Simon Birmingham has failed as education minister

There’s no doubt that as an education minister Simon Birmingham is at the bottom of the class.

His handling of the school funding imbroglio over the past 12 months represents a prime example of ineptitude and an inability to master the art of political compromise.

By enshrining in legislation what all now agree is a flawed funding system, Birmingham has put the Turnbull government’s survival at risk by alienating Catholic school parents in marginal seats across Australia.

Birmingham’s refusal to accept research, undertaken by Stephen Elder at Catholic Education Melbourne, exposing the flaws of the socio-economic model, proves he has been captured by bureaucrats.

As a result, the Education Minister has handed on a platter an electoral advantage to Bill Shorten that will continue to play out unless the bleeding is stopped. And it is not just funding where Birmingham has proved such a failure.

Universities in regional Australia, as well as the Australian Catholic University, provide a ladder of opportunity to students who are often the first in their families to undertake tertiary study.

Cutting back funding, and thus ensuring fewer places for such students, reinforces the impression that the government is more worried about the top end of town than those doing it hard. The school curriculum is another area were Birmingham shows an unwillingness to listen to sound advice. The Gonski 2.0 recommendations about how to raise standards represent a dumbed-down approach to curriculum that will ensure students underachieve.

That Birmingham has endorsed the Gonski 2.0 approach, an approach that promotes 21st-century learning based on generic, abstract competencies, flies in the face of all the available research.

As detailed in the 2014 National Curriculum Final Report I co-wrote, the most effective way to raise standards is to have an academically rigorous curriculum.

And the Prime Minister’s decision to take the reins would have more credibility if he had not played a major role in pushing the Gonski model and endorsing Birmingham’s actions.

Kevin Donnelly is a senior research fellow at the Australian Catholic University.