SOS Australia – Page 3 – Fighting for Equity in Education

We Need Stronger Public Education to Promote Social Cohesion

sosaustralia / March 11, 2026 / Public education

Australia has long been regarded as a successful multicultural society, integrating people from many different social and cultural backgrounds. Now, however, the sense of shared community that underpins this success is showing signs of strain. Racism and cultural intolerance have re-emerged as pressing social concerns.

Strengthening public education is one of the most practical ways Australia can build social cohesion and counter racism.

SA Greens Candidate Response to SOS Election Questions

sosaustralia / February 27, 2026 / Equity in education, Funding, Public education

The Greens candidate for Unley in the South Australian election, Dylan Kiernan, has provided the following response to the SOS Election Brief on education outcomes and funding in Sourth Australia.

School Outcomes and Funding in South Australia – An Election Brief

Trevor Cobbold / February 15, 2026February 16, 2026 / Equity in education, Funding, Public education, School closures

The following are key points of a brief on the South Australian election campaign by Save Our Schools. The full brief can be ddowloaded below.

South Australian public schools face deep inequity and chronic underfunding, especially for socio-economically disadvantaged students. Candidates in the South Australian election must stand up for public schools.

Not the Education State: Victorian Public Schools Remain Massively Underfunded by New Schools Agreement

Trevor Cobbold / February 2, 2026February 2, 2026 / Funding

The Victorian Labor Government likes to label Victoria as “the education state”. This is a joke as far as public schools are concerned. A new schools agreement with the Commonwealth Government continues the longstanding massive underfunding of Victorian public schools by billions while Catholic and Independent schools continue to be overfunded. The continued underfunding of public schools is a barrier to reducing the vast inequity in school outcomes between rich and poor students.

Increasing Bureaucracy Swallows More of Public School Funding

Trevor Cobbold / December 3, 2025December 3, 2025 / Funding, Public education, Teachers

Increasing bureaucracy is a feature of public school systems in Australia. The growth in administrative staff in schools and in central departments has far outstripped the increase in teachers and students since 2015. The most dramatic staffing growth has occurred not in classrooms but in state education departments.

The growth in administrative staff reflects increasing reporting and compliance regulations required by governments in the face of the increasing complexity of student needs and expectations about service provision. It is absorbing an increasing proportion of expenditure on public schools. More funding is being diverted from core functions of teaching and supporting the learning and well-being of students to administrative and operational tasks. Moreover, there is widespread evidence that teachers are over-loaded with administrative tasks themselves. A key issue is to identify what is necessary and reasonable and what is unnecessary and wasteful of time and resources. Reviews of the workload on teachers in public schools in NSW and Victoria have revealed that teachers face much unnecessary administrative work.

The Case for Full-service School Models in Australia

sosaustralia / November 26, 2025 / Equity in education, Funding, Public education

In their new report, the Mitchell Institute calls for full-service school models as a purpose-built solution to Australia’s growing educational inequality.

Despite decades of reform and record investment, inequality in Australian schools persists and continues to grow. Students in high-needs communities can face multiple, compounding barriers to learning: poorer health, food insecurity, unstable housing and limited access to early and ongoing supports. This can contribute to rising absenteeism, disengagement and widening achievement gaps.

The Mitchell Institute’s new report Achieving Better and Fairer Schools: The case for full-service school models in Australia argues that traditional schools are not designed to respond to these complex needs.

A different approach is needed to address the growing inequities in student engagement, wellbeing and achievement. Our report calls for full-service school models as a purpose-built solution, designed to integrate education, health and social supports so that all children have the opportunity to thrive.

OECD Survey Shows Australian Teachers Have a Very Heavy Workload

Trevor Cobbold / November 17, 2025 / Teachers

New figures released by the OECD show that Australian teachers have one of the heaviest workloads of in the OECD. Their working week is one of the longest in the OECD because of a large non-teaching workload. The heavy workload is a key factor in teacher stress, wellbeing, and resignations. Governments have failed to reduce the workloads, thereby exacerbating the ongoing shortage of teachers. More comprehensive policy initiatives and programs are needed to reconfigure the work of schools to reduce teachers’ workload and better support student learning and well-being.

What fully funded public schools could do

sosaustralia / November 13, 2025 / Equity in education, Funding, Public education

The following is the abstract of a paper by Professor Pasi Sahlberg and Trevor Cobbold published in the Medical Journal of Australia.

Australia’s most disadvantaged students are heavily concentrated in under-resourced public schools, worsening gaps in learning, wellbeing and life outcomes. Although governments have pledged to fully fund public schools through the Better and Fairer Schools Agreement 2025–2034, most schools will still fall short of their Schooling Resource Standard due to delayed and diluted implementation. The article argues that new investment estimated more than $20 billion over the decade must be directed to schools with the greatest need. Evidence shows four effective priorities: full-service school models, stronger family engagement, healthy school meals, and eliminating compulsory fees. Equity requires not just funding, but targeted, sustained action.

It’s Official! Accounting Tricks Denied Public Schools Over $2 Billion in Funding in 2023

Trevor Cobbold / October 28, 2025October 29, 2025 / Funding

A new report by the National School Resourcing Board (NSRB) reveals that public schools lost over $2 billion in funding in 2023 because of accounting tricks used by state governments under the Commonwealth-State funding agreements operating at the time. The accounting tricks are continued under the new funding agreements signed this year. They mean that public schools will remain underfunded for the next ten years.

Australia Has Amongst the Highest Teacher Shortages in the OECD

Trevor Cobbold / October 21, 2025 / Teachers

A new OECD report reveals thatAustralia’s education system is facing a diabolical staffing crisis. Since 2018, teacher shortages have soared leaving Australia among the worst-performing nations in the OECD on this measure. Despite the scale of the problem, little meaningful action has been taken to reverse the trend.

The lack of qualified educators is most acute in public schools, disadvantaged schools and schools in regional towns. There is also a very large shortage of special education teachers. Among OECD countries, Australia records the largest shortage of staff in disadvantaged and regional town schools, and the second largest in public schools.