Derryn Hinch 3AW

SUBJECTS: Andrew Wilkie, Fair Work Australia investigation of Craig Thompson

E&OE… 

DERRYN HINCH: The education spokesman for the Opposition, Christopher Pyne. Good afternoon.

CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Good afternoon Derryn.

HINCH: is there anything of NAPLAN that the Opposition supports?

PYNE: I think your introduction really hit the nail on the head.  The problem is that the NAPLAN tests because of the complication of the tests are hopelessly flawed.  Before the Labor government came to power ,the NAPLAN tests were being conducted and the results were being used by the teachers and by the principals to inform them what they should pick up with their particular students.  The government came in with a great fanfare and decided they would publish the NAPLAN results on the MySchool website and what that lead to was unfortunately human nature, that is teachers wanting to get the best possible results whether the students were actually at that level or not. 

So as you said, I know anecdotally as I have three children of my own at school and one to come that some students are asked to stay at home, some are asked not to conduct the tests and in some cases the worst case we are seeing teachers actually altering the results and genuinely speaking it’s quite widespread that teachers are teaching to the test.  That is not the purpose of testing students.

HINCH: That’s the biggest problem there and the other stuff is anecdotally and I have heard them as well as I mentioned.  The thing is if the teachers are just teaching to impress NAPLAN that is not good for education.

PYNE: That is exactly right.  That is the absolute antithesis of the NAPLAN testing.  It is because of the publication of the raw results that Julia Gillard says with great success that teachers feel that if they don’t teach to the test and if the smart students don’t do as well as they want them to it would affect on their promotion or pay scale and so forth.  This is where it has all gone off the rails.  I was shocked yesterday by Peter Garrett saying that the results of the NAPLAN were encouraging four years after the introduction of the Labor party they are stagnating or going backwards.  At least the Minister for Education can tell the truth that this is a problem and somehow we are going to fix it, rather than just pretending that everything is terrific.

HINCH: Well not encouraging - the prime minister herself says in that Australian interview that we are going backwards.  She says we are going to be … disturbing signs were her words and other regions are getting in front of us and that means we aren’t doing well?

PYNE: I thought it was an extraordinary interview when she described us as the runt in the litter and that we were losing the race now that is no way to talk about the education system. We have a great education system, but it could be a hell of a lot better, there is no doubt about that. But for the Prime Minister to say those things like somehow this is somebody else’s responsibility just seems delusional. She’s been the Minister for Education or the Prime Minister for the last four and a half years, and the results are going backwards. She spent close to $20 billion of taxpayer’s money, at the same time she abolished the literacy and numeracy tuition vouchers from the previous Government; which were working, and abolished maths and science programs, which the teachers and the university people were saying was the best thing in maths and science. So she is getting rid of the basic things that need to be done while spending $20 billion on school halls and give a way laptops.

HINCH: Christopher Pyne, thanks for your time.

PYNE: Good to talk to you Derryn.

Ends