The Australian Council for Educational Research's submission to the Australian Government Standing Committee on Employment, Education and Training's Public Enquiry into Adult literacy and its importance highlights the importance of these skills to Australia's well-being and economy, and calls on the government to continue participation in an…

The Australian governments' centrepiece Indigenous strategy, the 'Closing the Gap' framework, established in 2008 to address systemic Indigenous disadvantage, is underpinned by the concept of 'school readiness', which expects Indigenous families to bring their children to school ready to learn. The education system commonly blames Indigenous…

Educational and socioeconomic disadvantage in remote communities, and the inadequacies of government action to bring about significant change needs to be addressed. This article presents a descriptive study examining the complexities of staffing remote and very remote schools in Australia with appropriately-qualified teachers. The findings of…

An abundance of research in Indigenous education has not resulted in significant systemic change in relation to Indigenous education in Australia. In this paper we examine convergence and divergence across the policy, practice and research realms with the aim of identifying key sites of opportunity for innovation and change. Through analysing how…

Data reporting in the Australian education system produces deficit-based comparisons of academic achievement between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students. Since 2009, data from the National Assessment Program -- Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) have been used by the Australian government to allow it to report on 'Closing the Gap' policy. These…

Reporting on a qualitative study, informed by Australian Government Indigenous education and literacy policies, this article unveils early career teacher reflections about infusing Aboriginal perspectives in the English curriculum using multimodal texts. Forging a praxis between the Aboriginal practice of yarning (Bessarab & Ng'andu, 2010) and…

This publication provides information on the flow of government funding for vocational education and training (VET) in Australia. The publication is based on 2022 data provided by the Australian, state and territory government departments responsible for administering funds for Australia's VET system.

Improving Indigenous students' literacy is a major priority area for the Australian Government, receiving significant funding to address below benchmark English literacy standardised test results. Despite this, recent benchmark tests suggest Indigenous students continue to achieve well below the national average. This systematic review discusses…

Improving educational outcomes for Indigenous Australian students is a key strategy to helping Indigenous people reach their full potential. This has resulted in well-intentioned efforts by Australian educators and governments to ensure Indigenous children have positive school experiences. However, Indigenous students still lag behind their…

Since contact, there has been a foundation of inhospitable interactions between the original sovereign peoples of the Australian continent and Eurpoean arrivals. Despite government policies appearing to shift from assimilative practices to reconciliation processes in the latter half of the 20th Century, ongoing interactions continue to be…

Purpose: On June 21, 2021, a motion was introduced to the Australian Senate calling on the federal government to reject critical race theory (CRT) from the national curriculum, claiming that CRT is divisive and racist. This was allegedly sparked by revisions to the national school curriculum, which included a more accurate reflection of the…

Research messages is a summary of research produced by NCVER each year. This year's compilation includes a range of research activities undertaken during 2023, comprising of research reports, summaries, occasional papers, presentations, webinars, consultancies, submissions, the 32nd 'No Frills' national research conference, and various additions…

There is clear evidence that Indigenous education has changed considerably over time. Indigenous Australians' early experiences of 'colonialised education' included missionary schools, segregated and mixed public schooling, total exclusion and 'modified curriculum' specifically for Indigenous students which focused on teaching manual labour skills…

2020 looms large for Indigenous education in Australia, with the 'Refreshed' "Close the Gap" strategy hanging over the collective heads of schools, Indigenous students and their families. After a decade of promises, there is now an acknowledgement within the government that programmes to improve student outcomes in literacy, numeracy and…

While university participation rates among Indigenous Australians have been on the rise in recent years, parity targets remain elusive. In this context, surprisingly little attention has been paid to how aspirations for higher education are formed and nurtured. Studies tend to focus on barriers to access, often in ways that position Indigenous…