source : the age
Xander Hart
Selective schools are meant to be a beacon of merit. But they’ve become something else.
Twenty-four schools in WA offer Gifted and Talented (GATE) Programs, but by far the most competitive is Perth Modern, the only fully selective school in the state.
It consistently tops the ATAR rankings, and last year 10 out of 18 students with the highest ATARs graduated from it.
It offers the academic prestige of an elite private school for free, so the competition for spots is fierce.
A recent online survey my brother and I conducted of Perth Modern students shows that 45 per cent currently receive tutoring, and 30 per cent have previously.
The Department of Education says GATE tests “are designed to identify students who are most suited for our Gifted and Talented Secondary Selective Entrance programs”.
“The test identifies a student’s potential, rather than their acquired knowledge.”
And yet 75 per cent of Perth Modern Students prepared for the test, with the most common type of preparation being attending a tutoring centre.
Three-quarters of the students at Perth’s smartest school spent their primary school weekends in strip-mall tutoring centres, doing repetitive questions for hours on end, trading in their childhood for competitive exam prep.
This clearly hijacks the system, widening the divide between those who can afford to send their kids, and those that cannot.
Tutoring is a multibillion-dollar industry, preying on the fears of parents. The problem is not tutoring itself, but a system where paying for preparation can become a key advantage in gaining access to a publicly funded selective education.
Selective education is supposed to provide academically talented students opportunities without a private school fee, regardless of their families circumstance.
If preparation becomes something families must purchase, public education becomes just another market where money dictates who has access.
Unlike schools, tutoring providers operate outside standard regulatory structures. This leaves parents to assess the qualifications, quality, and practices of providers largely for themselves.
There are around 5000 tutoring business nationally, but there are no special accreditations or curriculums they need to follow.
Of course, there are steps we can take to fix the system. We can democratise GATE preparation by releasing past papers to disrupt the monopoly tutoring companies have on resources.
The test has been running for more than 20 years, and yet the lack of high quality, free resources means tutoring companies dictate prices.
Past ATAR exams are freely available for study, so why are GATE tests kept secret?
Ideally, no one would prepare earlier, but since people are, it is far more fair for the department to release resources equally.
We could also create a state government agency to regulate educational and safety requirements for all types of tutoring.
Until we fix this, we aren’t testing for the brightest minds, but for the deepest pockets.
Xander Hart and his twin brother Jonathan are year 11 students at Perth Modern School.
