How Vic public schools received one third of the capital funds of privates, despite educating twice as many students
While private schools are splashing cash on office towers, Scottish castles, polo fields and Olympic swimming pools, Victorian public schools received one third of the capital funds, it’s been revealed.
Education
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Struggling government schools in Victoria received one third of the capital funds of private schools despite educating twice as many students, a new report has revealed.
Analysis by the Australian Education Union shows five Victorian and NSW schools spent more on lavish facilities in 2021 ($175.6m) than 3372 government schools educating 842,000 students ($175.4m).
These high-spending schools include Loreto Mandeville Hall, which spent $37.7m and Caulfield Grammar which spent $23m on capital works in 2021.
Other such schools are also laying out funds on office towers, $80m Scottish castles, polo fields and Olympic swimming pools.
Other lavish spenders in Victoria in 2021 were Camberwell Grammar and Presbyterian Ladies’ College.
The report, which reveals a $30 billion capital divide between government schools and private colleges, comes as the Education Ministers are meeting in Melbourne on Friday to discuss funding, among other issues.
The AEU report’s findings also show that Victorian state school students each received $1699 for capital spending compared to $2997 for their private school peers.
It comes as private schools are set to get almost $1b more in capital funding from the federal government alone, the AEU figures show.
The report also claims that more than $40m from federal capital fund designed to support private schools in disadvantaged areas has been channelled into wealthy private schools.
AEU Federal President Correna Haythorpe called for the “staggering capital funding divide” to be addressed by governments in the bilateral school funding agreements that are being negotiated this year.
“Only 1.3 per cent of public schools are fully funded compared to 98 per cent of private schools and that inequity in recurrent funding is contributing to an unacceptable $30 billion divide in spending on new and upgraded schools,” she said.
“Our report is calling for a $1.25 billion injection into public schools to make up for the fact there has been no ongoing capital funding from the Commonwealth since the former Coalition Government axed it in 2017.”
Trevor Cobbold from Save our Schools, a state school funding lobby group, said the federal government “guarantees continuation of a special funding privilege for private
schools but refuses to guarantee the rightful funding of public schools.”
“It is a shameful double standard that will entrench the resource gulf between rich and poor,” he said.
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