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There’s a misconception everyone in Canberra is affluent,’ says St Francis Xavier College principal Angus Tulley. Picture: Kym Smith

Catholic education is hitting back at claims it engages in a reverse Robin Hood-style redistribution of funding, with analysis showing money directed to its neediest schools is more than 50 per cent higher than to its ­advantaged schools.

Ahead of today’s Senate hearing into the Turnbull government’s $18.6 billion reforms to rework the Gonski needs-based school funding arrangements, Angus Tulley, the principal of St Francis Xavier College in the north Canberra’s Florey, said he just wanted all students treated fairly and parents afforded choice.

“There’s a misconception everyone in Canberra is affluent,’’ he said. “My parents are bureaucrats, butchers, bakers, panel beaters … there might even be some belly dancers out there.’’

He said government changes would force him to cut 10 per cent of teaching staffing and a quarter of other staff ­because parents could not ­accommodate a fee increase. “Education is being used as a political football, and if they continue with this, they’re just going to kick an own goal.’’

More than 5 per cent of St Francis Xavier’s 1163 students have a disability and-or diverse learning needs. Mr Tulley said the school spent twice as much on students with a disability than it received, while one in 10 families were given relief on their fees.

As the debate over needs-based funding continues, the Catholic Education Commission of Victoria and of Canberra Goulburn have examined publicly available data on the government’s My School website.

The analysis looks at the actual funding schools received in 2015 and the school’s ICSEA, which is a score of educational advantage. The data shows that when advantaged and disadvantaged Catholic systemic schools nationwide are compared, the “government funding per student allocated to disadvantaged Catholic schools is 54 per cent higher than for an ­advantaged Catholic school. In government schools, using the same figure for per student, government funding is 38 per cent.’’

“The conclusion from this is that with the limited government funding available to Catholic schools — only 86 per cent of recurrent funding compared to government schools — the allocation of government funding by Catholic school systems is needs-based and, on one interpretation, more needs-based than government systems,’’ the analysis says.

­Canberra and Goulburn director of Catholic education Ross Fox said “our local education leaders have a strong sense of social responsibility to their school communities and understand school needs better than a single, magic, cookie-cutter model.

“Catholic school funding responds to real local needs.”

Education Minister Simon Birmingham said: “Under our reforms, Catholic education authorities will retain the autonomy to distribute their record and growing federal funding according to their needs-based formulas.’’

Stefanie Balogh

National Education Correspondent

Canberra

@stefaniebalogh

Article and Image Courtesy: The Australian 05 June 2017