Show Notes
What happens when a country turns education into a marketplace? Jane Caro thinks Australia has done exactly that, creating a school system that entrenches inequality while convincing parents that paying more must mean getting more. In the second episode of The Question of Education, Ben Lawless and Tom Mahoney talk to Jane Caro, author of Rich Kid, Poor Kid: The Battle for Public Education, about public and private schooling, parental choice, funding and why Australia has developed one of the most socially segregated education systems in the OECD. Jane makes the case that education is not simply another consumer product, and that a system built around parental choice inevitably advantages families who have the money to exercise more choices. Along the way: why parents keep paying enormous private school fees despite the evidence on academic outcomes, how schools sort students by class, whether governments have deliberately shifted the cost of education onto families, and why Jane thinks public school teachers are performing extraordinary work within a profoundly uneven system. We also get into social cohesion, meritocracy, gentle parenting and what parents choosing a school should actually consider. In this episode
Why Australia’s schools are increasingly segregated by social class Why paying more for education does not necessarily mean getting better academic results Parental choice, consumerism and the private-school arms race Public funding, private fees and an uneven playing field Whether Australia’s education system is building a class system Why inequality matters for meritocracy and social cohesion What properly funding disadvantaged public schools could look like What Jane would say to parents choosing between public and private schools Gentle parenting versus permissive and authoritarian parenting
“Our greatest resources are not the shit we dig out of the ground. They’re our kids, all our kids, not just your precious kids.” - Jane Caro Links The Question of Education Instagram TikTok
https://australiainstitute.org.au/store/rich-kid-poor-kid-vantage-point-issue-5 Ben Lawless - Lawless Learning Tom Mahoney - The Interruption
More from The Question of Education
What are schools actually for? We have never really agreed, and Adam Voigt thinks that unanswered question sits underneath almost everything that goes wrong in education.In the first episode of The Question of Education, Ben Lawless and Tom Mahoney talk to Adam Voigt - founder of Real Schools, author of Restoring Teaching, and creator of Restorative Practice 2.0 - about why schools should be campfires, not vending machines. Adam makes the case that a school's job is to grow decent learners and decent citizens, not to fill a child's deficits on demand or win a place in a literacy race.Along the way: why competition and a culture of blame bring out the worst in schools, why teachers default to command and control, and why he asks experienced teachers to "Marie Kondo" their practice. We get into Class Dojo, the marble jar experiment and reverse peer pressure, NAPLAN, and the explicit instruction culture war - including why Adam thinks branding low-SES teachers as agents of inequity is both unfair and unsupported by the evidence.In this episode Why we have never agreed on what schools are for Campfires, not vending machines Competition between schools and the culture of blame Why "the real world will slap them" is a myth Why teachers default to control, and the Marie Kondo reframe Class Dojo, the marble jar, and collaborative competition Teaching as gambling: shifting from outcomes to practice NAPLAN, "ever-increasing ambition" and what we actually value The explicit instruction culture war, and refusing the either/or "Schools shouldn't be vending machines, they should be campfires." - Adam VoigtAdam Voigt is the founder of Real Schools, a former principal, author of Restoring Teaching, and the creator of Restorative Practice 2.0.Links