Responding to the latest Council of Australian Governments Reform Group's baseline education and training comparisons, Mr Barr said the ACT risked complacency, given its historical successes. The comparisons showed ACT students outperformed their state and territory classmates on nearly every measure.''Of course I am grateful for the success of the system in delivering those results, but some serious questions would need to be asked if we were not at that level,'' he said.

Mr Barr said his focus was to improve the educational opportunities for Canberra students who were not as privileged as some of their other classmates. ''The entire system appears geared towards meeting the needs of comfortably middle-class students on their way to university,'' Mr Barr said.

He agreed with the COAG assessment that much of the ACT's educational success was due to its high socio-economic status. ''I don't believe there is enough focus on the constant battle to engage the non-academic stream of kids in the ACT, and equally, it is a challenge to convince people there is more work to do.''

Mr Barr said he also wanted to improve outcomes for the more than 1100 indigenous students in the ACT, whose results were better than indigenous students in other states and territories but who lag behind their non-indigenous classmates.

Part of the challenge was making sure they had engaging pathways through school and past Year 12, with Mr Barr keen to improve vocational education options for all students in the ACT and considering reforms to the college system.

He acknowledged closing the gap, while a national priority for the Rudd Government, would be a very hard task.

''It really remains to be seen how successful both the Commonwealth and the state and territory governments will be at addressing that significant gap,'' Mr Barr said.

''But it would be defeatist not to try.''