Student Protests Erupt Over 'Pay To Learn' - 3 Police Needed To Carry Away One High School Girl

Headline altered/improved by @SpuriousReasons

 Thousands of students took to the streets of Australian cities yesterday to protest Budget 2014 education cuts and deregulation of universities that will result in many of them paying $10,000s, or in some cases, more than $100,000 for university degrees.



Nearly all student protesters were non-violent, there were scuffles with police, but they were in the vast minority. In some cities, there were no confrontations with the police at all. PM Abbott predicted "a riot" and it didn't happen.

The Daily Telegraph is its usual balanced self:

Meanwhile, the Herald Sun served up some outrage at female high school protesters, but gave them the chance to speak, which they did well:

Teenage schoolgirls were carried away by police and more than a dozen people were arrested when a rowdy city protest against the Federal Government’s Budget changes to higher education turned nasty.

Thousands of angry demonstrators choked city streets, blocking traffic and forcing the suspension of tram services for several hours on Wednesday.
Police had to move in and remove a group of protesters - some teenage schoolgirls in uniform - from tram tracks outside State Parliament.

The group had defied several police warnings to leave the Spring Street sit-in before officers acted.

Fellow protesters had also urged them to leave.

Victoria Police’s Inspector Paul Binyon ­expressed his disappointment at the clash, saying protesters hadn’t kept to an agreement about how they would behave.

“I was surprised at the age of some of them,’’ said Insp Binyon.

“One demonstrator’s parents actually turned up and took their child home.”

Probably this one, from the Herald Sun front page:

 Education Minister Christopher Pyne did his best to mock and insult the students, and stir them up even more:

“They (the protesters) should be buying a big bunch of flowers and a box of Roses chocolates, and finding a household near where they live where there’s nobody there with a university degree, and knocking on the front door, giving them the flowers and the chocolates, and saying, ‘Thank you for paying for 60 per cent of my university degree, so I can earn 75 per cent more than you over my lifetime’,”

“I take all their protests with a pinch of salt,” he said.

What an idiot.

The students speak.

Camberwell High School student Tallulah, 15:

“The budget cuts are wrong, I want to go to university and I don’t want to pay through the nose for it. If these fees get too high, I may not be able to go to university, which I want to do for my future and for my family’s future.”

One said there were as many as 30 students from her Footscray school at the protest.
“By the time we go to university, how are we going to pay for it?” she said.

Williamstown High School student Simona, 16, turned up with several schoolfriends.

“I think that whatever university a student decides to turn to should be purely based on their entrance (score), should be purely reliant on their score, as opposed to how much money they have,” she said.

“Education is a right. It’s not a privilege, it’s a right.”

Her friend Alice, 17, said: “I am here today because currently we are under the reign of an oppressive, ignorant, idiotic government.”

The Abbott government changes are hardcore. Universities can charge what they like for degrees, and graduated students will have to pay their government loan debts sooner, and with rising interest. Abbott and Pyne will also slash funds the universities get towards paying for certain courses.

It's the long road, of short steps, towards greater privatisation of Australia's education system, and the students know it.

La Trobe University student union president Rose Steele:

“I think it’s really important that secondary students are here, because secondary students are going to bear the ­absolute brunt of the deregulated system,’’ Miss Steele said.
“They are going to be the ones who will be paying hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees.

“We will be coming out again and again.”

Reaction from student protesters on social media after the protests was jubilation, excitement and empowerment. They'd also had a lot of fun. They felt they had achieved something, the protests were mostly non-violent, in videos the police came across as rougher than the protesters, and they have what seems like the vast majority of the public on their side. Comments pouring onto news sites through the night were about 90% in favour of the students taking action to protest the Abbott government changes to the price of getting a decent education in Australia.

Melbourne #May21Protest, image via @RedDragon1917

And to close, Never Ask A Studio Protestor In A Live TV Interview What Her T-Shirt Says

15 year old student protester Tallulah, quoted above, gets targeted by Murdoch's Herald Sun. They're going after teenage girls who criticise Abbott now? Despicable.

The Herald Sun's frantic attempts to disparage the student protesters reaches a new level of absurdity. They are utterly gormless:

The students were protesting because they want to get degrees, and believe Abbott and Pyne's changes to university fees and deregulation will make it much harder for them to do so.

Murdoch sure employs some morons these days.

More To Come

Education Minister Christopher Pyne Warms Up For His Rewriting Of History Curriculum

This piece written by federal Education Minister Christopher Pyne was paywalled by The Australian. Here is is for free:

A robust, relevant and up-to-date Australian Curriculum is essential to improve the quality of education of all school students.

The Australian government wants a curriculum that delivers what students need for their future, what parents want and what the nation requires in our increasingly competitive and globalised world.

It must be both content-rich and, importantly, focus on the 21st-century skills of critical thinking, team work, problem solving, creativity, analytic reasoning and communication.

It must help students to be the best they can be. It must be based on high standards and high expectations for all students.

A modern and relevant curriculum must also be one that teachers are excited to teach.

More than anything else, we want to take the politics out of this issue. What really matters to students and parents is whether the curriculum is the best possible that we can create.

That means a curriculum that is balanced in its content, free of partisan bias and deals with real-world issues.

But that doesn't mean the curriculum should be dull. Australia needs a curriculum that helps teachers to breathe life into a child's time at school, one that challenges students and assists them to make the right choices for their future.

It means a curriculum that is dynamic and evolves as necessary while maintaining an independent, robust foundation so it is effective in meeting student needs.

A small nation like Australia must develop a curriculum that is national in breadth, rigorous in content, flexible and innovative in delivery and is a key driver in our goal to improve genuine education quality results for all Australian students. We cannot afford to do otherwise.

Working with the state and territory governments, the Howard government got the ball rolling. The previous government continued this work and now it is timely to review the content of the curriculum to take into account the many views expressed so far.

In particular, concerns have been raised about the history curriculum not recognising the legacy of Western civilisation and not giving important events in Australia's history and culture the prominence they deserve, such as Anzac Day.

Today, I am announcing the appointment of Ken Wiltshire AO and Kevin Donnelly to review the Australian Curriculum so we develop and implement a curriculum that is on par with the world's best.
Between them, Professor Wiltshire and Dr Donnelly have enormous experience in education and improving the performance of educational systems.

The time is right to bring this exceptional expertise and insight to bear on examining the robustness, independence and balance of the Australian Curriculum. They will do this by evaluating both the process of its development and the content.

I have asked them to gather the views of parents, state and territory governments and educators to inform their analysis.

I am excited about putting the Australian Curriculum on a robust and sustainable path, but this is just one aspect of how we are putting students first in our education policies.

In his new year message, the Prime Minister reminded us that we are a strong, resilient and smart people, and that the strength of our country lies in the willingness of Australians to improve their own lives by "having a go".

That's why the two principles I always come back to are putting students first and implementing what works.

There's a great deal of research that shows higher school achievement depends on teacher quality, school autonomy, a robust curriculum and parental engagement in their child's education.

Adequate funding for schools is obviously necessary, but increasing funding should never be an end in itself.

Countries that spend a high proportion of their GDP on education do not automatically produce high-performing education systems.

So this year I will be working hard with the states and territories to ensure our children are getting a high-quality, world-class education by focusing on those four key areas of teacher quality, principal autonomy, parental engagement and strengthening the curriculum.

I'll be focusing on these areas because they will make a real difference to students and their education.

Professor Wiltshire and Dr Donnelly have a great responsibility to help the government ensure that what we are teaching our children is true, worthwhile and meaningful.