NAPLAN testing needs to be dumped in NSW with 'haste', NSW Government says
Updated
New South Wales is the first state to call for NAPLAN testing to be scrapped, with Education Minister Rob Stokes demanding it be replaced as a matter of urgency.
What is NAPLAN:
- The National Assessment Program tests the literacy and numeracy skills of students in years 3, 5, 7 and 9
- Students cannot pass or fail the assessment
- The annual testing is designed to help governments and schools gauge whether students are meeting key educational outcomes
The test is being used dishonestly as a school rating system, Mr Stokes said, and has sprouted an industry that extorts money from desperate families.
Mr Stokes said the assessment, for students in years 3, 5, 7 and 9, is being used to rate students, not track their progress.
"You now have an industry that's grown up alongside it, where teachers are being encouraged to teach to the test rather than the curriculum," he said.
"It's become a vehicle for edu-businesses to extort money out of desperate students and their family.
"When you now have private schools marketing their NAPLAN success, that points to the failure of NAPLAN, and it's time we had discussions about replacing it."
Mr Stokes said the test had been "used and abused" and was not useful as it did not take into account any differences between different schools and communities.
He is expected to call on the Federal Government at a meeting of education minsters today to replace the test "in haste" with a less high stakes assessment as recommended by the Gonski report.
This would involve smaller, regular and more flexible testing based on the curriculum to assess a child's progress.
Mr Stokes said that if NAPLAN was not tied to federal funding, New South Wales would pull out of the test.
Labor's education spokesman Jihad Dib, former principal of Punchbowl Boys School, is in support of Mr Stokes' call and said the test had put enormous pressure on families.
"Because of the high stakes nature of it, the tutoring industry has absolutely exploded," he said.
"I know stories where parents are working two or three jobs just to pay for their kids to get tutoring.
"And kids as young as nine are not getting put into weekend sports just so they can go to cram schools or tutoring centres."
Mr Dib said NAPLAN narrowed the curriculum and "gets away from the purpose of education".
Federal Education Minister Simon Birmingham told Radio National that NAPLAN served a "very important purpose for many parents", but acknowledged schools' concerns.
He said the Government was open to ensuring NAPLAN results were "reported in a better way".
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