http://phillipmalone.com/2009/06/30/forced-school-mergers-in-victoria/ Site for all the stuff about me, Phillip Malone. Molly to my mates Wed, 11 Nov 2009 00:37:13 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 http://phillipmalone.com/2009/06/30/forced-school-mergers-in-victoria/comment-page-1/#comment-3436 mollyfud Fri, 17 Jul 2009 01:36:04 +0000 http://phillipmalone.com/?p=30#comment-3436 Hi Kate, Thanks for sharing your story. I agree that School councils are really not the ones that should be making the decisions and if the Department wasn't having to waste money trying to convince schools Councils that there schools need to merge, perhaps they could spend it more wisely making the right decisions in the first place! Hi Kate,
Thanks for sharing your story. I agree that School councils are really not the ones that should be making the decisions and if the Department wasn’t having to waste money trying to convince schools Councils that there schools need to merge, perhaps they could spend it more wisely making the right decisions in the first place!

]]> http://phillipmalone.com/2009/06/30/forced-school-mergers-in-victoria/comment-page-1/#comment-3435 Kate Fri, 17 Jul 2009 01:08:05 +0000 http://phillipmalone.com/?p=30#comment-3435 Our school council stood against the merger proposal and remained a united front - we survived. However, if there was no coercion as the government continually states in the media, then it should have no objection to giving its principals and school council members permission to be interviewed by reviewers and for that information to be made public. Faulty and out of date statistics were presented to school council. There was no backup information of the background to the statistics presented. The public should be made aware of the innuendo made that the school would receive nothing if it didn't close and of discussions held with principals because they weren't able to convince their school council. Did similar discussions take place with principals of schools who had made the decision to close to ensure that the decision was based on sound information? Schools were not provided with appropriate and balanced information to support the decision making process. It appears that DEECD staff relied on school councils not having a research or university level background. What was really interesting is that when I asked the project worker what research these decisions were based on, he said none, we don't have time. Meetings to discuss the merger never discussed the issues, the causes or the various and alternate possibilities to move education forward in our area. There was never a holistic look at the situation. One of the schools that is being forced to merge in our area wasn't even in the initial discussions to merge. They were brought into it at the last minute and I believe rail-roaded into it. DEECD staff didn't care which schools went as long as it was left with only two in the area. No planning, no consideration of the demographics etc, no socio-ecological consideration of the needs of the children in this area, no answers for how the DEECD will better provide for children alienated from the system, no genuine consideration of the needs of children with disability such as autism, no consideration of the new housing area that will house a large number of families, no consideration of the transport issues of families in some of the poorest areas of our region who do not have access to transport. None of this upholds the government's cross government and Fairer Victoria policies. DHS and families will be picking up the pieces for this decision for many generations to come. Our school council stood against the merger proposal and remained a united front – we survived. However, if there was no coercion as the government continually states in the media, then it should have no objection to giving its principals and school council members permission to be interviewed by reviewers and for that information to be made public. Faulty and out of date statistics were presented to school council. There was no backup information of the background to the statistics presented. The public should be made aware of the innuendo made that the school would receive nothing if it didn’t close and of discussions held with principals because they weren’t able to convince their school council. Did similar discussions take place with principals of schools who had made the decision to close to ensure that the decision was based on sound information? Schools were not provided with appropriate and balanced information to support the decision making process. It appears that DEECD staff relied on school councils not having a research or university level background. What was really interesting is that when I asked the project worker what research these decisions were based on, he said none, we don’t have time. Meetings to discuss the merger never discussed the issues, the causes or the various and alternate possibilities to move education forward in our area. There was never a holistic look at the situation. One of the schools that is being forced to merge in our area wasn’t even in the initial discussions to merge. They were brought into it at the last minute and I believe rail-roaded into it. DEECD staff didn’t care which schools went as long as it was left with only two in the area. No planning, no consideration of the demographics etc, no socio-ecological consideration of the needs of the children in this area, no answers for how the DEECD will better provide for children alienated from the system, no genuine consideration of the needs of children with disability such as autism, no consideration of the new housing area that will house a large number of families, no consideration of the transport issues of families in some of the poorest areas of our region who do not have access to transport. None of this upholds the government’s cross government and Fairer Victoria policies. DHS and families will be picking up the pieces for this decision for many generations to come.

]]> http://phillipmalone.com/2009/06/30/forced-school-mergers-in-victoria/comment-page-1/#comment-3050 A small win in the Fight to make Bronwyn Pike do whats Right : Phillip Molly Malone’s Blog Fri, 03 Jul 2009 15:10:35 +0000 http://phillipmalone.com/?p=30#comment-3050 [...] in the week I wrote a little post about the fight to get the Victorian Government, Victorian Education Department, Bronwyn Pike and [...] [...] in the week I wrote a little post about the fight to get the Victorian Government, Victorian Education Department, Bronwyn Pike and [...]

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