Latest / The Morning Edition / Selective schools: Competition has never been tougher

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Selective schools: Competition has never been tougher · The Morning Edition

0:07
S1: This weekend, thousands of teenagers will sit the entry exam
0:11
S1: for one of four select entry government schools for high
0:13
S1: achieving students in Victoria. It's a nerve wracking experience and
0:18
S1: the stakes are high. Many students will miss out on
0:21
S1: a place in New South Wales. Competition is also fierce
0:25
S1: for a spot at select entry schools. Students in both
0:28
S1: states spend countless hours preparing for the exams. I'm Benjamin Price,
0:34
S1: filling in for Samantha Sellinger Morris and this is the
0:37
S1: Morning Edition. So attention please, and eyes up front. Today,
0:42
S1: age education reporter Jackson Graham and Sydney Morning Herald education
0:47
S1: editor Christopher Harris explain how select entry education became such
0:51
S1: a big deal and such big business. It's Wednesday, June 17th. Jackson. Christopher,
1:03
S1: it's really great to have you on the podcast today. Jackson,
1:07
S1: why don't you take us through what's going to be
1:09
S1: happening this Saturday?
1:10
S2: All right. Well, several thousand students will sit the select
1:13
S2: entry exam in venues like our race courses and the
1:16
S2: exhibition buildings in Melbourne. A select entry exam is basically
1:21
S2: a three hour long exam for students in Melbourne at
1:24
S2: a year eight level to try to get into year
1:26
S2: nine at a school that will only let them in
1:30
S2: based on their academic results. The test is a pretty
1:33
S2: daunting challenge for any 13 year old to take. It
1:36
S2: involves writing quantitative reasoning and mathematics and test them at
1:42
S2: all sorts of things that they should have otherwise learned
1:44
S2: in their in their schooling up to about a year
1:47
S2: eight level. This year there will be 6400 students, which
1:51
S2: is 700 more than last year. People I spoke to
1:54
S2: who took the exam in 2016 say there are thousands
1:57
S2: more people sitting the exam than a decade ago. So
2:00
S2: many of them are actually pretty worried that, you know,
2:02
S2: if it was them sitting their test today. The competition
2:04
S2: is so steep that they might not actually get in. Uh,
2:07
S2: this trend has been upwards, obviously for the last couple
2:10
S2: of years. And there has been a big acceleration this year.
2:12
S2: So the competition is tight because there's only about a
2:15
S2: thousand places at the schools for students to get into.
2:18
S2: So yeah, there's a huge demand for that.
2:25
S1: So the system starts in year nine in Victoria for
2:29
S1: selective entry schools, but it's not quite the same in
2:32
S1: New South Wales is it? Christopher, can you help us
2:34
S1: understand how the system works there?
2:37
S3: It's a very different landscape in New South Wales. For starters,
2:40
S3: students enter into a selective school. In year seven. There's
2:45
S3: 47 fully and partially selective schools across the state, including
2:51
S3: the likes of North Sydney boys James Bruce and Sydney
2:55
S3: boys and Sydney girls. Our year six students at the
2:59
S3: entry test a couple of months ago, there were about
3:02
S3: 17,000 students competed for 4300 places. I went along to
3:09
S3: North Sydney girls where students were sitting the test, and
3:12
S3: you could see as they were walking in with their parents,
3:14
S3: they were almost sort of their faces were white with
3:18
S3: with nerves, because a lot of parents have been prepping
3:21
S3: those students for those tests for, if not a year
3:24
S3: or more, two years or more in coaching colleges and
3:27
S3: at home.
3:28
S1: I mean, this sounds like really serious business, doesn't it?
3:32
S1: And I was quite surprised to read that last year,
3:35
S1: the riot police had to be called in to the
3:37
S1: exam venue in Canterbury in New South Wales. And police
3:41
S1: also attended the venue at Randwick to kind of manage
3:45
S1: the throngs of people. Can you just tell us what
3:48
S1: the hell was going on there?
3:50
S3: Um, essentially what had happened is the New South Wales
3:53
S3: Government had. They wanted the students to sit the test online,
3:57
S3: so as part of that, they outsourced it to a
4:00
S3: private company called Janssen, who wanted the students to sit
4:03
S3: the tests at these mega testing centres across Sydney. And essentially,
4:09
S3: in addition to the Selective Schools Test in New South Wales,
4:12
S3: you can also set the opportunity class test, which is
4:15
S3: it's a class in primary schools in year five and six.
4:18
S3: And they do like advanced. It's for gifted kids, supposedly.
4:23
S3: And Jennison were going to test those students in the
4:25
S3: morning and then test the selective kids in the afternoon.
4:29
S3: And there are a few technical issues. There were delays
4:32
S3: with the morning session. So those parents didn't leave immediately
4:37
S3: with the students. They were standing around waiting to collect them.
4:40
S3: And then all the selective parents turn up really early
4:43
S3: because they're worried about this test that they've been studying
4:45
S3: for years for. They want to make sure they get
4:47
S3: there on time. They've travelled across Sydney anyway, so you
4:50
S3: get way more people in these spots than you meant to.
4:53
S4: There was frustration today in Canterbury, with thousands of parents
4:57
S4: and primary school students left waiting for hours at a
5:00
S4: selective school testing session.
5:03
S3: These people, these staff working that have been employed by Jennison,
5:07
S3: they kind of lose control of the situation.
5:09
S5: Just tell me one thing, how hard it is to
5:11
S5: organise this event when we can organise Olympic Commonwealth Games.
5:15
S3: And we just had chaotic scenes that it was completely
5:18
S3: beyond the ability of testing staff to manage. And um,
5:22
S3: they had to call in police to direct parents to leave.
5:25
S6: With such a large number of people stuck. The riot
5:28
S6: squad was called to manage the crowd.
5:31
S7: I thought, you know, you need you need the police
5:34
S7: to come in and and help them.
5:39
S1: And did the police have to make any arrests?
5:42
S3: Uh, no reported arrests, but I think, uh, no arrests.
5:49
S1: Okay, good. Um, so, Jackson, can you just tell us
5:52
S1: a bit about how the system is structured in Victoria?
5:56
S1: For decades, there was only two selective entry schools. But
6:00
S1: now there are more, aren't there? So can you just
6:02
S1: take us through that?
6:03
S2: Yeah. So there are four in Melbourne. They include Melbourne High,
6:07
S2: Mac.robertson Girls High School, Nossal High School and Suzanne Cory
6:12
S2: High School. These are the schools where you're accepted into
6:14
S2: year nine and they're your traditional select entry schools. Then
6:18
S2: we also have the John Monash Science School, which is
6:22
S2: students enter that through a different entry test, which is
6:24
S2: obviously Stem based for year ten. And we have the
6:27
S2: Victorian College of the Arts secondary school where students have
6:31
S2: to audition. So this is far fewer than Sydney has.
6:35
S2: Given the demand for getting into these schools. There's been
6:38
S2: plenty of chatter about whether or not we should have
6:40
S2: more select entry schools in Victoria. For now, though, most
6:44
S2: experts sort of warn against this in Victoria. Really looking
6:47
S2: to Sydney as a case study. The criticism is that
6:51
S2: select entry education leads to enrollment dominated by students who
6:55
S2: are already advantaged. My colleague Alex Crow has actually done
6:59
S2: some good reporting on this. She found more than 60%
7:01
S2: of all students enrolled in Melbourne's four select entry schools
7:04
S2: are from top socio economically advantaged backgrounds. That's according to
7:10
S2: her analysis of my school's data. I asked the government
7:13
S2: whether they had any plans for more select schools, select
7:15
S2: entry schools. Yesterday, they didn't actually respond. But when I
7:19
S2: asked the opposition education spokesman, Brad Roswell, he said any
7:23
S2: government that wants the best for students in the state
7:25
S2: should be looking at how they can better manage select entry.
7:28
S2: He basically told me that whether it's more places or
7:30
S2: more select entry schools, every option that lifts standards should
7:33
S2: be on the table. However, he also looks to Sydney
7:36
S2: as an example of potentially a case study to learn from.
7:40
S2: He points out that, you know, a small portion of
7:42
S2: students in select entry schools come from the most disadvantaged
7:44
S2: backgrounds in New South Wales. So basically, he says there's
7:47
S2: a lot to to weigh up. You can't deepen the
7:49
S2: divide in our public schools. You can't gut local schools
7:53
S2: of their best students. So I'm sure, yeah, they're sort
7:56
S2: of open to, to thinking about what the solutions look like,
7:58
S2: but they're certainly not there's not any simple solutions.
8:01
S1: So tell me, what is the basis of that criticism
8:04
S1: that Victoria's select entry school system advantages kids from better
8:10
S1: socio economic backgrounds?
8:13
S2: Yeah, I think that really goes to the heart of
8:15
S2: just how intertwined socioeconomic advantage is with education. They're very
8:20
S2: hard things to separate. NAPLAN testing is a great example
8:24
S2: of that. And really, it doesn't necessarily come down to
8:27
S2: wealth necessarily what it comes down to, at least the
8:31
S2: people behind NAPLAN testing would tell us is how educated
8:35
S2: your parents are. Um, unfortunately, you know, students who have
8:39
S2: parents who are also highly educated, who might have, you know,
8:43
S2: high levels of tertiary education are far more likely to
8:46
S2: exceed in academic settings than peers that are that aren't
8:50
S2: in that situation. So it's not necessarily all, you know,
8:53
S2: income based. And yeah, I think the criticism therefore goes that, well,
8:58
S2: we set up these select entry schools and many students
9:00
S2: who are able to sit the test come from backgrounds
9:03
S2: where they're already have a lot of educational privilege in
9:07
S2: their house and also, you know, out on top of that,
9:11
S2: things that change the equity equation, such as tutoring and
9:15
S2: preparing for, for the test over years, potentially, you know,
9:19
S2: all of these things add in a level of inequity
9:21
S2: into into the selection process.
9:25
S1: After the break.
9:26
S3: The parents also want their child to succeed. And they're
9:29
S3: thinking about university entry way back in year six. And
9:33
S3: they perceive that schools are the best vehicle to get
9:37
S3: the best year 12 results and give their child the
9:41
S3: best chance of succeeding.
9:50
S1: So can you talk a little bit more about that
9:53
S1: preparation that a lot of families and students do for
9:56
S1: these tests in terms of tutoring and that kind of thing?
9:59
S1: What do they do?
10:01
S2: Yeah. So I spoke to a couple of tutors last
10:04
S2: week and most of them said, basically, students are preparing
10:08
S2: for at least a year for these tests. So when they,
10:11
S2: the tutors take people on board, they're basically saying, all right,
10:14
S2: this is going to be 12 months of, of extra
10:16
S2: work per week. And often it's more than an hour
10:18
S2: or two hours of work, basically that they would be
10:20
S2: doing on top of their schoolwork. They, the tutors themselves
10:24
S2: acknowledge this is a lot for a 13 year old.
10:26
S2: It's a lot of pressure. You know, many, uh, school
10:28
S2: students would obviously think back to their year 12 exams
10:31
S2: as being a time of a lot of pressure. Well,
10:33
S2: you know, you have to think that that this sort
10:35
S2: of pressure is really being applied to, to a 13
10:37
S2: year old to get into a highly competitive school.
10:41
S1: Jackson if that's a lot of pressure for a child
10:44
S1: in year eight, I can't imagine what it would be
10:47
S1: like for a child in grade five. Is it a
10:50
S1: similar preparation process that you're picking up Christopher in New
10:53
S1: South Wales, or does it work differently somehow?
10:55
S3: Well, yeah, students are preparing for, you know, a couple
10:59
S3: of years. Parents are spending, you know, thousands on tutoring.
11:04
S3: We also have companies that provide this, um, they have
11:07
S3: a mock test every year and it kind of works
11:10
S3: like a bit of a students will sit that test
11:12
S3: and sort of similar to like the sort of the
11:14
S3: Harry Potter sorting hat. The company will actually tell them
11:17
S3: which schools that they should target when they're selecting their
11:21
S3: three preferences. So as they don't overshoot and be overly
11:24
S3: ambitious and get something they've got no hope of. But
11:27
S3: this these mock exams, with thousands of students conducted by
11:31
S3: some private companies each year, give you, as a parent,
11:35
S3: an idea of where your child sits on the bell
11:38
S3: curve of selective school results before you actually sit the test.
11:42
S3: So that gives you an idea of, you know, how
11:44
S3: big the tutoring industry is and how seriously parents take it.
11:48
S1: Christopher, why do parents want to get their children into
11:52
S1: these schools so badly?
11:54
S3: Well, I think, well, every year when we cover our
11:57
S3: year 12 HSC results, we go and speak to a
12:00
S3: lot of students and ask them, you know, what do
12:03
S3: you want to do? And, you know, one of the
12:07
S3: key themes I take away from that is that a
12:09
S3: lot of students, they want to get into either medicine
12:12
S3: or law. And the thinking I take away from that
12:15
S3: is the parents also want their child to succeed. And
12:19
S3: they're thinking about university entry way back in year six,
12:23
S3: and they perceive that schools are the best vehicle to
12:27
S3: get the best year 12 results and give their child
12:31
S3: the best chance of succeeding. So it's purely academic outcomes
12:36
S3: is what's driving the selective school decision in the first place.
12:40
S1: Jackson is it the same thing in Melbourne? The parents
12:44
S1: also wanting the best academic outcome for their children by
12:48
S1: trying to get them into these schools?
12:50
S2: Absolutely. I agree with Chris there in that, uh, you know,
12:53
S2: the career outcome and the higher educational outcome is what
12:57
S2: parents very much have front of mind. One parent I
13:01
S2: spoke to told me basically that, uh, really his, uh,
13:05
S2: child joining, uh, a select entry school was about being
13:08
S2: involved in a cohort that was going to be considered strong.
13:12
S2: So basically, if there's a high performing cohort of students,
13:16
S2: he wanted his child to be among that simply to
13:19
S2: drive them and to ensure, I suppose, that that student,
13:22
S2: his grades were lifted by the cohort as much as by,
13:26
S2: you know, their own ambition.
13:27
S1: Now, the whole system can be a little bit political,
13:30
S1: can't it? And I'm just wanting to know a bit
13:32
S1: more about how that works in New South Wales. Christopher.
13:36
S1: I mean, can you just go through a bit more
13:38
S1: about some of the concerns that experts have raised about
13:41
S1: the system?
13:42
S3: Well, it is very political. And I guess over the
13:44
S3: past 50 years, we've had governments have tried to tinker
13:47
S3: with the system or wind back the system. They've always
13:50
S3: found resistance. And I guess the central problem, some people
13:54
S3: outside of the selective school system have is that a
13:58
S3: these schools are taking away really smart students from local
14:02
S3: comprehensive schools, which is leaving them at a disadvantage. So
14:06
S3: over the years, we had big changes in the 1980s,
14:10
S3: which sought to reduce the number of selective schools than
14:14
S3: in the 1990s. A new state government expanded selective school
14:19
S3: places with the introduction of partially selective school streams in
14:23
S3: comprehensive high schools. The latest changes, a couple of years
14:27
S3: ago has been introducing the gender equity model, which reserved 50%
14:32
S3: of places in co-ed schools for girls, and before that
14:35
S3: we had the equity placement model, which reserved 20% of
14:39
S3: spots for students from certain equity groups.
14:42
S1: What I'm interested in here as well is, I mean,
14:45
S1: what do these schools say about us and about Australian
14:48
S1: society more generally? I mean, my parents went to these
14:51
S1: selective entry schools and they sort of came in in
14:54
S1: this wave of Jewish migration in the in the 50s
14:58
S1: and 60s when a lot of kids at these schools
15:01
S1: were from poor Jewish but aspirational families. Um, can you
15:06
S1: both take us through who actually attends these schools and
15:09
S1: tell us a bit more about their makeup?
15:12
S3: Well, if we look at the Acara data on selective schools,
15:15
S3: most schools have a large proportion of students who come
15:19
S3: from a language background other than English. And if you
15:22
S3: look at academics like Christina Ho at UTS, she writes
15:25
S3: a lot about how these schools are really seen as
15:29
S3: a haven for a lot of Asian families who want
15:34
S3: to get ahead and they like the schools. They like
15:38
S3: the selective tests because it mirrors the the academic testing
15:41
S3: that that is a big feature of the Asian education
15:44
S3: system that they might come from.
15:45
S1: Is it broadly similar in Melbourne? Jackson.
15:49
S2: Yes. Well, if you look at Melbourne High as one example, 86%
15:54
S2: of students who attend Melbourne High have a language background
15:56
S2: other than English, and it's similar at some of the
15:59
S2: other select schools too. I think, yeah, you know, it's
16:03
S2: broadly a similar thinking as what you described in, uh,
16:07
S2: with your own parents. I think, Ben, today, where the
16:10
S2: western suburbs has some highly aspirational families who have moved
16:15
S2: here from Asia and other areas. And basically, uh, yeah,
16:20
S2: you know, they see this as a ticket into, um,
16:23
S2: a different life. Uh, I think they see, uh, the
16:27
S2: sacrifice put in at an early age, you know, from
16:30
S2: in those early teen days as being important to setting
16:35
S2: the child up to having a better life.
16:37
S1: I'm interested in anxiety for the child and how much
16:41
S1: pressure these tests place on the child. How stressful do
16:45
S1: you reckon it is?
16:46
S2: Yeah, I think it's extremely stressful for these young students.
16:49
S2: I think they're, uh, they're put under a lot of expectations.
16:53
S2: Some of it sometimes is about, uh, you know, if
16:56
S2: they got in, it would be, um, a really proud
16:58
S2: moment for not only them, but for their family as well.
17:01
S2: And they feel that burden, I think in some ways.
17:04
S2: I think the stress isn't necessarily a bad thing as
17:08
S2: long as they can manage that well. And some of
17:12
S2: the students I did speak to, you know, they acknowledge that,
17:14
S2: you know, they said, well, you know, I need to
17:16
S2: balance my life. I need to be spending time, you know,
17:18
S2: really working hard and being disciplined around what I need
17:21
S2: to learn for this test. But I also need to
17:22
S2: spend time playing sport and watching TV and doing all
17:25
S2: the things that kids otherwise would do. So I think,
17:28
S2: I think, but I also think they're very conscious of that,
17:30
S2: of striking that balance and needing that balance.
17:32
S3: I did text a few students who have graduated in
17:35
S3: the past couple of years from fully selective schools and
17:37
S3: say like, hey, what did you actually think about it?
17:39
S3: And they said, well, yeah, you asked the. They said,
17:42
S3: we loved our time at school. It offered all these
17:44
S3: extra curricular activities. We were with other students who were
17:48
S3: of a similar mindset, but they said it went far
17:50
S3: beyond academics. We'd had all these sporting opportunities, all these
17:54
S3: extracurricular activities. We really enjoyed it, the perception. And they said,
17:58
S3: like a lot of people like to hate on selective schools,
18:01
S3: but they said, you know, the actual experience is a
18:03
S3: lot more well-rounded than than what a lot of people
18:07
S3: will leave you to believe.
18:08
S1: So there's a perception there that it's all about academics,
18:11
S1: but in fact, from the people you've been speaking to,
18:15
S1: students get a much more rounded educational experience than just
18:19
S1: focusing on literacy and numeracy and science, for example.
18:23
S3: And that's not to say that it isn't a hyper
18:25
S3: competitive environment. I've spoken to principals at selective schools. And
18:28
S3: they said, like, one of the big problems we have is,
18:31
S3: you know, you think students get tutoring before the test.
18:33
S3: Once they get here, the parents are thinking, we've got
18:36
S3: to keep we've got to do tutoring to keep up.
18:39
S3: And then, you know, this creates big problems. The principals
18:41
S3: say we've essentially got students who have covered the year
18:44
S3: seven maths before they've got here. It creates very bored
18:47
S3: students who are sitting in class. Why? They want students
18:52
S3: to have all these other opportunities available to them and
18:56
S3: do sport and things like that after school, not sit
18:59
S3: inside a coaching college. So there is definitely a problem there.
19:02
S3: But you know, students themselves say these schools are a
19:05
S3: lot more than, than, than what people might think.
19:12
S1: Well, I think that's a really good place to wrap
19:15
S1: it up. Thanks very much for your time, Christopher.
19:18
S3: Thanks, Benjamin.
19:19
S1: Thank you to Jackson.
19:21
S2: Thanks.
19:21
S1: And hopefully we don't need the riot police at the
19:24
S1: exam at Caulfield Racecourse on Saturday. In other news today,
19:33
S1: Grill'd is facing a lawsuit from the consumer watchdog, which
19:36
S1: claims the burger chain misled customers by overstating the extent
19:40
S1: of donations to a tree planting campaign. One nation leader
19:44
S1: Pauline Hanson will make her debut at the Press Club
19:46
S1: in Canberra today, and the reserve Bank has kept interest
19:50
S1: rates on hold for the first time this year. For
19:53
S1: these stories and more, go to our websites theage.com.au or smh.com.au.
20:01
S1: Today's episode was produced by Kai Wong. Our executive producer
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