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Uneven playing fields

The long wait for needs-based funding
by
June 2022, no. 443

Waiting for Gonski: How Australia failed its schools by Tom Greenwell and Chris Bonnor

UNSW Press, $39.99 pb, 367 pp

Uneven playing fields

The long wait for needs-based funding
by
June 2022, no. 443
David Gonski speaking at the 2021 Archibald Prize (Richard Milnes/Alamy)

In 2011, when businessman David Gonski was reviewing education funding in Australia, he visited two primary schools in Sydney’s west. At the first, he found the principal dealing with glass from a break-in the night before. As he sat in the school’s reception, he observed that the children arriving for school were from non-English-speaking migrant backgrounds. When they toured the school, the principal told him of the challenges he faced: homes without books; scant parental involvement. The second school, just a few minutes by car down the road, seemed a world away. The children were in school uniform, Gonski was greeted by a concert of beautiful singing, the buildings were perfect. The school served a different group of students. Truancy was not a problem.

Ilana Snyder reviews 'Waiting for Gonski: How Australia failed its schools' by Tom Greenwell and Chris Bonnor

Waiting for Gonski: How Australia failed its schools

by Tom Greenwell and Chris Bonnor

UNSW Press, $39.99 pb, 367 pp

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