Abstract:
The politics of curriculum in Gillard’s ‘Education Revolution’.
The introduction of a national curriculum for schools was a goal of the Howard government that was adopted by the ALP and is strongly promoted by the media and employers. In the name of this logical goal, right-wing educational interests push for an instrumentalist curriculum and competitive national testing. It is seen by them as a corrective to leftist content and methods and a vehicle for further school privatisation. Federal Education Minister Julia Gillard gets media praise for pushing on with the national curriculum and cites it as an early gain in the ‘Education Revolution’. The reform is being implemented by a new national body, Australian Curriculum and Reporting Authority (ACARA), under the leadership of education consultants and entrepreneurs Barry McGaw and Tony McKay. The new body is responsible for the K-12 curriculum, national assessment, data collection and reporting on all schools.
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