From Attendance Crisis to Participation Crisis

Reframing the Indigenous Attendance Problem

Ian Mackie

Assistant Director General

Indigenous Education and Training Futures

The Need for Innovation

The Equilibrium

The Four Pillars of Innovation

• Dynamics of Recognition

• Connectedness

• Principles of Persuasion for Principals

• The Service Guarantee

Where are we?

Data show us Indigenous education has been in a long-term equilibrium.

This equilibrium has been marked by:– low expectations and aspirations among students,

communities and teachers– low student achievement– low student attendance– high student and community marginalisation, suffering

and poverty.

AttendanceYear Indigenous Non-Indigenous Gap

2006 86.0 92.6 6.6

2007 85.4 92.3 6.9

2008 84.4 91.7 7.3

2009 83.9 91.3 7.4

2010 84.8 91.5 6.8

2011 84.5 91.4 7.0

Regimes of punishment

2007 2008 2009 2010 2011

Exclusion 811 804 943 931 1030

Cancellation 327 367 529 816 1114

Long suspension

4926 5819 6794 7390 7086

Queensland Department of Education Training and EmploymentData warehouse www.deta.qld.gov.au

Why attendance is important

Indigenous Education Achievement

Reasons for Attendance Crisis

• Poor or hostile parental and carer attitudes towards school

• Poor societal support or an insufficient valuing of education

• Poor teaching & inconsistent attitudes and policies towards non-attendance

• Poor Governmental support in terms of lenient application of the law; unsuitable curriculum and little provision for alternative schooling arrangements

• Poor attitudes among the children in terms of the presence of bullying, peer pressure to skip school, poor self-esteem and lack of career aspirations

• Poor jurisdictional strategies and policies

• Poverty and unemployment and economic stagnation

• Culture gap between boys and girls, rise of sub-cultures

• Problems in research – little evidence of what works (Adapted from Purdie & Buckley, 2010, p. 3).

Truancy in NSW; Iemma Govt 2008

Part Two Innovation & Dynamics of Recognition

Recognition & Identity

The Differentiated Other

Same Other

Trace Resource Exotic Comical Pitiable Resented Feared/Despised

•Consumer Producer Fascinating Erotic

The Feared/Despised Other

The Resented Other

We now have a situation where a type of

reverse racism is applied to

mainstream Australians by those who

promote political correctness and

those who control the various taxpayer

funded "industries" that flourish in our

society servicing Aboriginals,

multiculturalists and a host of other

minority groups. In response to my call

for equality for all Australians, the most

noisy criticism came from the fat cats,

bureaucrats and the do-gooders.

Pauline Hanson Maiden Speech – Hansard

The Pitiable Other

Comical Other

The Exotic/Erotic Other

Other as resource

Other as Trace

The Other as Resource & The shape of Australia

Indigenous Australia

Bernard Salt: The Australian May 26, 2011

• Net overseas migration… peaked at a historic 316,000 in the year to December 2009

• Dropped to 177,000 the following (election) year.

• The net overseas migration assumption required to deliver the big Australia 180,000.

• We seem to have settled on a trajectory that will deliver the big Australia's 36 million by mid-century.

David Uren: The Australian, May 06, 2011

If Australia stopped all migration, its population would still grow by 1.1 million over the next 10 years from natural growth:

•The numbers of working age would rise by only 21,000.

•The numbers aged 65 and over would rise by 944,000.

Part Three

Connectedness

Defining Connectedness

The extent to which community, family, & students feel personally: •accepted, •respected, •included and •supported

by others in the school environment (based on Goodenow, 1993, p. 80)

The Connectedness Paradigm

Build the connected:

• Child• Family• School• Community

Community

School

Family

Student

What’s so good about Connectedness?

Helps with students’:

•academic motivation, academic achievement,

•quality retention,

•emotional & mental health

Helps Prevent:

•Violence

•Alcohol & drug abuse

•Risk behaviours

Part Four

Principals of Persuasion

Principal as Persuader/ Compliance Professional

Architects of Nudge Theory: Richard H. Thaler & Cass R. Sunstein

Nudge Defined

A nudge is any aspect of the choice architecture that alters people’s behaviour in a predictable way

Automatic System (Humans)

Is rapid and feels instinctive• Gives us:

• Gut reactions

– the power of inertia

– The tyranny of the default setting

Reflective system (Econs)

• More deliberate and self conscious;

• E.g. converting speed of delivery in metric into imperial measure;

• Speaking a foreign language (Reflective);

• Speaking native language (Automatic);

Choice Architect

A choice architect has the responsibility for organizing the context in which people make decisions

Loss adverseWe are loss adverse

• People are twice as keen to keep something than they are to gain the same thing.

• E.g. UK Govt back down on privatisation of forests. People didn’t want to lose their forests.

• Can we persuade parents & students that schooling is something they own and so should not lose?

• One day of schooling is worth about $60. Don’t lose it.

Sinful goods

• Immediate benefit

• Later costs

Standard non-attendance letter

This letter:

Approved by lawyers

Threatens a fine

Is disconnected from the psychology of change

Language is complex

Compliance value?

Possible nudges: Loss adverseness

Ian has lost 10 days of his schooling this term.

If he loses a lot of days then he will probably lose the chance to get a good job.

Every day counts.

.

Lee’s attendance is above the state average.

Well done.

Every day counts

From the Mackie Persuasion Matrix

Reciprocity: be the first to give

Authority/Source Credibility- look professional

Consistency/get them to commit publicly

Relativity:Of coffins & Hearing Aids

Scarcity LikingGet them to like you

Social NormsEveryone is saying ‘yes”: I must too.

EgoIn the Marriott Hotel

Narrative transportation

Part Five Innovation & the Service guarantee

LEL

The Toxic Pipe Line

Disconnected→ Dropout→Prison

By the time they are in their 30s some 52% of Afro-Americans have been in jail.

http://www.aclu.org/school-prison-pipeline-game

The Virtuous Pipeline

Connected→ Retained → Educated → Job

Which Future-in the Present?

From Hattie 1:What we need

• Remove any disparities between schools and between ethnicity achievements

• Ensure all have adequate resources and teaching to attain appropriate outcomes

• Further reduce competition between schools. Encourage sharing

• Allow schools to become the major unit of evaluation

• Measure success more in terms of teaching & learning effects

From Hattie 2: What good teachers do

• Establish clear learning intentions

• Provide challenging success criteria

• Employ a range of learning strategies

• Know when students are not progressing

• Provide feedback

• Visibly learn themselves

From Hattie 3: Such that students…

• Understand what the learning intentions are

• Are challenged by success criteria

• Develop a range of learning strategies

• Know when they are not progressing

• Seek feedback

• Visibly teach themselves