15 to 19 year
  olds in Victoria rose by 25 per cent or 72,095
  persons.
• Growth in the government school sector
• The main beneficiary of the early enrolment
  growth in secondary schools in Victoria was the
  government school sector. Enrolments in
  government secondary schools grew by more than
  90,000 between the early 1960s and mid 1970s a
  61 per cent increase. As a result of this demand,
  between the mid 1960s and the late 1970s there
  was an increase of 101 secondary schools in
  Victoria, 90 of which were government schools.

3. The Enrolment Competition In Australian
education, the government school sector enrols
the majority of students. However, non-government
schools play a large role in Australian
education. There are two non-government school
sectors the Catholic sector and the independent
(or private) sector. Enrolment growth in
non-government schools As stated earlier,
government schools were the main beneficiaries of
increased enrolments in the 1960s and early
1970s. However, as Figure 2 shows, from the late
1970s the expansion of the non-government sector
in Victoria has been enormous. Initially Catholic
school enrolments experienced the largest
increases, but by the mid 1980s enrolments in the
independent school sector were booming as
government school enrolments slowly
decreased. Between 1963 and 2004, the
independent school sector in Victoria experienced
a 186 per cent enrolment increase in secondary
students. By comparison, there was a 105 per cent
increase in Catholic school secondary enrolments
and a 39 per cent growth in government school
enrolments over this period of time. While the
government school sector still enrols the
majority of secondary students in Victoria (60
per cent in 2004), its share is diminishing (in
1969 it commanded 74 per cent of the
market). Public funding of non-government
schools Parallel with the increased enrolment
numbers in the non-government sector has been the
introduction of government funding for these
schools. Commonwealth funding for non-government
schools commenced in 1963 under the Menzies
conservative Government (Partington 2004).
However, the amount of funding provided by
Menzies was only small, beginning in capital
works grants and slowly expanding to recurrent
funding from 1967. The decade following 1967
witnessed a substantial rise in government
funding of non-government schools. Between 1967
and 1976, the maximum total recurrent funding per
secondary school student in the non-government
sector in Victoria rose from 10 to 569 (Burke
2001). The main source of this increase was the
policy changes introduced by the Whitlam Labor
Government which boosted funding significantly
following a report into schooling in Australia in
1973. Funding for schools in Australia is
primarily allocated on a per capita basis,
therefore, as enrolments in the non-government
sector grew, so too did the government subsidies
for the sector. Despite the fact that the per
student rate for government school funding has
never been reduced (Burke 2001), the reality is
that as the government sector loses enrolments,
its total funding allocation diminishes. Under
the framework formulated by the Whitlam
Government, the position of the non-government
sector within Australian education was not only
consolidated, but it would also make it
politically very much more difficult in the
future to question the role of private schools
and to make educational demands upon them in
return for the social benefits they derived
(Teese 1984167).
Figure 1 Change in Secondary school enrolments
and school aged population from 1966, Victoria.
Figure 2 Change in secondary school enrolments
by school sector from 1963, Victoria
2. The Economic Influence The changes in the
Victorian education system outlined in the data
and discussion here occurred alongside a
significant shift in the dominant economic
theories which have shaped public policy in
Australia the move from a Keynesian model
towards approaches linked to economic liberalism.
This change in Australia is consistent with
changes occurring in other parts of the western
world over the past half century. Keynesianism
became the dominant economic model used to inform
government policy following The Depression and
the stock market collapse of 1939. It was based
on the idea that there was a need for significant
government involvement in all facets of social
services and government ownership of essential
infrastructure. It was during the peak of
Keynesian economic management in Australia that
the growth in school enrolments occurred and mass
provision of education through government schools
began . However, in the early 1970s, when
government had difficulty controlling the
combination of high inflation and high
unemployment, problems with the Keynesian
economic model began to appear. The Bretton Woods
fixed exchange rates system collapsed, leading to
a period of international financial deregulation
and the catapulting of domestic economies into an
international market (Quiggin 2005). Policies
based on macroeconomic, Keynesian models were
slowly abandoned in favour of a free-market
approach. From the mid 1970s in Australia,
economic liberalism (also known as neo
liberalism, market liberalism, Thatcherism or
economic rationalism) was the dominant position
in both microeconomic and macroeconomic policy
debates (Quiggin 200526). It was during this
time that the structure of the education system
began to evolve. Government funding priorities
shifted and private schools slowly began to gain
more enrolments. Government schools had been
enveloped by economic liberal philosophy, but
were still required to operate in a structure
best suited to the Keynesian social democratic
management approach. By the mid 1990s, in
response to growing pressure from the
non-government school sector and increased
competition for university places, individual
government schools began to break from the
comprehensive ideal of schooling and move towards
specialisation in order to establish a place for
themselves in the education market. The result
of this market-driven change in the education
system is apparent in the data presented here.
Analysis of shifting enrolments in the school
sectors, changes to school funding structures,
the introduction of public funding for
non-government schools, the growing competition
for academic outcomes, and the resulting
specialisation and stratification of the
government school sector are all key outcomes of
the changing policy paradigm of the past 20 to 30
years.
2
4. The Academic Competition Increased funding has
helped the independent school sector grow over
the past few decades. However, the sector has
also gained enrolments as a result of its good
academic reputation. Figure 3 highlights the
extent of the growing competition for university
places over a nine year period to 2004. It shows
that despite an increase in the number of
Victorian year 12 students of more than 10 per
cent, the number of university places being
offered to these students has decreased by nearly
10 per cent over the same period. Therefore,
between 1996 and 2004 the chance of a year 12
student gaining a university place at a Victorian
university has dropped substantially. The
favourable academic reputation of many
independent schools has attracted many
middle-class families with aspirations of
university for their children. In earlier decades
many such families would not have hesitated to
send their children to their local government
school. In a few affluent pockets of the city
of Melbourne, government schools continue to be
patronised on the back of reputations of high
academic achievement, but on the whole, the
government system is becoming increasingly seen
as a poor choice if a university place is desired.
5. The Result The majority of the government
schools in Melbourne that have improved their
academic outcomes since the mid 1990s are located
in Melbournes most affluent suburbs. Places in
government schools are prioritised according to
residential location. Therefore, attending the
government schools in Melbourne with the best
academic reputations is not an option for
students from less affluent areas. These
students chances of social mobility through the
government school system are severely
limited. The exodus of middle-class children
from the government school sector and into
private schools has been detrimental to
government schools across the majority of
suburban Melbourne. Most government schools find
that they can no longer compete academically with
a private school sector that not only charges
fees to students, but also receives a sizable
share of government funding. These schools are
able to attract middle-class families who would
previously have patronised the government sector,
and are also able to cream the government sector
of its best students by offering lucrative
scholarships. The playing field for university
entrance in Victoria is becoming more
uneven. Curriculum specialisation As a
consequence, government schools in many parts of
the state have made a decision to opt out of the
academic competition and focus on increasing
their strength in non-academic, vocational
subjects. Schools are creating links with
institutions of Technical and Further Education
(TAFEs) and providing tuition to senior students
using the rapidly expanding Vocational Education
and Training in Schools program. The expansion of
government schools into these curriculum areas
has rapidly increased since the mid 1990s,
coinciding with the decreasing numbers of
university places on offer. Specialisation of the
government school sector is seen as the key to
its survival. However, as Map 1 shows, the
government schools that have managed to maintain
a strong academic focus and have many students
gaining access to university are generally
clustered in a limited geographical space in
metropolitan Melbourne. Schools with increased
proportions of students gaining an offer to a
TAFE institute however, are more spread out.
Figure 3 Change in year 12 enrolment numbers and
number of university places offered from 1996,
Victoria
Map 1 Location of government schools with large
increases in university and TAFE offers between
1993 and 2003 and socioeconomic status of suburbs
in 2001. Melbourne metropolitan area
6. Conclusion Enrolment levels and the growth of
the government school system thrived in the
middle of the twentieth century in Australia, a
time when visions of social democracy and
fostering social cohesion were at the forefront
of policy-makers minds. As economic
circumstances changed in the 1970s, and theories
of economic liberalism began to dominate public
policy, the non-government school system began to
grow, boosted by increased government funding and
a changing public perception in the role of
schools. Competition for school enrolments and
university places forced many government schools
to specialise and this specialisation has led to
a limiting of academic opportunities for many
government school students particularly those
who are already socioeconomically
disadvantaged. For this situation to change,
Government intervention is required to ensure
that school specialisation is more evenly spread
across metropolitan landscapes, meaning that
there are greater opportunities for disadvantaged
students to achieve at a high academic level.
Isolated cases of public schools in Victoria
succeeding academically against the odds suggest
that this is a realistic vision. The funding
priorities of government need to be re-evaluated
with serious consideration given to the necessity
of funding asset- and currency-rich independent
schools. In addition, cooperation from
universities is needed in order to ensure that
the contexts in which students have progressed
through school is taken into account when
offering places within these institutions.
Explanation of Map 1 School location and
outcomes Data from the Victorian Tertiary
Admissions Centre (VTAC), tracking offers to Year
12 tertiary education applicants, has been used
to create Map 1. The map highlights those
government schools in Melbourne which have
experienced the greatest improvement in
university and TAFE offers gained by Year 12
students between 1993 and 2003. This has been
calculated using an index comparing the variation
of outcomes in each school from the mean outcome
for all government schools in the Melbourne
metropolitan area. The results for each school in
1993 and 2003 have been compared and the 30
schools showing the greatest change over the
period in each of the two outcomes have been
displayed. In total there were 156 government
schools in Melbourne with results in both 1993
and 2003. Socioeconomic status The Australian
Bureau of Statistics Index of Education and
Occupation has been applied to each Census
Collection District (a Census geographical area
of approximately 200 homes) in the Melbourne
metropolitan area. Each area is coloured
according to its index score, with red denoting
high socioeconomic status and dark blue denoting
low socioeconomic status. Gradients of colours in
between these extremes represent the gradients of
high and low socioeconomic status.
Data used Data for this presentation have been
extracted from a number of secondary sources. The
sources for each individual figure and the map
are outlined below. Figure 1 Commonwealth
Bureau of Census and Statistics (CBCS), Social
Statistics Australia, various bulletins between
1966 and 1968 CBCS, Schools, catalogue 4202.0,
1969 to 1972 Australian Bureau of Statistics
(ABS), Schools, catalogue 4202.0, 1973 to 1978
ABS, Schools Australia, catalogue 4202.0, 1979 to
1980 ABS, National Schools Statistics
Collection Government schools, catalogue 4215.0,
1981 to 1983 ABS, Non-Government Schools,
catalogue 4216.0, 1982 and 1983 ABS, National
Schools Statistics Collection Australia,
catalogue 4221.0, 1984 to 1988 ABS, Schools,
Australia, catalogue 4221.0, 1989 to 2001, ABS,
Australian Historical Population Statistics,
Datacube 3201.0. Figure 2 Source CBCS, Social
Statistics Australia, various bulletins between
1963 and 1968 CBCS, Schools, catalogue 4202.0,
1969 to 1972 ABS, Schools, catalogue 4202.0,
1973 to 1978 ABS, Schools Australia, catalogue
4202.0, 1979 to 1980 ABS, National Schools
Statistics Collection Government schools,
catalogue 4215.0, 1981 to 1983 ABS,
Non-Government Schools, catalogue 4216.0, 1982
and 1983 ABS, National Schools Statistics
Collection Australia, catalogue 4221.0, 1984 to
1988 ABS, Schools, Australia, catalogue 4221.0,
1989 to 2004. Figure 3 ABS, Schools Australia,
cat no. 4221.0, 1996 to 2004, Victorian Tertiary
Admissions Centre (VTAC), Annual Report
Statistics, 1996/97 to 2004/05. Map 1 VTAC,
unpublished, 1993/94 and 2003/04, ABS, Census of
Population and Housing Socioeconomic Indexes for
Areas, 2001.
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