Christian schools join to train teachers

This is a very positive development, as secular teacher traiing has very low standards in every respect.

It is however regrettable that they have followed the secular example and mandated four years for teacher training.  That was always a highpoint of out-of-control credentialism.  Teachers in times past did perfectly well with a one-year diploma and "Teach for America" sends graduates into difficult schools with only months of preparation.

A saving grace may be that the new arrangement will see trainees spending much more time in the schools than they do in the secular system

The Pentecostals have provided the lead for the new setup but the participating schools are mostly Anglican, so the  new setup is non-denominational, in the best Protestant tradition.


Five Sydney schools have joined together to pilot a training program to ensure the future supply of high-quality teachers for their schools.

Trainee teachers will enter into a four-year undergraduate or two-year postgraduate degree program with a big difference: the trainee teachers will be working in the schools with students for their entire tertiary education.

The Teaching Schools Alliance Sydney has been established by Blue Mountains Grammar School, St Andrew’s Cathedral School, The Scots College, Inaburra School and William Clarke College. The Alliance will partner with Australia’s largest Protestant-affiliated tertiary provider, Alphacrucis College, to deliver the degree program.

The Alliance hopes to address wider social concerns about student teacher quality, high attrition rates in the profession and classroom readiness of graduates. The pilot program will lead the way in directly addressing these issues and becoming a model that can be replicated across Australia, particularly in regional areas.

The initiative reconnects schools with the training of the next generation of teachers and utilises the tertiary partnership to form a ‘Teaching School Hub’. The model is already operating successfully in the Hunter Valley NSW with a cluster of schools from St Philip’s Christian College group of schools.

Each Hub will assess applicants on the basis of proven volunteerism, ethos alignment, EQ, IQ and appropriate academic standards before commencing training.

Alphacrucis liaison for the Alliance, Dr David Hastie, said that the ‘Hub model’ of teacher training provides significant benefits to the schools as well as the trainee teachers. “The clinical training approach embedded in the model has proven to be effective across the globe, but this Hub model adapts it for our unique Australia education context. The model provides professional and contextual preparation with a wealth of experience in curriculum development, assessment, small group teaching, parent interaction, problem-solving and conflict resolution.”

“The trainees are also well supported, their tuition fees are subsidised, they are paid part-time as a teaching assistant and they graduate with significant work experience.”

A typical Alliance trainee will spend 1-2 days per week paid to work in the classroom with a Mentor Teacher, which means that by the completion of their degree the trainee will already have hundreds of days of school-based experience.

The academic program includes a mixture of local face-to-face intensives, mentor training, and online coursework. A significant point of difference from existing models is that the training follows the rhythms of the school calendar rather than the traditional university calendar. This means that trainee teachers are receiving 40 weeks of training each year rather than the common university calendar of two 13-week semesters.

The degrees awarded are the same degrees awarded at traditional universities with the same standards, rigour and accountability to the governing bodies that set and monitor academic standards in Australia. In addition, the pilot is to be evaluated by an independent research team.

Full and partial scholarships are available to prospective trainees.

Background:

Blue Mountains Grammar School is a co-educational Pre-Kindergarten to Year 12 Christian school in the Anglican tradition. The school has two campuses located at Wentworth Falls and Valley Heights.

St Andrew’s Cathedral School is a co-educational Kindergarten to Year 12 Anglican school located in Sydney’s CBD.

The Scots College is a Pre-Kindergarten to Year 12 non-selective Presbyterian boys' school for day and boarding students. The College has campuses in Bellevue Hill, Rose Bay, Dolls Point and Kangaroo Valley.

Inaburra School is a co-educational Kindergarten to Year 12 Baptist school located in Sydney’s South.

William Clarke College is a Pre-school to Year 12 co-educational Anglican College located in Kellyville in Sydney’s north west.

Alphacrucis College is Australia’s largest Protestant-affiliated tertiary provider, and is aligned to the Pentecostal denomination. Founded in 1948, the College’s main campus is located in Parramatta with additional campuses in Brisbane, Melbourne, Hobart, Adelaide, Perth and Auckland.

Media release. Contact: Dr David Hastie – 0405 153 048. Alphacrucis College, Associate Dean, Education Development. david.hastie@ac.edu.au






Lure of big cities too strong for regional Australia to keep migrants, despite government efforts

Over four decades, country towns have mostly failed to retain migrants, according to the most comprehensive snapshot of Australian migration ever collated.

And this trend of migrants moving to the cities appears to be increasing, despite repeated government efforts to make life in the regions more appealing.

Professor James Raymer, who led a team of Australian National University (ANU) researchers to collect and refine almost 40 years of data, said migrants in a regional or remote area have a "very low chance" of staying in that area, and this pattern has been "very consistent over time".

"Most will leave within a five-year period, over half, if not 70 per cent, will leave, and if they're going to stay in Australia they're going to go to one of the big cities, probably Sydney or Melbourne," he said.

"What we actually see in the data, the chances of them leaving remote and regional areas has been increasing for a lot of the newer migrant groups."

Same access to services

Immigration Minister David Coleman is confident the new visas will attract migrants to regional communities and keep them there.

"We want skilled migrants to settle in regional areas long-term and want to ensure they are not disadvantaged compared to permanent migrants in our major cities," he said.

The visas require migrants to work in regions on temporary visas for three years before they are eligible for permanent residency.

Proposed laws will give these temporary visa holders the same access to welfare and government services as permanent visa holders.

"This Government will continue to back those migrants who commit to living and working in regional areas, to support local economies and contribute to regional communities," Mr Coleman said.

Details of the visas are still emerging, as the Department of Home Affairs holds briefings with migration agents and lawyers around the country.

However, the Migration Institute of Australia has criticised the decision to require regional-based migrants to earn $53,900 a year in order to qualify for permanent residency.

"While the Government is telling regional Australia it is listening to concerns about skills shortages, they are going to make it as hard as possible to fill them," institute president John Hourigan said.

"The requirement to earn this level of income for three years is not reasonable given the already suppressed nature of rural economies struggling with drought and diminishing investment."

New glimpse of internal migration

The ANU data is the most comprehensive picture of regional migration ever collected in Australia.

Across 47 regions and 19 nationality groups, the project tracks who has moved where every year back to 1981.

It finds that regions in Queensland, Western Australia and the Northern Territory have the lowest rates of retention of migrants.

Professor Raymer said his study also found that, for the most part, people were becoming increasingly settled. "The likelihood of us moving in Australia has been decreasing, so we're less likely to make moves across Australia these days as we were in the 1980s."

SOURCE  






Medicine prices in Australia among the cheapest in the world, research shows

If you take medication for several health issues, you may be surprised to find out Australia has some of the cheapest prescription drugs in the world.

A recent drug price index compared the cost of 13 common medications across 50 countries and found on average the prices were 25 per cent below the median global cost.

These medications were used to treat common health conditions including heart disease, asthma, depression, anxiety disorders and erectile dysfunction.

Australia ranked as the 11th most affordable place to buy common prescription drugs, including antidepressant fluoxetine (better known as Prozac) and erectile dysfunction drug sildenafil (marketed as Viagra).

"I wasn't surprised to see us the top of the list for affordability," said Anna Kemp-Casey, research fellow at the University of South Australia who was not involved in the study.

"Our Commonwealth does a really good job of negotiating prices for things that go on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme."

In Australia, the vast majority of prescription drugs are subsidised by the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) which aims to ensure people have access to affordable medication.

The price index, conducted by healthcare company Medbelle, found drugs were cheapest in Thailand, Kenya and Malaysia, while the US topped the list for having the most expensive pharmaceuticals.

"Mostly that's to do with lack of regulation around pricing," Dr Kemp-Casey said.

"It's a free market in terms manufacturers being able to charge what they like, which is not the case in Australia."

Australia fared best (in terms of affordability) with cholesterol-lowering drug atorvastatin (brand name Lipitor), our second-most commonly prescribed medications, and sildenafil.

The cost of life saving lung cancer and leukaemia drugs will soon be slashed after the Government listed new medications on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme.

There are, however, a handful of medicines the index found to be significantly more expensive in Australia than in other parts of the world, such as the sedative alprazolam (marketed as Xanax) and insulin glargine (branded Lantus), used to treat diabetes.

But Dr Kemp-Casey said the drugs found to be less affordable in Australia weren't a cause for great concern, since they are either new (and so don't have a cheaper generic version) or aren't doctors first choice of treatment.

"Our ability to negotiate a low price with the manufacturers is much less than another country who is using [a drug] first line ... because their market is much bigger," she said.

"It makes sense to pay more for something we don't want to use as much of. "In terms of things we'd be expect people to be using a lot of in Australia … they are the very low-priced ones, and that makes sense."

Generic drug prices in Australia were more than 36 per cent lower than the global median, while brand drug prices were 7 per cent cheaper, the index found.

While Australia fared well in the ranking, Dr Kemp-Casey said this index should be interpreted with some caution, as it only looks at 13 types of medicine.

"When you look at a larger range of generic medicines, things might come out a little differently," she said.

Medicines still too expensive for chronically ill

In 2017 a Grattan Institute Report found Australians were still paying too much for prescription drugs because of "loopholes" in PBS pricing policies.

Dr Kemp-Casey said the Australian system was largely affordable for people in good health, but those with chronic illness or multiple diseases found the cost of medicines prohibitive.

Under the PBS, the government subsidises the cost of medicine, so that general patients pay no more than $40.30 (for most PBS medicines), and concession card-holders pay a maximum of $6.50.

"It's not unusual for me to hear about someone who has 15 or 20 different medicines they take in a month," she said. "You multiply each one of those by $6.50, and you can start to see how things get very expensive for people, especially on low income."

The PBS Safety Net is designed to protect patients (and their families) who require a large number of medicines in one calendar year by discounting or eliminating the cost of drugs once they reach a certain threshold.

But Dr Kemp-Casey said, unlike the Medicare Safety Net, in which medical expenses are automatically recorded, patients using the PBS are required to keep track of their own spending.

"Unless you go to the same chemist every time … those records aren't all kept in one place," Dr Kemp-Casey said. "So, a lot of people are probably eligible for the safety net who don't actually get there … that causes extra hardship too."

SOURCE  






Thriving in drought: How investing big in water saved the Brown family

The Barkly Tableland is a large inland area about half way between Darwin and Alice Springs, a most unpropitious location for any economic activity.  But grass does grow there most years

When Adrian and Emma Brown bought Amungee Mungee Station in 2014 to build intensive cattle production in the Northern Territory, they were warned it could be an expensive project that may not succeed.

But five years on, their business has been thriving. They haven't had major destocking, like most nearby properties on the Barkly Tablelands

Their bold cattle management strategy allows them to run more cattle without degrading the land

The Browns have built some of the most significant water infrastructure in the northern pastoral industry and it's holding them in good stead amidst the lowest rainfall on record in the Barkly Tablelands.

As a result of the drought, hundreds of thousands of cattle have been trucked from properties in the region, and the Browns say if it wasn't for the water infrastructure development, they would have de-stocked too.

"We're really starting to push forward at a rapid rate and this drought probably won't hold us back," Mr Brown said.

But Ms Brown said investing in this water infrastructure wasn't just about drought-proofing but also getting better use of the entire property during all types of conditions.

"There was never a question of let's put a massive development in for the one in seven years where we don't get a wet season," she said. "It was … we've got an investment here, we've spent the money buying the land but we're not using it, so it's like having a hotel and only using the bottom floor when there's another 20 floors above it.

"So, we basically said let's be able to utilise as much of the country as we can and do it in a way that it's sustainable long term.

"We don't want to put 1,000 cattle on a watering point and run them there for the rest of time, we want to be able to have 200 cattle in a paddock, do a slow rotation system so the country is getting spelled and there is no land degradation happening."

Within three years at Amungee Mungee, carrying capacity increased from 2,600 cattle in a normal season to over 40,000.

"Our feed quality has improved so we're now in a position where we can actually sell at this time of the year which is great," Ms Brown said.

The family also doesn't have the stress of needing to scramble to buy cattle once the drought does break, where prices will probably go up and quality breeding cattle will be in demand.

"This de-stocking program hurts for three to four years ahead," Mr Brown said.

So how does it work?

The Browns say it's a simple strategy that includes restricting the cattle numbers in a paddock by fencing off paddocks extensively, installing more water tanks and troughs so cattle walk no more than four kilometres for a drink.

This means they don't lose condition and allows them to graze across more areas. It also means less land degradation.

At Amungee Mungee there are also 200 sites where pasture is monitored and water quality is tested, and this helps them with long-term budgeting for grass.

The Browns have now expanded their project to other stations.

Along with their long-term investor, billionaire Brett Blundy, the Browns have now purchased two more stations, Walhallow and Creswell Downs on the Barkly Tableland.

The same infrastructure and cattle management plans will be rolled out at those stations over the next few years.

But building the infrastructure in conditions where temperatures push over 40C can test workers. Gary Cutting, who's in charge of fencing more than 1,000 kilometres on Creswell Station, says it's hard work, but they've found ways to cope. "We get to rotate and sit in the aircon for 400 metres so it's not too bad," Mr Cutting said.

Innovation is part of the solution; Mr Brown and his team invented a fencing machine that can cover more than six kilometres in a day using a GPS and a barbed wire machine that strains the fence as they go.

Unlike building in the city, popping down to the local hardware store isn't an option — so thousands of pieces of this infrastructure puzzle all have had to be brought in from hundreds of kilometres away.

Dealing with those long distances led the Browns to another idea.

Innovation in the outback

They were unhappy with the quality of polythene pipe and concrete troughs being brought up from southern states, so they decided to build their own.

They'd also seen the limited options for products to build up infrastructure on Ms Brown's family property Beetaloo Station on the edge of the Barkly Tableland.

"We just saw a market, there was no-one specialising in that, so we basically moved to Katherine and started the trough business," Ms Brown said.

Since then the products have been in such demand from pastoralists and the mining sector that the Browns recently opened a new factory and large extrusion shed in Darwin to bring all of their manufacturing into one location.

They can produce tanks, troughs, barbed wire and polythene pipe of different sizes.

The Browns say they're motivated by a desire to show the rest of the country what can be done in northern Australia if the right investment is made.

SOURCE  

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