By Bridie Smith
Some of Melbourne’s most established bilingual state schools are missing out on funding because they’re operating under a fractured and inequitable system, parents and teachers say.
Advocacy group the Bilingual Schools Network also said these schools, where demand is growing, often operate without unified standards.
Abbotsford Primary School parents with their children. From left: Lorena Burns with Ben, 7, and Tom, 5; Ben Luk with Emma, 7; Jieh-Yung Lo with Hopelyn, 7; and Suk-yi Lo with Callum, 8 and Raelyn, 10.Credit: Paul Jeffers
The network is made up of principals, program leaders and teachers from 11 bilingual state schools, including Melbourne’s first English-Italian school (Brunswick South Primary) and Australia’s oldest English-Chinese bilingual school (Abbotsford Primary School).
“These schools often operate in isolation, without a cohesive support system or unified standards,” a network strategy document seen by The Age says. “The absence of a comprehensive policy and uneven distribution of resources limits the potential for these schools to expand and thrive.”
Abbotsford Primary School’s 166 students are taught in English and Mandarin.
Footscray resident Jieh-Yung Lo drives an hour-and-a-half each day to take his seven-year-old daughter, Hopelyn, to the school because he wants her to be fluent in Mandarin and familiar with her Chinese heritage.
But a feeling that the school lacked standardised approaches and support led parents, including Lo, Zarah Goh and Amy Poh, to form a working group to better integrate Mandarin into its curriculum. They have designed language games, helped with assessment and started a Chinese tuckshop, so students can practise their Mandarin in a realistic setting.
“We’re trying to help the school build the Chinese curriculum because there is no statewide standard, so we’re having to do [things] ourselves, and we’re not teachers,” Lo said.
Amy Poh, a fellow member of the parent group, said some parents felt the bilingual program wasn’t being as well-executed as it could be, despite the school’s dedication to being bilingual.
“We realised that we had to pool our resources, so some of us went in to teach Mandarin too,” Poh said. “We also helped to teach the students phrases and assess their verbal skills.”
Poh, who has sons Marcus, in year 4, and Damian, in year 5, at the school, said just 30 per cent of parents had paid the voluntary school contribution, adding to the school’s financial strains.
“Even now, the kids have to share textbooks at school,” she said.
A public policy professional, Lo also said he was concerned about where bilingual primary school students would go for secondary school.
“There are not many high school options that have bilingual programs, and you don’t want them to lose that learning and that training,” he said. “There is a real disjointedness between primary school, high school and university.”
Most of Victoria’s state bilingual schools are primary. Of 18, just five are high schools.
Lorena Burns was born in Uruguay and her sons Ben, 7, and Tom, 5, speak Spanish at home. But Burns wanted her children to be fluent in Mandarin and Spanish and so sought out Abbotsford Primary despite it being a 45-minute peak-hour drive from the family’s Bulleen home.
“We believe it is going to open up opportunities in life and work,” she said.
“We knew we wanted them to speak multiple languages and Mandarin was top of our list because we believe it will be important for their future careers and also when travelling as adults.”
The Bilingual Schools Network also identified teacher shortages as a problem in the sector but said this could be addressed if the Education Department put bilingual teachers in a separate category to language teachers.
This would prompt the Victorian Institute of Teaching to follow suit and highlight the bilingual teacher shortage, increasing the chance of getting the profession added to Australia’s skilled occupation list, the network said.
The network’s 11 member-schools receive additional funding through the state government’s Designated Bilingual Program. To receive funding, schools have to provide face-to-face teaching in the target language to all students for between 7½ and 12½ hours a week.
The funding is calculated by the number of students enrolled and the hours per week the target language is used while teaching.
However, other schools with partial-immersion bilingual programs do not receive additional funding, a policy the network describes in its strategy document as inequitable.
An Education Department spokesperson said bilingual education played an important role in Victoria’s education system.
“The Designated Bilingual Program supports this by delivering high-quality bilingual learning in selected mainstream government primary schools.”
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