Statement 1: Budget Overview (Continued)
Making every school a great school
The Government is improving the quality of our education system. Since coming to office, it has almost doubled school investment to over $64 billion, engaged the States and Territories in a series of ambitious National Partnership agreements and also launched a comprehensive review of the funding arrangements for schooling.
The Government's school reform agenda is focused on:
- improving teacher quality; and
- supporting all students to reach their potential.
Rewarding our great teachers and boosting the teacher workforce
In recognition that teachers represent the single greatest in‑school influence on student outcomes, the Government is delivering on key election commitments to increase the number and quality of teachers.
The new National Rewards for Great Teachers program will provide $125 million each semester, from the start of 2014, in reward payments for the best teachers. Around 25,000 of the country's best teachers each year will receive a reward payment worth up to 10 per cent of their salary.
The Government will also develop an employment‑based training program for new teachers, offering a new pathway into a teaching career for professionals with specialist qualifications or relevant work experience. This will commence from 1 January 2012.
These initiatives build on the Reward Payments for School Improvement, which will provide reward grants from 2012‑13 of up to $75,000 for primary schools and up to $100,000 for secondary schools who have shown the most improved performance over 12 months, and on reforms to improve the transparency, accountability and empowerment of the school system.
Supporting children with disability
The Government is introducing a range of measures which will improve the assistance provided to students and young people, with a particular focus on children with disability, including:
- the Better Start for Children with Disability initiative, which will provide $146.5 million over five years to improve access to early intervention services for eligible children with disability, through grants to families of up to $12,000 to access services up to the child's seventh birthday; and
- providing $28.7 million over three years in additional funding for the existing Helping Children with Autism initiative which similarly provides grants to families to access early intervention services for their children.
In addition, the Healthy Start for School measure will encourage parents to take their child for a pre‑school health check to ensure they are healthy and ready to learn, by making receipt of the Family Tax Benefit Part A end of year supplement contingent on undertaking a health check in the year a child starts school.
The Government is providing $200 million over three years for the More Support for Students with Disabilities initiative, which will support students with disability in their classrooms and improve learning outcomes. This will also provide an opportunity to identify the strategies which best improve the learning experiences of these students.
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