Education Policy

All of our state policy principles and aims should be read alongside our relevant federal policy principles and aims, as well as our state campaigns and federal campaigns.

Principles

1. A strong public education system for all stages of life is key to building a just society. The opportunity to learn unlocks potential, reduces inequality and allows people to live a good life.
2. Public investment in education is essential to personal and community well-being, social fulfilment and economic prosperity.
3. Public education – including providers of early childhood, primary, secondary, tertiary, vocational and adult education – should be free, secular, well-funded, and high quality.
4. The level of resources provided for a child’s education should not be determined by wealth.
5. Governments have a responsibility to intervene to ensure positive educational outcomes for all, regardless of disparities in wealth, income, power, language, ethnicity, gender, sex, sexuality, disability, or geographic location.
6. Governments must work to ensure students have access to the equipment, technology, materials and supplies needed to support their education.
7. All levels of the public education system must be funded and supported in a way that allows them to incorporate educational best practices into teaching strategies.
8. School staff working conditions should be professionally enriching and financially rewarding.
9. Educators must be provided with sustainable workloads, along with the time and space in their schedules necessary to be able to effectively integrate improvements into their work.
10. The salaries and conditions of school and TAFE teachers, educational support staff in schools, early childhood educators and other educators should be increased to levels that:
    1. better reflect the value and importance of their work, experience and expertise;
    2. provide secure pathways to career development; and
    3. encourage committed and capable people from across the community, who reflect its diversity, to become educators.
11. Performance-based pay and arbitrary caps on promotions are unfair, discriminate against disadvantaged schools and students, and undermine the cooperative environments essential to achieving better educational outcomes.
12. To address the loss of skilled educators from the profession, the education system should provide the structures and support needed to reduce overwork, while offering stability and clear opportunities for career growth.
13. Important decisions relating to education and schools must be meaningfully open to input from teachers, parents, students and their broader communities, including input from unions, councils, experts and professional associations.
14. Education unions, subject matter experts and teachers’ associations are the appropriate representatives of educators in relation to all educational matters.
15. Educational institutions should include support staff, including those equipped to provide appropriate 'wrap-around' services – such as counsellors, psychologists, nurses, disability workers and social workers.
16. Competition between schools and other educational institutions, such as those premised on narrow performance measures, erodes the quality and effectiveness of the education system.
17. The substantial growth in federal and state government funding to non-government schools (relative to government schools) has had an adverse impact on public education.
18. Public education infrastructure and land should remain in public ownership and control.
19. Disabled people must be provided with non-segregated and inclusive education environments.
20. Support for students with disabilities should be delivered through a collaborative approach involving teachers, support staff, families, and students themselves, to ensure coordinated learning and reduce the risk of marginalisation or reliance on support workers alone.
21. Access to quality early childhood education is a key foundation of a child’s social, emotional and cognitive development.
22. Governments must ensure universal access to quality early childhood education and childcare services, free of charge.
23. All levels of education should be culturally safe and responsive, ensuring that students, families, and staff feel respected, valued, and free from discrimination or harm.
24. Access to meaningful and high-quality education in languages other than English is crucial to prevent loss of language amongst migrant and First Nations communities.
25. The educational opportunities and outcomes for First Nations peoples should be equal to the rest of the Victorian population.
26. First Nations communities should be supported to meaningfully contribute to the design and delivery of educational services for their children and other community members.
27. Everyone should have access to lifelong public education and training, including well-resourced vocational education.
28. TAFE and other publicly owned and operated providers of vocational education and training (VET) should be protected and expanded.
29. Vocational education and training should primarily be provided through the public TAFE system, while community and not-for-profit VET providers should also be supported.
30. Community-based facilities that provide accessible education, training, and support to people of all ages, backgrounds, and abilities play a critical role in delivering adult, community, and further education — particularly for the most marginalised members of the community.

Aims

Improved conditions for educators

1. Substantial improvements to base pay and employment conditions for teachers and educators across all sectors, including improved pay, professional recognition, and access to quality pre-service and in-service training.
2. For teachers and educators to be compensated for overtime work performed, and:
   1. for overtime pay to reflect actual additional hours worked;
   2. for penalty rates to apply as appropriate;
   3. for governments to actually enforce rules in respect to staff overtime, compensation and penalty rates;
   4. for schools to provide relief and cover to teachers to allow them adequate time for planning; and
   5. for better staffing and resourcing of schools in order to provide teachers with a genuine choice about whether or not to work overtime.
3. Smaller class sizes throughout the public education system to achieve manageable workloads for all educators and the best educational outcomes for all students.
4. Maximum class sizes and teaching loads to be based on evidence and set down in industrial agreements.
5. Rejection of performance-based pay for educators and arbitrary caps on promotion due to their unfairness, discrimination against disadvantaged students, undermining of a cooperative environment and placing downward pressure on pay and conditions.
6. Increased release time for both education and support staff to participate in professional development opportunities, events and networks.
7. All educators to be properly qualified and provided with access to high-quality training, support and mentoring.
8. Greater funding for administrative support staff for schools to help free up teacher time.
9. Address the over-use of casual positions in schools and TAFE institutes by introducing a benchmark of a minimum of 80 percent of teaching to be performed by permanent staff in schools and TAFE institutes.

Funding and infrastructure

10. Significant increases to funding for public education infrastructure, capital works and maintenance in order to create optimal learning environments.
11. New and upgraded schools to be prioritised based on genuine need, particularly in areas with high projected population growth, and for new schools to be located close to residential communities and public transport.
12. Smaller existing schools not to be closed solely on the basis of narrow financial viability criteria.
13. The phasing out of fees for all public education institutions.
14. Vocational education and training to be free in all schools.
15. Funding arrangements for public education institutions that advance their quality and effectiveness, including by prohibiting market-based competition, privatisation, outsourcing, vouchers, and competitive tendering mechanisms.
16. Eliminate all ‘voluntary’ fees for 'non-core' activities charged by public schools through increased funding that is sufficient to ensure that all students can afford to participate in the full range of extracurricular activities including but not limited to camps, excursions and instrumental music.
17. The criteria for the location of new schools and the allocation of funding for school upgrades and maintenance should be fully transparent and publicly accessible.
18. Governments to exercise appropriate oversight over public school finances.
19. Funding to schools to be provided on the basis of equity, the needs of students and at a level to cover all core educational programs.
20. Governments to only provide funding to non-government schools that would, without it, fall below the minimum per-student funding level mandated by the Schooling Resource Standard (SRS).
21. Government to support the voluntary integration of suitable non-government schools into an expanded and revitalised public education system, while respecting the continued role of culturally and religiously distinct schools in a diverse education landscape.
22. No government funding for schools that operate for private profit.

Democratic governance and curriculum

23. Decisions about curriculum, testing, reporting and teaching to be made in consultation with appropriate educational experts, teachers, parents, students and other stakeholders.
24. All school councils should have student members with full voting rights, elected by the students.
25. Schools and curriculum material free from corporate sponsorship and influence including the use of material featuring sponsor identities or logos.
26. Promote a variety of educational experiences that encourage students to be active, questioning and creative in all aspects of their lives.
27. Incentivise provision of education and best practice in sustainability and waste reduction in all educational institutions.

Inclusive teaching and learning environments

28. Staffing and resourcing to ensure that children with particular additional needs are provided with a comprehensive education – particularly for schools with high proportions of:
    1. socioeconomic disadvantage;
    2. First Nations students;
    3. students with a disability and/or neurodiversity; and
    4. students from non-English-speaking backgrounds.
29. Provide more support for early intervention for students with literacy and numeracy difficulties, including more trained specialist staff using evidence-based techniques.
30. Provide professional development and training in AUSLAN and Braille for a broader range of school staff, corresponding with student need.
31. An increase in specialist teachers, inclusion aides, other support staff, and support services for students and pre-school children with particular additional needs.
32. Provide schools with resources and support necessary to expand their provision of out of school hours care (OSHC).
33. Support for parents to educate their children at home if they meet requirements to provide a balanced education, core educational outcomes and social interaction with peers.
34. Homeschooled children to be financially supported to participate in VET programs.
35. Increased resources for First Nations students, including more First Nations teachers and support workers, language, reading, and cultural materials.
36. Investment in training and development for non-Indigenous teachers to develop requisite knowledge and skills to teach Indigenous perspectives.
37. Increased supports, along with cultural training for all staff, which help to reduce disparities in educational outcomes for students from culturally diverse and non-English speaking backgrounds.

Cultural inclusion and language education

38. Increased resource allocation for the teaching and learning of languages other than English, including:
    1. support for the teaching of community languages in public primary and secondary schools;
    2. funded pathways for bilingual community members to train and qualify as language teachers;
    3. support for sister-school relationships between Victorian schools and schools in other countries, including for the purpose of facilitating authentic language, cultural and social exchanges;
    4. targeted bilingual or immersion programs in areas with strong community language populations; and
    5. support well-resourced centres for adults to study community languages.
39. Improved support for trade-specific English language courses.
40. Expand the inclusion of the history, culture and contemporary experiences of First Nations peoples in the school curriculum, and in the education and professional development of all teachers.
41. Ensure that new migrants, asylum seekers and refugees can access appropriate publicly funded English language courses.

Safety and wellbeing

42. Ensure schools provide breakfast and lunch programs to all students which are of a high standard, nutritious, optional and free.
43. Government to provide students from lower-income families with stationery, uniforms, textbooks, computer equipment, software and other subject-specific supplies and equipment.
44. Where school communities decide to have a compulsory school uniform, these should be affordable and comfortable.
45. Increased support services to address barriers to education and for vulnerable students, including education reengagement programs for children, young people and adults.
46. Evidence-based interventions and supports that improve student engagement and reduce the likelihood of student expulsion.
47. Prevent schools (including religious schools) from discriminating on the basis of sex, sexual orientation, lawful sexual activity, disability, relationship status, parental status or gender identity.
48. All preschools, primary and secondary schools to provide age appropriate and accredited education in respectful relationships, including gender relations, gender identity and sexual orientation, family violence, sexual harassment, child sexual abuse and pornography.
49. Each school to have at least one staff member who is reasonably qualified to help support the mental health and wellbeing needs of students, as well as fellow staff, who are gender, sex or sexuality diverse.
50. Provision of sufficient mental health support, as well as suicide prevention programs, to all schools and educational institutions.

Early childhood education

51. Expansion of government-run early childhood education services across the state and the elimination of waiting lists.
52. Ongoing investment in training and development to support early childhood educators and allied professionals to enter the sector, reskill or upskill.
53. Two years of free preschool education to all three and four year old children, delivered by registered, fully qualified educators.
54. Early childhood education to be provided by government and accredited community organisations and not-for-profit providers.
55. Culturally safe programs that support First Nations children’s sense of identity, belonging and participation in early childhood education and care services.
56. Increase investment in research on the social and educational outcomes of innovative approaches and play-based learning in a Victorian context.
57. Increase investment in research and delivery of educational programs for the most vulnerable children.
58. Improve public awareness and understanding of early childhood education as a public good and an important component of children’s development, not just a service enabling parents to return to work.

Tertiary and further education (excluding universities)

59. Guarantee recurrent public funding to ensure financial sustainability of TAFE as the state's primary provider of vocational education and training, including libraries, community service obligations and other student services.
60. VET funding priorities to balance student needs, employment demand, and providing skills in satisfying and sustainable employment.
61. For free-of-charge vocational and adult education to be available to everyone – including permanent residents and refugees.
62. A substantial increase in the availability of apprenticeships, particularly in rural and regional areas.
63. Stronger government oversight of private providers of vocational education and training to ensure that they comply with equivalent standards and reporting requirements applied to public providers.
64. Educators – in consultation with relevant industries, industry bodies and unions – to have a key role in developing and reviewing training packages across all VET sectors.
65. Phase out any public funding to private VET providers for courses where a meaningfully equivalent option is already available – or could be provided – by a public provider.
66. Greater funding and support for community-based services and facilities – such as Neighbourhood Houses and Learn Local Centres – that provide accessible education, training, and support to people of all ages, backgrounds, and abilities

Further reading 

• Education (federal Greens policy – includes universities policy)
• Sign the open letter: Fully fund our public schools (campaign)

Return to all state policies