Secondary Education in Queensland had not been substantively provided (outside of Grammar and other class-based schools) until the first suburban, multilateral (offering a variety of courses) State high schools were opened in Brisbane; at Wynnum in 1942 and Cavendish Road in 1952. Several state reviews were generated by the great disappointment the community had of the state system, including transitions from primary to secondary education, and the transitions from secondary to tertiary education. Historically, the Queensland education system had been under pressure from instrumental policies which prioritised towards the state’s old agrarian and emerging industrial economy.

The Watkin and Radford Committee overturned the stagnated colonial-era secondary education system but the politics of the state overwhelmed the states in the last quarter of twentieth century, with demands for ‘back-to-basic’ policies and yet with the same demands for sophisticated ‘work-ready’ job skilling. The more rounded objective of producing a fully-rounded independent learner was lost in the instrumentalist politics, and political players poorly understood the emerging technology, social values, and the educational implications of this contemporary history. The early twentieth-first century was an era of educational reviews in the political scramble. The role of the Commonwealth became stronger with the National Curriculum. Neo-liberal economic influences saw the growth of educational management with mixed results. Part of the neo-liberal economic imperative was ‘product differentiation’ whereby state high schools became ‘secondary colleges’ or elite ‘academies’. Geographic Description 1: Inside The Green Belt Geographic Description 2: Brisbane River Geographic Description 3: Flood Gullies; Flood Plains; Ridgelines (Steep, several coming off Mount Coot-tha); Valleys

Citations

Entry extracted from Queensland Department of Education document, Secondary Education, undated.

Image Citations