Canberra's most disadvantaged students will have access to millions of dollars of extra Commonwealth funding after federal Education Minister Julia Gillard agreed not to hold the ACT's middle-class status against it.
Under previous funding deals, Canberra's high socio-economic status ruled out needy students from extra financial assistance.
This was because the funding model used the average income of a student's postcode to assess need, instead of individual family circumstances. The Australian Bureau of Statistics does not place any ACT postcode in the bottom 25 per cent of Australia.
ACT Education Minister Andrew Barr said the first meeting of Labor education ministers yesterday was a huge breakthrough for the ACT.
"It might be true we are a middle-class city, but I made the argument that the Commonwealth needed to look beyond postcodes and to the financial circumstances of each student," he said.
He used the example of Red Hill Primary, which is in one of Australia's wealthiest postcodes but also enrols students from much lower socio-economic backgrounds.
Under the new National Partnerships Agreement, ACT students will be assessed on their individual household income. Mr Barr said the new money worth millions to the ACT would start to flow next year, once details of the 2009-13 funding agreement were worked out.
The ACT Education Department had enough information on students to identify those most in need and already gave extra support to the most disadvantaged through bursaries and equity funds.
Mr Barr said his biggest concern at the ministerial council was missing out on extra funds because the ACT was considered middle class.
"There is no doubting we have pockets of serious disadvantage here and any extra assistance can make a great difference," he said.
Ms Gillard agreed yesterday to develop pilot initiatives that focused on literacy and numeracy in low socio-economic status schools by the end of the year.
The ACT will also receive its fair share of new IT funds, which Prime Minister Kevin Rudd promised as part of his "education revolution".
Mr Rudd pledged during last year's election campaign to provide a computer for each student in senior secondary school and ensure 100-megabit broadband access nationwide.
But the ACT Government allocated $20 million in 2006 to provide all high schools and colleges with more computers and a 1-gigabyte fibre-optic connection.
Ms Gillard agreed to allow states and territories to keep any savings from the cost of computers to spend on associated technology upgrades.
Mr Barr said this would allow the ACT to buy smartboards and other new classroom technologies.
He said the Commonwealth had agreed that the first $100 million of its $1 billion IT program would go to the neediest schools with the lowest rates of computer access, 17 of which were in the ACT. He said it was likely the ACT would make a bulk purchase agreement with NSW to save more money.
On the Federal Government's promise to provide every four-year-old child with access to 15 hours of preschool a week, Mr Barr said he had negotiated another "equitable" outcome for Canberra.
The ACT would also be able to spend some of the money to cut preschool class sizes, he said.
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