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Education

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Hopefully the push to new technologies such as renewables, H2 and nuclear, will lead to a requirement for more exciting and interesting courses at schools, rather than just herding the masses through the arts degree gate sausage machine.

Defence scrambles to train nuclear scientists for 'exciting roles' on AUKUS program

Students and public servants are being enticed with generous scholarships to study nuclear science and engineering so they can begin "exciting roles" on Australia's new nuclear submarine program.
www.abc.net.au
 
University axes Arts degree.

Federation Uni decision to cut arts degree 'destructive and short-sighted', union says

Federation University announces it will cut its Bachelor of Arts program due to declining enrolments and steep fee increases, a move the union describes as "shameful".
www.abc.net.au

This is due to declining enrollments.

Just wondering what others think about the BA degree.

Does it give useful skills in today's world, or is it just a refuge for Lefty intellectuals ?
 
They can still go to the cities and learn. There is importance to BA degrees to society.
I've been harping on for a while now about the terrible state of education in this country. It's a deadset pain acquiring new skills or interests.

I believe there is currently some kind of "internet education revolution" going on. Well at least that's what Tony Robbins keeps pitch about in endless youtube ads
 
Australia has to get back to an engineering and scientific based education system, there is a huge opportunity presenting as the clean energy wave spreads through all industries, new technologies, new processes, new materials, we have to take the opportunity to improve our educational standards for our kids sakes. If not we will just continue down the path of importing our highly paid skilled workers and making our kids social workers, baristas and table waiters.

It wasn't long ago in the places like the light industrial areas of Melbourne, that Australians had the skills and inspiration to design and build great cars.

Drive Flashback: Australia's first proper sports car

The road to a mass-produced Australian sports car is paved with crashed hopes and dreams. In the 1960s and '70s, the Bolwell brothers came closest.
www.drive.com.au

A list of some great Aussie inventions.

20 Australian inventions that changed the world - Australian Geographic

Australians can be an ingenious bunch. Here are some of the best inventions to have come out of the nation.
www.australiangeographic.com.au

Unfortunately not many arts degrees lead to a product that can be on sold to put bread on everyone's plate, inventions and new processes, efficiency improvements in existing processes, those are the things that bring sustainable recurring income to the country and maintain our welfare, health and education systems in the long term, when the raw materials that currently pay the bills are depleted.
Or indeed as is happening now with coal in the future it will no longer supply the large amount of income it has done in the past, what replaces that income? We need to get an engineering and scientific backbone to our economy......

Unfortunately the universities reducing the arts degrees and increasing the scientific and engineering courses doesn't change the underlying problem Australia has IMO, which is poor standards in the lower schooling years, all it will do is encourage more overseas students to take up the new positions available in the universities as our kids aren't doing the STEM subjects required for the higher level degrees.
I personally think going back to teaching the kids the times tables would be a good start, at least they then have an ability to use mental arithmetic, I do know it has moved my grandson from hating math's to being second top in grade 6 and actually now enjoying math's.

Challenges for STEM education not yet met

The world is one of fast-changing technologies, shifting job descriptions and new industries arising overnight that should be good for STEM students but challenges persist.
www.afr.com
The world is one of fast-changing technologies, shifting job descriptions and new industries arising overnight.

While this could prove a potential gold-mine for students of science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM), Australia's school performance in these subjects has not been improving and ingrained gaps in socio-economic and gender attainment are not shifting, says the Australian Council for Education Research (ACER).

Continuing decline in performance​

Timms was the co-author of an ACER policy insight paper, The Challenges of STEM Learning in Australian Schools, published in May this year. The paper acknowledges that Australia has been talking about STEM education for 20 years but the results are not good.

"Set against Australia's desire for strong, comprehensive and equitable STEM education is evidence that our education systems are not up to the challenge," said the paper, co-written by Kathryn Moyle, Paul Weldon and Pru Mitchell.


The paper says recent results of national and international tests show a continuing decline in performance by Australian students and concerns persist that Australia does not have sufficient teachers qualified to teach STEM.

Education departments need to do more work on increasing teacher capacity and teaching quality in STEM. School systems have to support STEM education opportunities and facilitate effective partnerships with tertiary education, business and industry.
 
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Excellent response sp.

It would be interesting to know how many secondary school teachers have BA's , as opposed to qualifications in what they actually teach, especially Maths and Science.
 
Yes @SirRumpole the teachers have way too much say in their own KPI's and the levels of achievement they have to attain, IMO they have become 'sacred cows' nothing can be said about their outcomes and they can never be blamed, the media and politicians are way too quick to protect them from scrutiny. Why that is the case I don't know, maybe it is political connections and social connections?
We are just constantly moving the goal posts down, in order to cover a failing system, I'm not saying that there aren't any good teachers, of course there are, I just believe they are far outnumbered by poor teachers, sadly.
I asked the grandson how he was doing at math's, as we only taught him his multiplication tables a couple of years ago, when he couldn't answer simple mathematical problems at home during covid lockdown.
He said he was really enjoying it and doing well, they were starting to learn algebra, year 6. So I asked how are the kids that don't know their multiplication tables going, he said they are struggling, so pressing further I asked how are the doing when they have to do a test, to which he said if they can't do the test they are given a test that they can do.
Look maybe I'm too critical, but I just can't see how poverty isn't going to rise in Australia, if our kids can't achieve a reasonable level of education. IMO what we have at the moment is a negative feedback loop, where we are pushing through teachers in a sausage factory like manner, in the name of improving teacher to student ratios.
The problem is IMO, the quality is being sacrificed in the name of quantity.
How you fix that? I'm sure there are experts who know, but are not allowed to say, but a good start would be ensuring that the teachers are actually competent to teach.
For the past 20 years, teachers pay and conditions have been improved in the name of improving outcomes, that hasn't happened, another tack has to be taken before it is too late IMO.
It isn't just teaching that is suffering from a poor education system, it permeates through to a poor workforce, poor math's skills limits the quality of any profession that relies on it for the quality of the end product and leads to the situation where quality labour has to be imported.
 
You can't get teachers with experience in the subject matter right now.
Latest example for me was my sons electrician teacher at tafe. He came out of retirement and cannot teach to save his life. No one else available.

The whole class literally found out there was actually a book they were supposed to buy beginning of the year-last week. This is after endless tests and the teacher teaching the wrong subjects for each test. My son had to strong arm the teacher into letting them all go get the book immediately from the shop. The teachers excuse was that he "didn't like teaching like that".

Another recent one was a friend going to English classes with a teacher that couldn't speak English properly.

Primary and high schools are a bloody right off.
There's some good teachers around. But there's a damn majority of sht ones.

Not that kids or parents would be great to deal with.
 
Like I said it is the quality of a lot of teachers and also just because someone knows the subject doesn't mean they can teach it, a lot of teaching the skill is the ability to communicate and keep the student engaged.
I personally think teaching should be taken out of universities again and teaching specific institutions should be re established as before when there were teacher training colleges.
Then there was a selection process and entrance interview, just because someone likes the idea of teaching, it doesn't always follow they have the right personal traits to be a teacher, the current system has no filter as long as someone completes the course they get a certificate and a badge.
To me that system is destined to fail, when a major component of the skill set can't be taught or measured, yet universities aren't designed to deal with that.
For example how do you get a teacher interested in the outcomes, when the main driver for them taking up the profession was to get maximum holiday time and work that aligned with school times?
I'm not saying that all teachers have that attitude, but in the same breath I would be surprised if some didn't especially when it has one of the lowest university entrance requirements.
I'm not trying to have a go here, just saying that we need desperately to improve our teaching standards and the past method of throwing money at it hasn't worked so as with a lot of things maybe a back to the future approach should be tried.

On a side note @moXJO , I'm a sparky and so is my oldest son, he works in the mines really smart kid, year 12 physics, chemistry, maths 2 & 3 calculus etc.
He wants to get his house paid off, then wants to become a TAFE teacher, he is 44. When he was a kid he used to help his younger siblings with their homework, at the company he worked for in the Goldfields they used to let him teach the apprentices for 4hours a week, he is the sort of guy the TAFE system needs.
 

To me, the only answer is (which will never be done because the unions will throw a tantrum) is for the Federal government to create 'polytechnics), specialising in STEM and competing with State schools, provide finance for uni students doing appropriate subjects and financing it by cutting funds it now provides to private schools.

That way, it can select students on merit, not their parent's income and we have the best chance of the best people having the skills we need.
 
Exactly, we used to have polytechnical schools like WAIT ( Western Australian institute of Technology), they changed them all over to universities, then the purpose gets watered down and lastly the subjects and courses that attract the high paying O/S students take precedence.
Then it follows the rest down the same path, sausage factories concerned with quantity, rather than quality and local content.
To be honest IMO, it started going down hill when a lot of high level politicians with a background in teaching attained office, since then it has become a festering mess for everyone except the teachers.

the Perth Technical College

History. Curtin University was founded in 1966 as the Western Australian Institute of Technology. Its nucleus comprised the tertiary programs of the Perth Technical College, which opened in 1900. The university's Bentley campus was selected in 1962, and officially opened in 1966.

Western Australian Institute of Technology, 1966 to 1986, history - About | Curtin University

Emerging in 1966 as one of Australia's largest and innovative Colleges, The Western Australia Institute of Technology (WAIT) grew quickly.
www.curtin.edu.au

The reason it will never go back, is as you say the unions will throw a tantrum, because a lot of the political motivation behind the move was to make the jobs a degree job, which then attracted more money.
When people went to WAIT or a polytechnic, they only received a certificate or a diploma, they had to go to university to get a degree, answer make everything a degree make every institution a university and water down the course.
They old filtering system ensured the best rose to the top and everyone attained a level where they could perform to their abilities, now every one is the same and the Australian degree has been devalued as has the product. I never went to Uni, but I worked alongside many people who did and the difference in abilities of engineers is huge, as it is in most fields today, due to the decline in education standards and the removal of filters like the junior certificate, leaving, matriculation etc.
 
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I was thinking of polytechnics as an alternative to State secondary schools, although the TAFE sector also needs rejuvenation.

Polytechnic secondary schools would give students a better grounding in STEM so that there would be an easier transition into Uni STEM courses, instead of the unis having to do remedial courses in Maths etc. Poly students wouldn't have to sit through useless classes in social equity and the like and would be able to concentrate on getting useful skills, and they could make a better choice whether they wanted a trade qualification or Uni degree.
 
Would have told this story before, son did a secondary teaching degree, he was going to save the world until he did his prac then he saw the assaults', false actuations and the way teaches were treated that's all before you talk about the pay.

He is now a manager of a company best choice he ever made.
 

That's disappointing. It probably says a lot about why politicians send their kids to private schools.
 
A well raised capitalist. Good for you.
 
Yep non of it bodes well for our education system, as you say there is a guy that is needed in the education system, but what is there for him?
Our society is an absolute mess, we have car thieves chasing police around in stolen cars, teachers getting bashed by students, elderly getting raped, assaulted and robbed and we project an impression that we are more concerned with the perpetrators welfare than the victims IMO.
We are certainly living in strange times.
Your son is fortunate he is obviously smart and has his head screwed on, but there aren't as many company managers jobs as teaching jobs that need better teachers.
As for kids bashing teachers, who are there to help them improve their lives, well you can't do anything about that because as we all know in every bad person there is a good person just waiting to get out, all they need is a big hug and they will stop hurting you.?
Prisons are full of them.
 
IFocus said:
Would have told this story before, son did a secondary teaching degree, he was going to save the world until he did his prac then he saw the assaults', false actuations and the way teaches were treated that's all before you talk about the pay.
Click to expand...
Yes police have similar issues, we are breeding a lack of respect for authority, which is another area of Australian society that will end badly IMO.

But does it all stem back to the fact discipline is no longer in fashion for children, just ask them nicely and if the don't do as they were asked, then beg, bribe, whinge, whine and nag them until the adult looks like the child and brings out the big guns "count to three", but never get past two over and over again.
That one just commands instant respect, but more often a lollie, you see it in the shops every day in the shops.

This guy was just given 10 months non parole period, for bashing police with a baseball bat, I guess if that policeman receives long term health issues, that's life. He probably should not have got his head in the way of the bat.

'Inadequate' police bashing sentence triggers calls for law overhaul

A sentence imposed for a Warrnambool man who attacked two police officers with a metal baseball bat has sparked outcry.
www.abc.net.au
 
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Firstly, my son was at Ballarat University when they changed the name to Federation University.
Like a lot of his friends there, they just referred to it as FU.
Which just about sums up the attitude of the Universities to its customers, the students.
Back in the early 90's when i was working in Irian Jaya, I needed some thing totally unrelated to my work as an outlet.
Not being a TV watcher, I started a remote arts degree through Deakin University with a major in the history and Philosophy of science.
I would select the required books from a list , and they would be air freighted to me. System worked really well.
The nature of the remote learning meant that one could do the course all year round by taking 'summer semester subjects" when the usual university courses where shut down over summer.
I learnt a number of things from this exercise.
1. When I did my Engineering Degree, I had about 35 hours of lectures, pracs and tutorials per week. An arts degree was about 15 hours of lectures and tutorials with zero pracs each week.
2. When you have been working for a number of years, have people reporting to you, and have to manage your time carefully, doing extra curricula study is significantly easier than when at 17 you are marched off to uni from the shelter of high school.
3. An arts degree is about as useless as t1ts on a bull, and as relevant as a speech by Gina Reinhart on living as a poor person.
They don't even offer the concept of arguing about ideas, its toe the left wing line or fail.
All you have to do is quote parts of various prescribed books to pass.
The only part I enjoyed was when we had compulsory weekend get togethers of the remote learning students, where i took the opposite view of whatever the previous earnest young student had put forward.
It was dead easy to show that they really did not understand what they read or wrote by pointing out their obvious contradictions, or demonstrating what happens in the real world as distinct from what happens in theory.
So, from my observations, if they lose the arts degrees, the world is unlikely to fall apart.
Mick
 
Here is an article on the subject of University degrees, from a group which are usually left leaning and agrees with my assessment.

Universities turn degrees into toilet paper

Earlier this year, Productivity Commission data revealed that 47.8% of Australians aged under 25 were enrolled in a bachelor degree at university. In turn, it confirmed that the Rudd Government’s goal to increase university participation rates to 40% have been exceeded. According to data...
www.macrobusiness.com.au
Earlier this year, Productivity Commission data revealed that 47.8% of Australians aged under 25 were enrolled in a bachelor degree at university. In turn, it confirmed that the Rudd Government’s goal to increase university participation rates to 40% have been exceeded.


According to data published on the federal government’s Course Seeker website, this explosion in enrolments has been achieved by scraping the bottom of the barrel, with 221 different bachelor degrees offering university places to students with Australian Tertiary Admission Rank (ATAR) scores below 50 – the bottom 10% of high school leavers:

“Low university-entry scores for teaching degrees is a growing concern”, [Australian Education Union president Correna Haythorpe warned]…
Click to expand...
 
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