Assisted Schools and Training Colleges (Special Provisons) Act No 5 of 1960

• One of these is Hartford College in Sydney, a new Catholic school with an emphasis on the liberal arts, including classical literature, languages and philosophy.
• But there is a long tradition of parents and local communities starting their own schools if they feel what’s on offer is not suiting their families’ needs.

Ragged schools

• Before compulsory schooling, Ragged schools appeared in Melbourne as early as 1859.
• In the 20th century, parents of children with a disability, established schools to meet the specific needs of their children.

The community schools movement

• Coalitions of parents and teachers set up community schools as alternatives to a narrow, paternalistic, exclusionary education.
• This was influenced by American education philosopher John Dewey’s ideas about democratic schools and the freedom given to students in Scottish educator A.S. Neill’s Summerhill school.
• By the end of the century, community schools had either disappeared or had evolved into places for students who were not progressing in mainstream schools.

Low-fee, faith-based schools

• After a 1981 High Court decision, the federal government began to fund a wider range of schools, including religious schools.
• Rules that limited the establishment of new schools were also scrapped, further opening up new parent and community-initiated schools.

New, specialist schools

• But there are also new schools for students with high academic potential, bush schools, sports schools, performing arts and music schools, science-based schools and sustainable schools.
• Read more:
  20% of Australian students don't finish high school: non-mainstream schools have a lot to teach us about helping kids stay

How do parents create a new school?

• For the last four years, we have been researching the development of a new Adelaide school, Ngutu College.
• It was established by former state school principal and Kamilaroi Man, Andrew Plastow, in response to teacher and community concern.
• It describes itself as having:
  Aboriginal cultures as its soul, children as its heart and the arts as it spine.

What does this mean for the mainstream system?

• The strength of public education is the interaction between children, young people and their wider community.
• The more separate, specialised schools that are set up, the more the public loses these students, parents and communities.