League table argy-bargy

Debate over school league table is hotting up

Grapevine

In a world first, one Australian school will form a unique partnership with a Ugandan refugee school, courtesy of a partnership between Australia for UNHCR, the United Nations Refugee Agency’s charity in Australia, and Skype. Called Here & There, the collaborative program will enable Years 7 and 8 students in both countries to learn about each other’s lives as part of their geography studies. Secondary schools across Australia can apply by explaining why their Year 7 and 8 students would like to share stories about their lives with students from Nakivale Refugee Settlement. The school selected will then work with the school in Nakivale on a multimedia project designed to help students understand differences and similarities in childhood as experienced in their respective countries by interviewing one another on a supervised Skype video call in September. Here & There is aimed at raising awareness of issues facing refugees and has been designed to dovetail with the Australian geography curriculum. Interested schools can apply online by 20 August. Schools are encouraged to exercise creativity in their application through innovative use of multimedia, using either video or images, and can change and add to their application before the deadline

Grapevine

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Victorian blueprint for school reform

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Grapevine

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The Last Word - Distracted

As STEVE HOLDEN discovers, researchers are trying to figure out whether web-browsing, tv-watching texters are doing something really clever, or just not finishing their homework

Grapevine

‘The amount of time that has been spent trying to sort this matter in a logical fashion with the (New South Wales) Department of Education and Training (DET) over the past two years is just ludicrous. There have been more twists and turns than an Agatha Christie novel, and now the school community has decided to add a gripping chapter of its own by bringing in a crane and chains. If there’s to be a truly climactic chapter, it will happen if or when the DET tries to remove the building. We’re watching the site 24/7, and if the community has to go in and chain the demountable down, it will.’ So said parent spokesperson and school council member William Cant, when parents and supporters of Black Hill Public School north west of Newcastle in January took the extraordinary action of preparing to chain down a demountable building scheduled to be removed from the school grounds by the DET

The baby and the bathwater

It’s okay to use clichés, so you don’t have to throw the baby out with the bathwater, but before you go ahead, check on the baby and maybe put the bathwater on the garden