ATAR: State shows serious lack of transparency over Year 12 results

Parents should be able to study how their child’s school performed for Year 12 results. And parents weighing up where to send their kids should have access to as much information as possible. In Queensland, the information made available by government authorities is meaningless, writes Stephanie Bennett.

For the second year, the state government has made the baffling decision to keep individual school Year 12 results secret.

The seriousness of such a lack of transparency over a fundamental part of the education system cannot be overstated.

Today, every parent should be able to see how their child’s school performed with regards to Year 12 results. Likewise, parents weighing up the all-important decision of where to send their children to high school should be given easy access to as much information as possible.

Instead, all that is made available by the government authorities is state level data which gives a snapshot of the entire 50,000 plus Queensland cohort – meaningless to the average punter.

Some private schools, such as the ones The Courier-Mail have celebrated today, have chosen to share their results.

Largely, because many schools understand the important insight it gives both current and prospective parents into how they are operating and what they have achieved with regards to Year 12 results.

Education Minister Grace Grace insists parents are not disadvantaged by the lack of information. File picture: NewsWire / Sarah Marshall

But two years into the new Queensland Certificate of Education system, which coincided with the dumping of the Year 12 outcomes report detailing every schools’ cohort result, the government seems happier than ever to keep the bulk of families in the dark. Schools are not even required to include such a fundamental and basic measurement in their annual reports.

The continued insistence from the likes of Education Minister Grace Grace that no parent is impacted by these changes is both frustrating, and simply wrong.

Today, The Courier-Mail is thrilled to celebrate some extraordinary achievements from schools, including remarkable results from those caught up in the distressing mid-year Covid-19 outbreak.

But we know there are many more stories of high-achieving students, their hardworking teachers and their supportive school communities which will not be publicly celebrated today. Likewise, parents who are contemplating what high school to send their children to have again been denied a simple way to assess a school’s Year 12 performance.

No one believes Year 12 results are the only thing parents take into account when selecting a school. But to pretend it would not be a factor for some parents who know their child is academically inclined is disingenuous. The class of 2021 cohort has managed to complete their senior schooling in two of the most challenging years most of us have lived through.

As QCAA chief executive Chris Rider said yesterday, this year’s cohort had proved their resilience in the face of extraordinary circumstances.

We couldn’t agree more. We just wish that the government would allow all their achievements to be celebrated.