# I heard state schools in Melbourne city are bad! How bad?



## jenlin82

Hi,

I'm a newbie in Melbourne, just touched down in Sept 16 2009. My husband was offered a job by a company here. It took us quite some time to get a rental place. Anyway we've got one in Elwood. Before we were here we heard from many people saying that Australia is so good...Australian are a caring & loving community, good educations, good universities....these are the things that attracted us here just for the sake of our kids. Their education means a lot to us. since we've decided to move here we want it to be a good change.

But just yesterday, one of my hubby's colleague share us her story, she has been here for almost 20yrs. She said she make the same decision like us do one time ago but now full of regrets. She said states schools here S***Ks and children easy influence by those bad kids and private schools here the fees are more expensive than the fees for universities. If we wanted to send them there we have to be super rich. She asked us to think twice before decide to settle down here.

We came here with full of confidence and hopes that our children can get a better education here but... 

How true is this? We are very lost. This really demotivate us.
How bad is the state school here? Maybe i can listen to some good achievement stories from anybody about the state schools that can make us feel a little bit better and relieved?


----------



## Wanderer

Hi jenlin82,

We had a similar question posed some time ago and having at look @ http://www.australiaforum.com/education/535-state-school-private-school.html will give you the views of several posters.

Certainly you can find great variability in quality of public schools and as Mike started off with in that thread, it can have a bit to do with the community served by a school for it is somewhat of a fact that students in a school and their attitudes can reflect neighbourhoods in which they live and even the values they learn from their family life and that in turn will determine the teaching difficulty teachers may have, it sometimes taking strong willed teachers to be successful.

So I imagine that private schools have the possibility of reducing the chance of variability but even private school students are not all angels and it can also be their involvements outside of school grounds that can affect what happens within, and for instance if parents are working longer hours to afford private school fees the parents obviously then have less contact time with their children.

At the same time, I would suspect you would have to be in the bottom range of public schools to find an extremely bad one and again, if parents do have the chance of being clioser to their children, there may be every chance of some at least having the time to be involved.

My own public school years and those of my daughters are long gone and I can recall issues that my own mother got involved with and likewise concerns that I and my wife had over some issues with our daughters.
One outstanding issue that one public school dealt with as a result of mid-year results was to re-arrange their teacher allocation, there having been a great shortage of mathematics teachers at the time, but it happened and very successfully.

Though Elwood is a long established area, a suburb of reasonable standards, things can change with time but I do not know that it would have greatly for it is an attractive enough area in which to reside, close enough to the city and what could be regarded as middle class and above suburbs to south and east.
St. Kilda to the north has always had its seedier side in respect to nightlife especially and I am unaware of any affect of that in the Elwood community but I think it ought to be minimal with cost of rent/buying dictating those who move there.

But the best thing is to get involved and that ought to happen even before you seek to enrol any children; head down to the local public school and seek out the administrative office there and ask whether thay have a Parents group, usually something of a Parents and Teachers association for a lot of schools. It is likely that you would also be able to make an appointment to see the school principle and be open about any concerns you have and ask the principle openly whether they have a Charter of Standards or general school rules in regard to behaviour and how any difficulties are handled, how he feels about the school and whether teacher turnover is high or low etc.

They may have open days, so ask about that or any other means they have available for a parent to get the vibe of a school.

And certainly there can be issues that may have been worse for some students and parents at some schools than what can happen at others, governments always being under pressure re funding and the tighter economic times of right now can only increase that pressure.
If anything, I would think teachers have become more unionised, more political in recent decades and that is something that has not necessarily had the best outcomes either but with pressures teachers are under I can understand that though I wonder whether it has really improved the lot of teachers or just had added another element that the school community has to deal with.

But do find out what you can about the school education system, google being a great place to start in finding the education department web site for government level policies, perhaps even a school web site to see what is being reported on at the school level and then go and have a look at the school and get your own impression.


----------



## connaust

I think the other person may have had bad luck and their comments are a generalisation. State schools are often better than private schools, depends upon individual school, staff, community etc. 

The most important thing that is forgotten and makes huge difference, is parents being involved e.g. going through homework etc.


----------



## mike

I think it is really impossible to compare a whole country's education system with another.

I have taught English in Japan in their public schools. Certainly if you wanted your kids to be good at maths and science their schools are great. If you wanted your kids to think and have opinions about wider social issues, Japanese schools don't seem to teach this.

I went to a fairly inexpensive private school and I would say in general the level education and level of discipline was better in the schools that I went to. 

When I went to university I met people who went to public and private schools. It really is impossible to say one was better than the other. 

I remember growing up and there were definitely some better state schools than others. Talk to your neighbors in your area and you should find out.

With regards to your kids being influenced by other kids with problems, that can happen anywhere. I think that is easily solved by spending as much time with your kids as possible and getting to know their friends/teachers etc.

Also with things like the internet and mobile phones, I think it must be a little more tough raising kids today than it used to be. Things like cyber-bullying didn't exist a few years ago.


----------



## adelaalan

*Which is the top public & private schools in Melbourne?*

A lot of people talk about Balwyn High for public high school, but I can't find its

streets zone. Any ideas?

Sydney Grammar School, Edgecliff Preparatory School, Paddington, NSW
Is it good?

My 8 years old little boy want to attend school in Melbourne, but I would like a UK

school, how is it?
Wherwell Primary School
Wherwell
Nr. Andover
Hants. SP11 7JP

I want to learn more computer programming, where to find the best training

institution?

My Major: Computer Science
Work at: Batteriescenter au
University of Melbourne


----------

