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Natasha Bita is a multi-award winning journalist with a focus on free speech, education, social affairs, aged care, health policy, immigration, industrial relations and consumer law. She has won a Walkley Award, Australia’s most prestigious journalism award, and a Queensland Clarion Award for feature writing. Natasha has also been a finalist for the Graham Perkin Australian Journalist of the Year Award and the Sir Keith Murdoch Award for Excellence in Journalism. Her reporting on education issues has won the NSW Professional Teachers’ Council Media Award and an Australian Council for Educational Leaders award. Her agenda-setting coverage of aged care abuse won an Older People Speak Out award. Natasha worked in London and Italy for The Australian newspaper and News Corp Australia. She is a member of the Canberra Press Gallery and the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance. Contact her by email natasha.bita@news.com.au

@natasha_bita

Natasha Bita

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ExclusiveEducation

A son with a backpack and his mother holding his hand sending him to school on the first day of school and the schoolboy is looking at the camera

Gonski funds don’t add up as Labor ‘gifts’ $16.5bn

After a year of squabbling with states, the Albanese government has revealed a final figure for Gonski funding of public schools but its cash contribution doesn’t appear to add up.

Natasha Bita

ExclusiveHigher Education

Electrician repairing circuit breakers in industrial electric panel.

Trades trump degrees in jobs market

Is a degree worth the debt? New data reveals that apprenticeships can lead to better employment outcomes than university degrees – without the HECS debt.

Natasha Bita

ExclusiveNation

poor, sad little child girl sitting against the concrete wall

Cost-of-living stress blamed for surge in child abuse cases

A top government adviser on child safety has linked rising poverty with increased reporting of abuse and neglect, with one in every 20 Australian children reported to be involved in such cases.

Natasha Bita

UniversitiesNation

CANBERRA, AUSTRALIA - NewsWire Photos - February 25 2025: Senator Sarah Henderson during the Environment and Communications Legislation Committee Estimates at Parliament House in Canberra. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman

Election gets uni bosses off the hook

Vice-chancellors who faced a grilling from senators over their million-dollar salaries could be off the hook after a Senate inquiry was delayed.

Natasha Bita

ExclusiveNation

OZ_BIZ_SUMMERFINANCETIPS - Gold nuggets the hands of the miner. The working hands of a peasant with pure gold. top view

Skills shortages ‘risk national security’, scientists warn

A ‘spreadsheet management approach’ to university education is creating skills shortages that threaten national security, professional organisations have warned.

Natasha Bita

ExclusiveHigher Education

CAREERS: Don't stress about your ATAR, there are lots of other pathways to career success. Picture: iStock

Wrong uni degree choices costing billions

‘Overwhelming, complex and confusing.’ Thousands of school leavers have cast judgment on universities’ admissions systems in a new study that calls for better career guidance.

Natasha Bita

ExclusiveHigher Education

Group of graduate students holding their graduation hats.

‘Soft marking’ for struggling uni students ‘dumbing down’ nation: academics

Hundreds of university professors and lecturers have blown the whistle on falling academic standards and cheating, in alarming evidence to a rushed Senate inquiry into university governance.

Natasha Bita

ExclusiveEducation