In the big wide world of Google, people can review everything from ice-cream shops to parks – even brothels.
But as of next week, reviews and ratings for schools will disappear. The search engine giant – remember its old motto, “Don’t be evil”? – has told schools the change is designed to prevent “unhelpful or prank reviews”. Not to mention defamatory remarks about staff and students.
Google won’t allow school reviews. Credit: AP
From April 30, existing reviews or ratings of schools will be removed and users will not be able to submit new reviews or ratings.
With 4.12 million school students around Australia, things can get fruity in Google reviews. While many parents use the ratings and comments to inform their enrolment decisions, reviews that are ancient, anonymous and just plain weird are not uncommon.
“Obviously, the star ratings have a big impact on [school] credibility,” says Tim Nelson of school marketing business Look Education.
“When people are searching for schools, and they might not know a lot about the school, and they see two stars, they’re immediately thinking, ‘What’s going on here? What’s wrong?’” Nelson says. “And in a lot of the cases it was just students trolling or past students.”
But what will the keyboard warriors do now? Nelson says they’ll move on to other platforms such as Facebook and Reddit.
Google being Google, CBD couldn’t get someone on the phone to talk further.
Going full Python
Monty Python had it right: The People’s Front of Judea hated only one group more than the Romans: the Judean People’s Front (spot the difference?). “Splitters!”
Chris Kearney is a former member of the Greens who is standing as an independent in the Melbourne seat of Jagajaga.
A similar scene is playing out in Melbourne’s north-east, where Chris Kearney is standing as a “Voices of” independent in Jagajaga, which is held on a healthy margin by Labor’s Kate Thwaites.
Kearney is a teacher, environmental consultant and business analyst who is running on a platform free of the “party politics of the major parties”.
He was also, until recently, a card-carrying member of the Victorian Greens. Which caused some problems – he’s running against Greens candidate Jy Sandford. The Greens responded to Kearney’s move by expelling him from the party in February.
Or at least that’s what they thought they did. Kearney tells us his membership formally expired in December 2024, and “effectively” expired in May 2024. Talk about quitting before you are fired!
Labor MP Kate Thwaites during question time in 2021.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
The Greens may not have had the pleasure of expelling Kearney, but he’s still deeply salty about the party. “They have become the Hartlepool subbranch of the People’s Front of Judea,” he told CBD.
Readers will no doubt be familiar with the People’s Front of Judea, from Monty Python’s Life of Brian.
The “Hartlepool subbranch” slur, though, took some more unpacking. Kearney said he was referring to a 19th-century Napoleonic Wars legend about locals in the English town of Hartlepool hanging a monkey, believing it to be a French spy. In his telling, Kearney is the monkey – erm, obviously.
“There is a cult within the Greens; they have taken over. They have been doing a purge,” said Kearney, who had joined the party in 2010.
The Victorian Greens HQ did not want to comment when contacted by CBD, other than to “confirm that it is against our member code of conduct to run as a non-Greens candidate”.
Kearney said there were three misconduct allegations, including one of bullying. The bullying was rejected, another allegation lapsed, and by the time of the third one that resulted in his expulsion he had already left.
The whole affair resulted in an 11-page grievance declaration about the divided branch and included three recommendations to state council about the future conduct of preselections. It was produced under the banner of the Greens’ mantra of “ecological sustainability, grassroots participatory democracy, social justice, peace and non-violence”. Certainly non-violence, but a whole lot of aggro along the way.
Donations like child’s play
Mystery donations are everywhere this federal election campaign, and why wouldn’t they be when nobody needs to declare who has been giving them cash until February next year?
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese at a press conference during a visit to Batemans Bay, NSW, on Monday.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
Labor is now trying to spin its undisclosed funds into a good thing, by gamifying the whole experience. Subscribers to the party’s community outreach emails have been given the “rare opportunity” of drumming up donations in a race-the-clock appeal.
Some anonymous donor will shell out $50,000 if supporters can raise another $50,000 from backers who click on the little red $25, $50 and $100 buttons.
If it fails, we guess the anonymous donor will take their moneybags elsewhere? If it succeeds, we’ll be able to reveal the identity next February. We’ll have more fun with the next election, when new disclosure laws kick in requiring donors to declare themselves to the Australian Electoral Commission within seven days.
With Stephen Brook, Liam Mannix
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