Australian Education

When Australians engage in debate about educational quality or equity, they often seem to accept that a country cannot achieve both at the same time. Curriculum reforms intended to improve equity often fail to do so because they increase breadth or differentiation in offerings in a way that increases differences in quality. Further, these differences in quality often reflect differences in students' social backgrounds because the 'new' offerings are typically taken up by relatively disadvantaged students who are not served well. Evidence from New South Wales will be used to illustrate this point. The need to improve the quality of education is well accepted across OECD and other countries as they seek to strengthen their human capital to underpin their modern, knowledge economies. Improved equity is also important for this purpose since the demand for high-level skills is widespread and the opportunities for the low-skilled are diminishing.