In this issue:

• Do schools matter for early school leaving?
• Better focus required on principal career paths and roles
• University students less engaged than US counterparts
• ACER UPDATE

School completion is viewed as a major policy issue in Australia. Early school leavers are more likely to become unemployed, stay unemployed for longer, have lower earnings, and accumulate less wealth over their lifetime. Policy makers are particularly concerned with the role of schools in early school leaving, with a view to policy intervention. If individual schools have important effects on school leaving, then policies could be introduced in particular schools to reduce early school leaving. However, such policy interventions would be less appropriate if schools or school factors do not make substantive independent contributions to school leaving.

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Building communities of professional learners is the key to meeting Australia’s school leadership challenge a new review of research has concluded.

The Australian Education review 53: The Leadership Challenge: Improving learning in schools, written by University of Tasmania researcher Professor Bill Mulford, draws on papers from ACER’s 2007 Research Conference and many other contemporary sources within the leadership research literature to address and provide a focus for the issues facing Australian school leadership.

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Australian and New Zealand tertiary students are less engaged with their universities than their North American counterparts according to results from the first administration of the Australasian Survey of Student Engagement (AUSSE). More than 9000 students from 25 Australian and New Zealand universities participated in the survey in 2007. The public report was released by ACER in April.

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Masters takes part in 2020 Summit

ACER’s chief executive Professor Geoff Masters took part in the 2020 Summit in Canberra earlier this month. He was part of the Summit’s early childhood and school education sub-stream. It identified the need for more seamless, national approaches to our most pressing educational challenges – including a greater focus on development in early childhood and on the needs of Indigenous students and students living in remote and disadvantaged areas of Australia.

A question posed at the Summit was: What would it take for Australia to develop the best education system in the world? Many ideas were proposed, but there was general agreement that keys included addressing the needs of disadvantaged and low-achieving students; ensuring that every child has access to an excellent teacher; investing more in education and training; and encouraging local partnerships between schools, businesses, parents and their communities.

Assessment tool for the hospitality industry

ACER Press has been selected, from a number of submissions, to provide advice and supply an assessment tool, the Work Personality Index, which will be used for the recruitment of a range of positions in the Hospitality industry. Organised through the peak industry body, the Restaurant & Catering Association (RCA), the proposal has been given federal government approval and funding. The hospitality sector is one of the largest employers of people in Australia and it is anticipated, by the RCA, that approximately 1,000 businesses a year will be using the tool to help with the selection of staff. Work has begun on developing a Hospitality Profile template, which is the first stage of this project.