Interactive map of ACT Primary Schools

I have used Google Maps to make an interactive map that shows all Government Primary schools in the ACT. Also shown are 1.6km radius circles from each school. Schools listed to close under the Towards 2020 plan are represented by a red dot, and red circle. Those remaining open are represented by a blue dot and blue circle. The new P-10 school in West Belconnen (on the site of the old Ginninderra District High) and the proposed P-10 school in Harrison are also shown.

Placing your mouse over a dot will pop up a window identifying the school. If you click on this dot the walking circle will disappear. The controls at the top of the map can turn circles on and off with one click. If you have painstakingly selected or deselected individual schools these buttons will throw away your selections.

These 1.6km radius circles represent the farthest a primary age student can easily walk to school. In fact this is at the edge of what is considered a reasonable walking distance for children of this age.

Examining the map with the closing schools “turned off” the suburbs of Giralang and Weston are particularly badly affected. The relative isolation of Spence is reinforced, and some parts of Melba and also Gilmore will be a long way from a Primary school.

It is also makes you wonder why they chose to close Melrose and not Lyons, as this would have made for a better spread of schools. The same can be said for Isabella Plains and Bonython, though neither would have safe access to alternate schools.

Update: I updated the map to reflect the final decision of the ACT Government. In summary, Mt Rogers, Giralang, Isabella Plains and Gilmore are no longer shown as closing. In addition I have added the P-10 school the Government plans to build on the Kambah High site (to open in 2011). It seems odd to put a P-10 school right next to the existing Urambi Primary.

Small schools are not more expensive

Small schools are not more expensive. This may come as a surprise to anyone who has seen the Government’s misleading cost per student figures. All schools have some fixed costs regardless of how many students attend the school, and then the costs increase linearly with the number of students.

This can be seen in the following graph, which plots total cost of ACT Primary Schools versus size (student enrolment):

Traffic safety issues not considered

According to the Government’s report (“Review of School Crossings and Traffic Issues at Schools, Child Care and Older Persons’ Facilities”, July 2004) “The ACT has one of the lowest pedestrian accident rates in the world” and “the ACT has a rate that is less than half the Australian average for the number of pedestrians killed. The report states that “one of the key reasons for this achievement is it’s relatively well planned layout with a strong road hierarchy system”.

Closing neighbourhood schools forces school children to cross major roads, breaking down the road hierarchy that makes Canberra safe. No mention of traffic safety has been made in the Government’s plan. At the consultation meeting for the South East Belconnen region the Education Department CEO, Dr Michele Bruniges admitted that safety assessments had not been done. Clearly the safety of school children was not part of the process for deciding which schools would close. This is not good enough.

Update: Published in the Canberra Times, 18th August.

Tuggeranong a shambles? Belconnen a farce

If the tuggeranong figures are a shambles then the numbers for North West Belconnen are a farce. The total number of primary school students in their North West Belconnen region in 2010 is projected to be 2515. This is for the current situation. Under the Towards 2020 proposal* it is 3089, a difference of 574. This is largely due to the students from Holt and Higgins being double counted. They have been redistributed to surrounding schools but the new West Belconnen school (P-6 initially) has also been included.

How to fix it? Let’s start with treating Belconnen as one region. Splitting Belconnen up was only ever a political ploy to make the school closures more palatable.

Here are the projected 2010 enrolments for Belconnen as given in the Towards 2020 proposal:

.          School    Status quo Proposal Difference
1       Charnwood PS        175      220         45
2           Evatt PS        140      430        290
3          Florey PS        345      480        135
4           Flynn PS        150        0       -150
5          Fraser PS        350      374         24
6         Higgins PS        190        0       -190
7            Holt PS        150        0       -150
8          Latham PS        195      310        115
9       Macgregor PS        325      350         25
10 Miles Franklin PS        370      425         55
11   Mount Rogers PS        125        0       -125
12    West Belconnen          0      500        500
13         Aranda PS        350      350          0
14           Cook PS        135        0       -135
15       Giralang PS        145        0       -145
16         Hawker PS        210      210          0
17         Kaleen PS        395      450         55
18      Macquarie PS        220      275         55
19    Maribyrnong PS        185      350        165
20 Southern Cross PS        175      110        -65
21     Weetangera PS        250      330         80

It is not clear how to remedy the numbers for Belconnen. If we assume all of Higgins and Holt go to the new West Belconnen School, plus 65 from Southern Cross, then we get 405 for West Belconnen. In the ballpark for the Towards 2020 number of 500. That leaves 125 from Mt Rogers and 150 from Flynn to be redistributed.

The Towards 2020 plan redistributes pupil numbers where they will conveniently fit, not where they might actually want to go. Just to get some idea of the situation in 2010 we will make some arbitrary assumptions about where to place the displaced students.
Starting with Flynn, their closest schools would be Charnwood, Fraser and Latham. Charnwood is not a destination of choice. To get to Latham they would have to go under Ginninderra Drive. Fraser is full already. Regardless we’ll split the Flynn kids three ways, 50 each to Charnwood, Fraser and Latham.

The obvious choices for kids who currently attend Mt Rogers would be Miles Franklin and Evatt. Miles Franklin is fairly full, so we’ll top it up with 55 kids and the other 70 we will place in Evatt.

Kaleen and Maribyrnong only have to accommodate 145 from Giralang, but they are listed as changing by 55 and 165 respectively. Perhaps someone thought they were redistributing 220 students? In any case if we assign 70 to Kaleen and 75 to Maribyrnong this is the result:

.          School    Status quo Proposal Difference
1       Charnwood PS        175      225         50
2           Evatt PS        140      210         70
3          Florey PS        345      345          0
4           Flynn PS        150        0       -150
5          Fraser PS        350      400         50
6         Higgins PS        190        0       -190
7            Holt PS        150        0       -150
8          Latham PS        195      245         50
9       Macgregor PS        325      325          0
10 Miles Franklin PS        370      425         55
11   Mount Rogers PS        125        0       -125
12    West Belconnen          0      405        405
13         Aranda PS        350      350          0
14           Cook PS        135        0       -135
15       Giralang PS        145        0       -145
16         Hawker PS        210      210          0
17         Kaleen PS        395      465         70
18      Macquarie PS        220      275         55
19    Maribyrnong PS        185      260         75
20 Southern Cross PS        175      110        -65
21     Weetangera PS        250      330         80

Which adds up to 4580 students in total for the status quo projections and the Towards 2020 proposal.

Under my scenario Evatt goes from a projected enrolment of 430 down to 210! The Department needs to release some amended figures. How can parents even hope to plan where their kids will go when the figures are so wrong?

* I chose option 2 as it is simpler to add up the numbers, otherwise I would have to make messy assumptions about how many of the year 5-8 students in the Melba middle school ended were previously in Charnwood.

Update: I think I have worked out the South East Belconnen inconsistency. Of the Cook kids 55 go to Macquarie and 80 to Weetangera (and none to Aranda … hmmm). There were 65 kids left to place from Southern Cross (going from P-6 to P-3), so they have plonked them in … wait for it .. Kaleen! Huh? I am pretty sure they have then double counted these kids and assigned them to the new P-10 super school at West Belconnen.

Government fails the test

The Stanhope Government have not only failed to learn from the school consolidation policy of the Alliance Government (“Schools approach was ill-considered”, Editorial, August 2), they have fallen well short. The earlier plan at least had extensive criteria which could be addressed. This Government has none outside of capacity figures, which they admit are wrong in many cases.

The fact that the “Government’s salesmanship of its education policy has so far been lackadaisical” is, in no small part, due to the lack of rigour in the proposal. It is tissue-thin. There are few reasons to defend it because there were few reasons behind it.

The Stanhope Government used aggressive PR tactics with distorted figures to try and capture the agenda. This has failed and demonstrated that they are not interested in the best possible outcome, merely their outcome. They have not dealt with the community in good faith.

At least the Alliance Government assigned Departmental officers to schools to assist them in making submissions. In contrast the Stanhope Government have forced parents of targeted schools to become educational experts and only belatedly released the figures which parents need to fight their case.

The campaign against the Towards 2020 proposal has been effective because it is badly flawed. They need to rip it up and start again.

Update: Published in the Canberra Times, 3rd July.

Demountables fear for pupils

That demountable buildings will be required to cater for students displaced by school closures is a disgrace (”Demountables fear for pupils”, July 28, p4). It shows the poor level of planning in the Government’s proposals.

From the Government’s projections, by 2010 one third of primary schools will be above 90% capacity with little or no spare room. These are 2010 figures. By the Governments own reckoning even more students need to be accomodated in 2007, 2008 and 2009. By design, then, there will be overcrowding in one third of Canberra’s primary schools.

The Government’s own population projections assume a steadily decreasing fertility rate and yet we know that fertility has increased for the last four years in the ACT. Under the Towards 2020 proposal, displaced students have been “assigned” to other schools to conveniently round out capacity figures with no thought to where parents will actually want to send their children.

We have a recipe for overcrowding in our public primary schools. High irony, except for the affected kids and their parents, who, it should be noted, are eligible to vote.

Private schools result of history and affluence

Jack Waterford talks of “parents voting with their feet” in the drift to the private system (Canberra Times, “Lessons in learning”, July 22, Panorama, p2). This is not a reflection on the public education system in the ACT, but of the availability of private education and Canberra’s relative affluence.

The ACT has the highest proportion of non-government schools in the country. The non-government primary sector in the ACT is dominated by Catholic schools which comprise 22% of all primary schools. This is also the highest percentage in the country and has been for more than 20 years. Other religious schools make up 9% of primary schools, and other independent primary schools are only 3%.

A national survey conducted by the Australian Council for Educational Research in 2004, found that one third of Government school parents would send their children to a private school if they could afford it. The ACT is much wealthier than the rest of the country (average weekly earnings are 25% higher than the national figure).

The 2004 Sensis Consumer Report found that, for private school parents, the overwhelming reason for their choice of school was religion.

So, in the ACT almost a third of primary schools are religious, the population is wealthier and the most common reason for sending your child to a non-government school is religion. Closing Government schools will not change these underlying realities, so can we all stop pretending that school closures will boost the percentage of kids in Government schools?

Update: Published in the Canberra Times, 25th July.

Barr responds to criticism with more spin

In response to criticism of the Government’s selective use of statistics (Canberra Times, “Schools costings ‘misleading’”, p1, July 17) Minister Barr told the ABC that the Government’s numbers are correct, and the cost per student for some small schools is more than $19,000. Not some, TWO.

Minister Barr also issued a press release with yet more misleading statements. He quoted the difference between the average cost of schools with less than 200 students and those with enrolments of 400 to 600, and stated the smaller schools were 40% more expensive. And yet one fifth of the primary schools slated for closure have enrolments greater than 200, and in the very same press release was a quote which stated an ideal size for primary schools of 300-400.

So why didn’t Minister Barr compare schools of less than 300 with schools of 300-400 (or even 300-600)? Because the figures don’t look nearly as bad for small schools. The average per student cost for schools of less than 300 is $10989, and for those between 300-600 it is $8783. So the smaller schools are, on average, 20% more expensive. Half the figure Minister Barr quotes. Now can we start having a rational debate based on real figures?

Updat: Published in the Canberra Times, 19th July.

Schools costings ‘misleading’

The Canberra Times article (”Schools costings ‘misleading’”, p1, July 17) spells out what has been clear for some time. The Government has attempted to portray small schools in as bad a light as possible in order to push their agenda for closing schools.

The costings and savings documents recently released by the Government show they only plan to make savings on some salary related costs and Schools Based Management costs. If just the salary and management costs per student are used to rank the 69 Government primary schools (1=cheapest, 69=most expensive) some of the schools to be closed are in the top 50% of cheapest schools (Isabella Plains (25), Gilmore (33)). Others such as Higgins (39), Giralang (41), Mt Rogers (42) and Cook (44) are cheaper than sixteen other schools which are not being closed.

Can someone else explain this as the Government aren’t willing, or perhaps able, to.

Update: Published in the Canberra Times, July 18th.

Ranking schools by Salary and Management Costs

When the Stanhope Government first released their Towards 2020 plan they used misleading statistics to paint small schools in as bad a light as possible. Their per-pupil costs included costs like depreciation. When fixed costs such as depreciation are calculated the cost per pupil for smaller schools will always look worse than larger ones.

Later we found out that their projected savings were only calculated on some salary savings and schools based management (SBM) costs. I’ll have something to say about the SBM later, but if we take them at their word and just rank primary schools by salary and schools based management costs we get the following list (* = closing school):

Where are the whole of Government costings?

The ACT Government has finally released a breakdown of costs by school and an analysis of projected savings. It is a pity that this was not done before the public consultation meetings so that parents could be as well informed as the Government, and so have a more useful discussion.

At the consultation meeting for South East Belconnen Minister Barr assured us the Government would take a whole of Government approach to the cost of school closures. This has not be done, or if it has, it has not been released. When can we expect the costs associated with increasing childhood obesity, loss of community amenities, loss of social capital, increased road traffic and associated measures to protect commuting children to be deducted from their projected savings?

Minister Barr and Dr Bruniges (CEO of ACT Education Department) also acknowledged that risk assessments had not been done for the children forced to travel when their local school is closed. Dr Bruniges admitted that such assessments were required by law. When can we expect the results of these assessments to be published?

Projected enrolment for Turner incorrect

The projected enrolment at 2010 for Turner Primary under the Towards 2020 proposal is listed as the capacity (350), rather than unchanged from the 2010 status quo projections (275).

Tuggeranong Figures a Shambles

The projected enrolments in Tuggeranong under the Towards 2020 plan do not match those quoted for the status quo.There are five hundred more students under the Towards 2020 proposal.

Two glaring errors are obvious:

School plan based on no data

The importance of “decision grade” information to support decision-makers was stressed in Steve Neilsen’s column (Canberra Times, Public Sector Informant, July 4). One wonders if any information was used to decide school closures, let alone “decision grade”. The projected enrolments in Tuggeranong under the Towards 2020 plan have 500 more students than the projected enrolments under the current system. This is largely because the figures for Chilsholm and Wanniassa P-10 schools have been inflated by 320 and 200 pupils respectively. As well the projected enrolment for Wanniassa Hills Primary has been swapped with Wanniassa Primary. The projected enrolment for Theodore Primary has been mistakenly listed as the current enrolment.

Apart from the absolutely shambolic nature of the document, what are we to make of this? My interpretation is that these figures were not calculated as part of a comprehensive plan, but cobbled together after the decisions had already been made. On what basis, only the Minister can tell us. My bet is it will turn out to be Cabinet-in-confidence.

Update: Published in the Canberra Times, 11th July.

College system not broken

Colleges in the ACT are a success story (”Closures alone won’t work: expert”, June 5) as 63% of yr 11 and 12 students attend Government schools in the ACT. This is above the nation-wide average of 60% whereas public schooling rates in high schools and primary schools in the ACT are generally below the national average. The ACT College system is not broken, so please don’t try and fix it Mr Barr!

Barr dodges again

Minister Barr again dodged the question of incorrect capacity figures at the North Canberra consultative meeting (Canberra Times, July 4) by repeating his mantra that the Principal can request an audit of capacity at any time. Isn’t it a bit late for that?

Minister Barr has admitted that in some cases the capacity figures are wrong. He has admitted that the cost per student includes those with special needs. He has admitted that the cost per student is inflated by fixed building costs that will not be saved if the school is closed. The total number of students in the projected figures do not agree between the status quo and under their proposals. The data used for making the decisions in the Towards2020 document have been shown to be flawed, so the proposals cannot be regarded as sound. There has been no external review of their proposals to examine their educational or financial merit.

Now we find out from the Education Department that in some cases demountables may have to be used if some schools have a large influx of displaced students. Now there is some irony!

It is time for the Government to scrap Towards2020 and start again from scratch. Let us hope they are brave enough to take this step.

Update: Published in the Canberra Times, July 5th.

Public school system chaos

The rush to close schools will have massive repercussions over the entire education system, public and private as outlined in your article (Public school system chaos, July 3). This is an important message for parents whose children attend schools not listed for closure. They must ask hard questions of the Government about the dodgy capacity figures, and how their schools will be affected with large influxes of kids from other schools. Parents of out of area children currently enrolled in affected schools (Miles Franklin, Evatt, Kaleen, Maribyrnong, Aranda, Weetangera, Bonython, Calwell, Chisholm, Monash) need to know if their children will be given lower priority than displaced kids, or if the Government plans to house any overflow in demountables.

A lesson on schools?

Peter Brassington (A lesson on schools, June 30) sends his kids to a private school and doesn’t want to hear from those of us opposing the Governments current plan. He would do well to think on this quote from a non-government school website: “If a fee account remains unpaid after the third week of term the school reserves the right to ask a family to make arrangements for their children’s education elsewhere”. Elsewhere? Can he imagine circumstances whereby he could no longer afford to send his kids to a private school? If he can, can he then imagine how grateful he would be that some of us have stood up and defended the public system?

Barr has head in sand

At the school closure consultation meeting for Tuggeranong Minister Barr admitted that the capacity figures for Gilmore and Isabella Plains were inflated by the presence of temporary buildings. He refused to conduct an audit to correct the Department’s figures, stating that the Principal of the school can request an audit of school capacity. The Minister has stated he wants a rational debate. How can we have a rational debate without the correct figures? Should we put this down to incompetence, laziness or deceit?

Dodgy accounting on school closures

According to the Canberra Times report of the South Canberra consultative meeting we now know that the Government costings per student include building depreciation and departmental overheads that are roughly proportional to the student numbers at the school.

Minister Barr has publicly stated that no school buildings will be sold as a result of closures. So building depreciation costs will continue, and the maintenance costs will still be borne by the Government. The departmental overheads will remain the same. So just what will be saved as a result of these schools closing?