All citizens of Canberra, including most parents, will feel a slight surge of pleasure at the news that ACT students are outperforming their counterparts in other Australian states and territories. But not too much because we would expect that, would we not? We would expect that, because, as the report which brought the findings said, there is a very clear relationship between socio-economic disadvantage and educational attainment and achievement, and because Canberra, while having its pockets of poverty, has a disproportionate share of its population among the highest socio-economic groups. These are the groups most likely to have books in their homes. Most likely to see the benefit of education and to push their children to learn. Most likely to get closely involved with their children's schooling and to operate as partners, with teachers, in seeing that they learn to the best of their abilities. In this sense, some objective demonstration that parents, teachers and the children are doing their job, and that it is showing up in significantly better average reading, writing and numeracy results, is pleasing, but nothing to be complacent about.

That sense that we should not be too smug will be reinforced by findings in the report that Australian students perform strongly by international standards, but in a manner well short of the top performing nations overseas. The results report by the Council of Australian Governments review had Australia significantly above OECD averages in scientific, reading and mathematical literacy, but that we consistently had fewer students in the very top levels. With reading, for example, 11per cent of Australian 15-year-olds were in the top level of reading literacy, compared with 22per cent of students from South Korea. Sixteenper cent were in the top level of mathematical literacy, but in Finland, 24per cent of their age cohort were. With 10-year-olds, 9per cent of students were in the top numeracy group, compared with 41per cent of 10-year-olds in Singapore; with 14-year-olds, 6per cent of Australian students were in the top levels, compared with 45per cent in Taiwan. No doubt, there were significantly higher proportion of students from the ACT at these top levels, but it is doubtful that territorial achievement was up at the levels of nations such as Singapore, Korea and Finland. It is very interesting to note that it is particularly these three countries which are known to be most successful with the most noble dream of public education of an equal opportunity for all, producing results that cut right across class divides. Here in Australia, an equally well-funded system creates some opportunity, but generally benefits the already well-off better than those who are behind. While Korea, Finland and Singapore have quite different educational systems, each, in its own way, seems to be achieving something we are not.

Indigenous outcomes are the most obvious, if not the only, area where our educational system is not making enough difference. There are obvious problems including poor school attendance, the family disadvantage of even motivated children, inadequate resourcing for schools in remote areas, and poor management and cultural chasms in central educational bureaucracies. But more than mere coercion, mere money and mere staffing is involved, and it seems doubtful that the government's desire to ''close the gap'' can be fulfilled without a fundamental re-evaluation not only of education delivery, but also of pedagogy the theory and practice of delivery.

It is interesting to note that the United States wrestles with many problems similar to Australia's, including a sense that outcomes are at best marking time, not much improving. Australia has, on average, far better outcomes than America's, but many similar problems with disadvantaged groups. There is one American state Massachusetts which is seeing marked measurable improvements in objective outcomes even as performances in other areas are in the doldrums. Why? It seems that it is because that state a liberal and progressive one is committing the liberal and progressive heresy abhorred by virtually every person with a Diploma of Education of the content-rich and fact-based curriculum. Rather than teaching students how to learn about things, it teaches them the things itself. Children furnished with useful facts, from history, from science, from mathematics, and from literature are far more likely to learn to be critical thinkers, curious and interested students and people who will seek to extend and deepen their knowledge, including with all of the tools available to those for whom core facts and common curriculum has been less important. The ACT system is generally at odds with the cultural literacy and core knowledge movement, but the fact that most ACT students do better may be a reflection of the fact that they grow up in environments in which common core knowledge is important. Educators as much as students must keep their minds open to all theories and techniques of better learning.