Australian teachers find it more difficult to control their classrooms compared with their counterparts overseas, presenting another challenge to an already-strained education system. by Susan Nguyen.

Australian classrooms are more disruptive than learning environments overseas and experience higher incidences of bullying and truancy compared with the OECD average.

Yet Australian teachers feel less equipped than their international counterparts to manage disruptive behaviour, placing additional stress on an education system that is already grappling with declining student performance.

These are the findings of the OECD’s latest report card on Australia’s education system released this week, which also identified high levels of teacher attrition as a “particular concern” preventing educational institutions from consolidating gains that flow from having more experienced teachers in the system.

Although Australian students perform at or above the OECD average, education standards have steadily declined - particularly in older students - since international testing was introduced more than two decades ago. Inequities also persist for Indigenous students and remote learners.

In the early 2000s, Australia ranked 4th internationally in reading, 8th in science and 11th in maths according to PISA, which assesses the performance of 15-year-old students across the OECD. By 2018, we had fallen to 16th in reading, 17th in science and 29th in maths.

Australia has lost the equivalent of one year’s worth of learning over the past two decades. We were once on par with top performing nations such as Singapore. But now the average 15-year-old Singaporean is three years ahead of Australian pupils.

We also lag behind countries that we used to outperform. The UK, Canada and New Zealand have leapfrogged ahead of us in all three assessment domains.

Our performance has slipped despite Australia spending more than the OECD average on education and record levels of government funding.

Source: OECD Education Policy outlook in Australia

Since 2011, education expenditure has increased in real terms and is projected to be $25.3 billion in 2022-23. Over the next ten years, there will be a 46 per cent increase in Australian Government funding per student.

Improved funding is clearly not translating to improved outcomes. As former education minister Alan Tudge surmised in a March 2021 speech to the Menzies Research Centre, if this was happening to the economy, our diminishing academic performance would be a national topic of conversation.

One of our priorities at the MRC is to maintain a firm spotlight on education policy. We will be exploring solutions for reversing the decline in education standards, attracting and incentivising the teaching profession, improving the learning environment and restoring our former status as one of the top performing nations in education.

Taking back control of the classroom

Australian teachers find it more difficult to control their classrooms compared with their counterparts overseas, presenting another challenge to an already-strained education system. by Susan Nguyen.