A draft report into how to improve the West Australian public high school system has found more needs to be done to make education accessible for all students, and that changes to the ATAR pathway could be the key.
The Post-School Success Expert Panel Report: Consultation Draft was released on Thursday and is a blueprint to strengthening secondary school pathways.
WA Education Minister Tony Buti has announced the draft report. Credit: Holly Thompson
Education Minister Tony Buti said the draft report made it clear changes were needed to ensure the system was equitable.
“We are committed to ... helping to prepare students for the range of further study, training and work options available to them,” he said.
The draft contains 35 recommendations on how to improve the system, particularly related to ATAR and WA certificate of education (WACE) attainment.
Expert panel chairman Bill Louden said a strong senior secondary education system was vital for students and for the state community and economy.
“We need to acknowledge that the world around us has changed faster than our senior secondary system, and as a result, there are some students whose needs are currently not being met,” he wrote in the report.
“We are proposing a suite of recommendations that will ensure senior secondary pathways are accessible and meaningful for all students.”
Some key recommendations included enabling as many VET qualifications as possible to contribute to ATAR, in line with other Australian jurisdictions, expanding the information included in the WA Statement of Student Achievement to reflect a holistic picture of success, and to develop an additional level within the WACE to accommodate students with a recognised disability.
The report also listed six ‘key imperatives’ including increasing student retention, stating that “retention is a major and persistent challenge” for WA.
Another key imperative was to recognise the value of students, the report stating “education systems don’t always value [student] uniqueness.”
The report also revealed there had been a 9 per cent decrease in students choosing ATAR courses since 2016, and an 11 per cent enrolment increase in general courses.
It noted while this might be the right choice for some students, there was concern “at least some students are not selecting pathways that are sufficiently challenging for them and may compromise their long-term educational interests.”
Dissolving the hard distinction between ATAR and general courses and expanding the number and type of courses and programs that can count toward an ATAR would enable the system to recognise a broader range of student achievement, the report found.
It could also have benefits for breaking down the perceived ‘ATAR-centric’ nature of the system, relieve timetabling pressures, and help students to make study choices that match with their individual learning goals.
The draft report has been released for public consultation, with the final report to be provided to the state government on October 1.
“Senior secondary pathways have wide-ranging implications for a broad range of stakeholders, so it is important that this consultation draft be open for feedback from the public,” Buti said.
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