Extracts from submissions
Indigenous education
Dr Bob Boughton, Co-operative Research Centre for Aboriginal and Tropical Health, Alice Springs, May 1999
"Among the reasons being given [for the decision to phase out bilingual education] is that the program has made no appreciable difference in developing English language literacy. Unfortunately, the evidence on which the Minister drew this conclusion is of doubtful validity, since it consisted of a crude comparison of the average scores of all students in bilingual schools on a standardised literacy test with the scores of those in schools which did not have that program. Since the analysis did not include any controls for other variables, and since it was not broken down by school, this data tells us virtually nothing of importance about the effectiveness or otherwise of the program.
"While this may ultimately be beside the point, in relation to whether or not children and parents have a right to choose to be educated in their own language, it is of relevance to any argument that says bilingual education somehow discriminates against children by inhibiting their capacity to become literate in the dominant language of administration and politics. On this question, the jury is still out, in that no conclusive evidence has been produced to show a negative correlation between having learnt in a bilingual program and gaining English language literacy. Anecdotal evidence, e.g. from Batchelor College's Teacher Education Program, or the Institute for Aboriginal Development's Vernacular Literacy Program, suggests that graduates of bilingual schools often become very effective advocates of their community's interests, particularly in relation to education.
".
"It is also of some concern that neither the statistical data on which the Minister drew his conclusions, nor the report of the Review Committee on which he also supposedly based his decision, have been made public, and until that happens, it is difficult to engage their proponents in more detailed debate about their methodologies or findings.
"The Commonwealth funded an extensive in-depth study of English language literacy acquisition in remote schools in seven communities a few years ago, published in 1996 in several volumes as the Desert Schools Report. The NT Education Department was an active participant in this study, which made no recommendations regarding the bilingual program. While the Report acknowledged the vital importance of TESOL, the principle focus of its recommendations, which were made in relation to teenagers, was on strengthening the involvement of the communities in the education process, something which is likely to be reduced in the wake of the decision to phase out bilingual education.
"This decision appears to have been taken largely on the grounds of cost-effectiveness, namely that for the amount spent, the results are not good enough. While no one disputes the urgent need to raise English literacy standards above the current level, some bilingual schools, properly-resourced and with a history of strong community involvement, appear to be doing just that. Those that are not may well be affected by some of the other factors outlined in the Desert Schools Report, including the particular language ecology of the community, the absence of stable experienced trained staff, particular social problems in the community affecting school attendance and so on. Each school and community needs to be examined on its own merits before any meaningful comparison can be made.
"One might also consider, on equity grounds, the amounts of money spent on teaching languages other than English in NT schools, e.g. Indonesian, and whether the Aboriginal population is being treated equitably in this respect, when a few million dollars is considered too much to spend on their languages. As the data I presented to the Collins Review shows, Aboriginal children now form nearly 50% of the school age population in the southern region.
"While the Minister dismissed their concerns in his most recent statement to the Legislative Assembly, the main reasons Aboriginal people have given me for opposing this decision is the threat it poses to their languages and cultures. They correctly perceive that educational programs play important functions in valorising certain kinds of knowledge over other kinds, and that reducing language instruction to something done informally, or in a non-core part of the curriculum, sends a clear message both to the children and their teachers about what is important, as well as to the wider non-Indigenous community. My own limited understanding from research done by Dr David Wilkins here in Alice Springs is that specific languages belong to specific areas of country in complex ways which are integral to the maintenance and reproduction of culture, so to refuse a community which wishes to do so the right to use the resources of the education system to assist this process of cultural transmission seems to me to be a very serious infringement of their cultural rights, perhaps even a direct attack on their native title rights. I would urge you to seek some advice on this from native title legal experts and anthropologists with expertise in the role of languages in the transmission of such rights.
"Finally, the question of bilingual education should not distract attention from the primary problem, which is the under-resourcing of efforts to provide a full and appropriate compulsory and post-compulsory education service to the vast majority of Aboriginal children and young people, and the apparent willingness of both the NT and Commonwealth to tolerate a situation which clearly threatens peoples' capacity to exercise and enjoy their basic human rights. The degree of educational inequality is indisputable, and its impact is felt in the NT every day in high levels of ill-health, unemployment, incarceration and general social distress."
Last updated 2 December 2001.
