Well the big news today had to be Carpenter's cabinet re-shuffle. The announcement was made, and what it delivered was 5 out of 16 ministers hanging on to their portfolios. Among the affected was Jjiliana Ravlich who has lost the education title, which may or may not bring about drastic changes.
Although the change was suspected I'm less than hopeful that McGowan will deliver a better service to Education. Ravlich played a central role in delivering OBE to WA schools, and this wasn't easy to achieve. Public backlash and instant criticism was met, not surprisingly though for such an outcry to happen in WA politics when you consider what the only weekly newspaper we have to read in this state is....and don't get me started on 6PR!
A lot of people actually forget the job that Ljiliana had since gaining the portfolio. She's a politician, she doesn't just go into any decision blindfolded. To make policy you have to actually do a little research and ensure that what you're doing will be accepted by the majority of the people you are supposedly representing (unless your surname is Howard).
Ljiliana would obviously have advisors, and when she was in her previous role she would have called on them for....well....advice. Before implementing OBE obviously research teams would have delivered her information to help her to decide whether outcomes based education is feasible in this state. The information would have said: Computer says yes!
Therefore Ravlich went ahead with a decision that, in her mind, was for the good of the state and that everyone would embrace...well in politics you can please 'almost' everyone.
The public outcry and resentment towards Ravlich which followed, mostly due to the media and the bandwagon that it produces towards OBE, was, in my opinion, unjustified. Yet that's just my opinion and a lot of people tend to disagree with me anyway, including my fiance who holds some strong views against OBE.
Yet we're all different I guess and different opinions is what makes the world go around. It'll be interesting to see just how different McGowan is to Ravlich and wether courses of study and OBE will be sticking around. I for one hope that they do.
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2 comments:
I thought OBE was introduced by Colin Barnett when the Libs were in power?
That is true, the "Curriculum Framework" was written and introduced in 1998 when Colin Barnett was minister of education.
The CF was supposed to be the model for OBE in WA schools from K-12.
Year 11 and 12 Courses (TEE courses) have remain unchanged in this time and are mostly (with the exception of English, Aviation and Media Studies) syllabus based courses with a percentage calculated assessment regime.
Ljiljanna Ravlich tried to introduce the OBE style "Courses of Study" into WA senior school classes to replace the TEE courses.
The new COS were to have an exam worth 50% of a students final mark (just tlike the TEE) but the COS had no set syllabus and was to be marked using levels.
Even Freddy the blindman could see there was no way this could be used calculate a reliable TER for university enterance so WA teachers and parents have been fighting it ever since.
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