News

Independent recognises important role of education

8 March 2006

Education is one of the key obligations of a government to provide to its citizens and more needs to be done to raise its profile in the Victoria Park electorate, according to Independent candidate Andrew Owens.

"Education is the means to all manner of ends, and it allows an area to grow and has the potential to significantly reduce crime. Victoria Park has two public and several private high schools - one of which I am a graduate of - as well as two TAFE campuses and a university serving the area," said Mr Owens.

"With the present Labor Government's focus on extending the high school leaving age, there is a need to adequately fund public schools and enable them to deal with the new challenges ahead. One of these challenges is clearly vocational education - as students are now staying behind that would previously have been considered TAFE- or work-ready, programs need to be put in place for those students with qualified, professional staff to guide them through the programs.

"Another challenge is the seeming contradiction in the Labor Government's push for education while failing to guarantee the continuance of the highly successful Aviation program at Kent Street Senior High School for more than 12 months at a time. Schools, in order to grow, need to know five years in advance what they are doing. This program has motivated and inspired hundreds of kids over the years; it involves partnerships with the tertiary sector; the parents and kids love it; and it can be measured easily in terms of success with graduates of the program now flying Qantas and Singapore Airlines planes (among others) and working as RAAF Squadron Leaders. If elected, I will fight to get continuing funding for this worthy program that is putting Victoria Park kids literally on top of the world."

Mr Owens also attacked the lack of flexibility in the TAFE system, and stressed that this should be a key concern of governments. "University students at all of Perth's institutions have the ability to study externally or online. Yet the only TAFE campus in Perth which provides this service is in Joondalup, 27km from the city. My own studies there enabled me to move into fields of work I could not previously enter. Why can't this be available everywhere? The TAFE colleges want it - it will enable them to compete at the diploma level with other institutions and increased funding of course means enhanced programs for their internal students. With the advent of online methods of study, external courses in areas such as management, IT and business are cheaper per head to run according to figures available from the universities.

"I think it is time to acknowledge the excellent role that TAFE colleges play in skilling our young people in particular, and it is time to allow them to have an even greater role in educating our community."