Thank you, Kerryn Garner ("School zones are disrupting communities", Comment, 8/9) We live a 10-minute tram ride from a school and our children started there before restrictions and before our now nearest school existed. Our fifth child's application to follow his four older siblings there in 2017 has been rejected. Our children have contributed to this school as vice-captain and male dux (2011), school captain (2015), and given it two ATARs over 98. They have been champion debaters, held lead roles in school productions, played in music ensembles and shared their home with international students. Our third and fourth sons are students there. However, next year, for our fifth child, we must embrace a new school, timetable and teacher interviews, find time to get to concerts of a new school orchestra, buy a new uniform etc. Our community has been divided. Families try to stay friends as we wait to see whose child will get to follow his or her siblings. Others with less or no commitment to the school, lie about where they live to get a place there, wasting its resources weeding them out. It is the families that make a school, not the other way around. We, like our friends, just want to keep our families together.
Caroline Cornwallis, Preston
Some students need alternative pathways
It is little wonder there has been a jump in expulsions by state schools (The Age, 9/9). Disruptive behaviour is now displayed at all levels by students who have no respect for school and teachers. It is interesting that we do not hear about expulsions from private schools. I know from my own experience that those rejected by the private system end up in a state school. Does the private system make any attempt to find a place for its rejects? There was a time when those who did not fit into school could leave and find a job or apprenticeship, but now everyone is expected to complete year 12. For those young people who are unable to co-operate, there needs to be an alternative pathway.
Megan Peniston-Bird, Hawthorn
Clarifying PISA scores of young Australians
Alan Walker (Letters, 8/9) says a change in PISA scores is meaningless as scales are normalised each time the test is conducted. This is wrong. The scores are not normalised every time the tests are conducted. When the scale was established (in 2000 for reading, 2003 for maths and 2006 for science), the OECD average was fixed to exactly 500. This average was based on all OECD countries that participated in that year. If lower performing OECD countries joined the study in a later cycle, they will lower the OECD average. The OECD average is directly comparable over time. As a consequence, the average for individual countries are also directly comparable between cycles. Therefore, a drop in the average score for Australia does mean that the average performance of students has declined.
Dr Sue Thomson, PISA national project manager, Australian Council for Educational Research, Camberwell
Downward maths slide a matter of concern
Alan Walker, our PISA scores do indicate a steady drop in Australia's performance in maths since 2000. A core group of items are used each time to anchor the scores so the real trend in performance can be measured. A country's rank position varies depending on which other countries take part, but absolute scores do not. Australia's most recent PISA score of 504 in 2012 is down from 524 points in 2003. This drop is equivalent to about seven months of schooling. PISA is one of the best measurements of mathematical achievement we have. We should all be concerned at this downward slide.
Kaye Stacey, professor of mathematics education, University of Melbourne
A woman's free choice
Julie Szego – "Burkini's veiled threat" (Comment, 9/9) – is correct that some clothing is a political choice, but it is disingenuous to mention Klu Klux Klan outfits. Klan hoods are a symbol of racism. Islamic covering up means many things. For the Iranians I know, it is a symbol of an oppressive theocracy while for others it is what they feel comfortable wearing. Szego says it "may" be a free choice. In this society it is a free choice, just as wearing wigs to cover hair is for some orthodox Jewish women. The association with "religious pressure" and "violent Islamism" says more about Szego's concerns than about the clothes and the women who wear them.
Floyd Kermode, Preston
The wrong targets
I wonder why women are being targeted in this xenophobic crusade against burkinis. It would be more appropriate to keep a close watch on the men and boys who kill and maim, hiding cravenly behind the excuse of religious righteousness. Can we please pay attention to what is happening here: punishing women for the sins of men. It does not matter to anyone else what you wear to the beach, as long as you are decent according to custom of the place. That is, unless you want an excuse for some sexist bullying.
Rae Barclay, Highton
The important debate
The more noteworthy aspect of the French ban on burkinis, aimed at a minuscule number of Muslim women, was the uncharacteristic ineptitude of gendarmes who became the Western equivalent of Iranian "morality police". This trivial debate diverts attention from a much needed focus on the patriarchal tradition of Islam, Christianity and Judaism in policing women's bodies in areas such as abortion, marriage and social behaviour.
Jon McMillan, Mount Eliza
Buyer's right to build
Julie van den Driesen (Letters, 9/9) decries the demolition of "family homes" and the building of McMansions. For the most part, homes that are demolished are sad relics of the 1950s and 60s. Many younger buyers want modern houses, and they do not want large blocks with trees and gardens. Indeed, Melbourne's urban sprawl might be less of a problem had earlier generations been less enamoured of the quarter-acre blocks.
When houses are sold, sellers probably have more money than they could have imagined a few years ago and buyers have the right to do what they like, subject to what councils allow. In 50years time, people will probably be complaining about the destruction of stately old McMansions and branding their replacements as monstrosities.
Al Morris, Doncaster
Please, let us pay
The Chinese way of showing affection and appreciation is by using money. We present the amount of money inside a red envelope, called ang pow. And we are hurt if this amount is not accepted. It is also customary to pick up a bill on someone's behalf, for instance while dining at a restaurant. The Chinese who paid for Sam Dastyari's expenses may have had this in mind. The amounts in question were so small. The punishment certainly did not fit the crime.
Yoong Crooke, South Yarra
Keeping them honest
Why can't political donors be required to send donations to a federally run blind trust, from which funds could be directed to needy political parties or politicians, without any perception of bias or influence?
George Houlder, Cambrian Hill
The worth of a child
Wendy Squires rightly questions the cost of Medicare rebates for IVF (Comment, 6/9), but how do you put a price on any baby? Is a $100,000 IVF baby better for society than a $200,000 IVF baby? Yes, there appears to be a problem with many Medicare-funded procedures but how honest are the suppliers? No one forces them to offer Medicare-funded procedures to women who may have no hope.
Certainly age limits could be useful, but personal biases can creep in. What funding should be available to women under 40 years who are obese? What funding should go to couples who need IVF after vasectomies undergone in previous relationships? What funding should be provided when IVF is required for male infertility if the man is over 50? Perhaps it is time for women who do not become mothers to take on fulfilling roles, rather than Squires suggesting they may need therapy.
Helen Goodman, Williamstown
Our glorious old game
The AFL thinks it has invented something new with its idea of seven-a-side footy played on a rectangular field (Sport, 8/9). Children were playing this version of the game in Dunolly in the 1940s and 1950s. For us, seven on each side was perfection, with the five key positions and a ruck and rover, but we also played with fewer children, depending on who turned up after school or during the holidays. We also learned a lot about possession and authority. The kid who brought the footy was always a captain and the umpire. There was no dissent. Those of us who did not own a footy would not risk him picking up his ball and taking it home.
Bill Humphreys, Golden Square
Leave our footy alone
Will someone please inform AFL boss Gillon McLachlan that football is not a "product" to be sold and marketed, but one of the few cultural artefacts that is truly Australian. Further, the AFL does not "own" it because it did not create it in the first place. It belongs to no one and everyone. Stop the stupid tinkering with it.
David Champion, Ivanhoe
A price too high
Australia's 25years of steady growth is worth celebrating (The Age, 8/9), although I do not see why a picture of Scott Morrison was attached the article. He was not responsible for any of this success. Also, this growth has created problems that need to be attacked. First, the cost of housing (rental or purchase) has increased by about five-fold over the median income, creating a situation where our children and grandchildren will be made poor by the cost of accommodation. Additionally, the degree of inequality within the population has increased. This will create further difficulties because those who are left behind will be very unhappy. Both the Brexit result and the transformation of Donald Trump into a presidential candidate can be sheeted back to inequality.
John Mills, South Yarra
Growth, but not for all
I was an adult through those 25years of growth, and more than 18years before that. I was a worker, a jobseeker and a worker again, retiring to reasonable comfort. I have watched unemployment go from almost nil to around 2million. Luckily, I rarely see the one in seven children who are living in poverty. But walking along Flinders Street, I see adults in poverty, sitting and lying on the ground.
I have followed the transformation of governments' terminology. From "moving to sunrise industries" to "unemployed" to "bludgers, job snobs, leaners", each term more degrading. And all from politicians and economists who rarely use the words "poverty" and "misery".
Don Hampshire, Sunbury West
My dad's long wait
My 89-year-old father has occasion to use taxis. Often they drive past his home if he is not waiting by his walker on the footpath and turn up late to pick him up. The best was on August19, a cold and showery day. Having pre-booked a taxi to pick him up after a University of the Third Age class, and six phone calls later to 13CABS, which assured him each time he was priority, he was still waiting on the street an hour and 40 minutes later for a taxi. We are still waiting for 13CABS' response to our complaint.
Amanda Richdale, Box Hill North
Battle to travel
Melburnians complain about using buses instead of trains when rail lines are being upgraded. Meanwhile, on weekends and evenings, there are no buses to and from Kilmore East Station, the only one which serves Kilmore. There is also no footpath to the station, a distance of more than 1kilometre on a steep and dangerous road. Many elderly people and young families who live up to five kilometres from the station are severely disadvantaged by this lack of public transport. The Kilmore & Districts Residents & Ratepayers Association plans to petition the state government. We hope funding will be made available to provide better public transport for our fast-growing area.
Anne Rose, Kilmore
AND ANOTHER THING
Donations
The Dastyari Disgrace will be like the Sinodinos Shuffle – five minutes in the sin bin, and then (funny) business as usual. What a mob.
Graeme Campbell, Hawthorn
Sam Dastyari says he "wasn't thinking straight". If something isn't straight, it's usually crooked.
Gary Ching, Glen Iris
Fix offshore detention, then fix Senator Dastyari.
Brendan O'Farrell, Brunswick
My council rates are soon due. Can I please have a contact for a Chinese donor.
Tom Glynn, Strathfieldsaye
Sam, did you really expect people to believe you couldn't afford a $1670 travel bill when you're paid more than $16,000 a month?
Frank Lawton, Montrose
Beware of Confucians bearing gifts.
Michael Boquest, Williamstown
Dastyari sold his soul for a mess of pottage. Wake up, Bill. Tap the hapless senator on the shoulder and tell him to move on.
Neil Brunlow, Croydon North
Why didn't Dastyari ask for the cash in a brown paper bag? That way no one would have been the wiser.
Tony O'Brien, South Melbourne
Perhaps the Labor Party should have Chinese checkers.
Des Files, Brunswick
While Bernardi is leading the movement to stop Chinese government influence on our policy makers, could he please ask God to butt out also?
Sarah Bone, Wonthaggi
Fewer political donations. Fewer political ads. Hooray.
Patsy Patten, Toorak
Shorten refused to move against Dastyari. No surprise there as both are right-wing factional operatives.
Tony Delaney, Warrnambool