Report on Government Services: School education data raises concerns, Greens, Labor say

A new report has shone a light on Tasmania’s education system, revealing deficiencies in student outcomes and prompting calls for the state government to do more to improve them.

Vica Bayley, Greens education spokesman. Picture: Nikki Davis-Jones

The Rockliff government is being urged to do more to improve the school system after a new report showed the state was lagging behind the rest of the country on a range of educational outcomes.

The Productivity Commission’s Report on Government Services (ROGS) 2024 showed that Tasmania was performing worse than the national average in every school education category.

The Year 12 attainment rate fell by 4.5 percentage points to 53 per cent in 2022, compared to the national average of 76 per cent, while attendance rates are also lower than the national average in most categories.

Furthermore, retention rates for secondary students are down to 71.7 per cent, which is the lowest in Australia besides the Northern Territory, approaching 2010 levels.

Tasmania’s Year 12 attainment rate fell to 53 per cent in 2022, new data shows.

Labor education spokesman Josh Willie said the percentage of students with a disability receiving educational support was also lower than it was in every other state and territory.

“It’s time we had a government which prioritised the education of our children so we can turn around these results and build a better future for all Tasmanians,” he said.

Greens education spokesman Viva Bayley said the government’s “much-vaunted” education reforms, such as its policy to extend all secondary schools to Year 12, were “not having the desired effect”.

“[The] backwards slide [in attainment rates] applies to students from all socio-economic levels, pointing to a wider issue in the school system. This is a serious situation,” he said.

“While standardised testing like NAPLAN has obvious limitations, it’s nonetheless extremely concerning to see how much Tasmanian students are struggling with reading, writing, and numeracy compared to their mainland counterparts.”

Education, Children and Youth Minister Roger Jaensch. Picture: Linda Higginson

Education, Children and Youth Minister Roger Jaensch acknowledged there was “always more to do to meet long-term challenges” in the state’s education system but there was “much to be proud of” in the new figures, such as the highest increase in government school expenditure in Australia against the national average.

“Attendance levels for Tasmanian schools improved between 2022 and 2023. We will continue our work with education ministers nationally to investigate the cause of declining attendance, with trends in Tasmania mirroring those across the other states and territories,” he said.

Mr Jaensch said the ROGS data also showed that the staff to student ratio in Tasmania was better than the national average and NAPLAN reading outcomes were “comparable” with the rest of the country in 2023.