ACT will hold inquiry into literacy and numeracy after equity gaps widen

Education Minister Yvette Berry welcomed opposition education spokesman Jeremy Hanson's motion calling for a literacy inquiry and moved an amended motion in the Legislative Assembly on Thursday.

"We've broadened it out to include numeracy because literacy and numeracy are connected and we want to make sure that those equity gaps are understood," Ms Berry said.

"There's a lot of information flowing around right now and there have been numerous inquiries into literacy across the world and across the country.

"We don't want to really rehash some of those inquiries, but look at what we need to do in our schools to make them even better and address those equity gaps."

It is unknown who would lead the inquiry but Ms Berry said it would be chaired or co-chaired by people with expertise in literacy and numeracy.

The inquiry will be required to provide a full report before the last sitting day in June 2024.

The inquiry follows a report by Equity Economics which showed one in three 15-year-old students in Canberra is not meeting the reading benchmark and called for evidence-based literacy instruction in all schools.

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Mr Hanson said he looked forward to seeing the report delivered next June.

"It's great news for all ACT school children, particularly those who are falling behind in literacy. And as we know, that's far too many kids in Canberra. So this now provides a pathway forwards," he said.

Ms Berry acknowledged the equity gap in reading and numeracy between advantaged and disadvantaged students had increased significantly and the inquiry would look at narrowing this achievement gap.

"What we want do is improve that support to our schools. We want to improve that support to students and teachers," she said.

"We want to hear from academics and parents to understand what we need to do, to make those improvements because education doesn't stand still and we want to do everything we can to make our system at the best."

She said the rising cost of living, COVID-19 and teacher workforce shortages was contributing to the widening education equity gap, but said the ACT education system remained one of the best in the world.

"We've already introduced a number of measures. So it's not like we've been standing still and waiting for an opportunity to arise to conduct an inquiry," Ms Berry said.

"We've already got systems in place and processes in place. We've got 145 literacy coaches across the ACT and our public schools to support teachers and educators to educate around literacy."

The Australian Education Union ACT branch president Angela Burroughs welcomed the inquiry as an opportunity to debunk myths about how literacy is taught in ACT schools.

"The first is that literacy outcomes in the ACT are in crisis and that we are sliding backwards. The evidence shows the ACT to be high performing, but this doesn't mean we don't aspire to do better," Ms Burroughs said.

"The second myth is that education policy in the ACT prohibits the teaching of phonics and that the Education Directorate sets down rules that make explicit instruction take a back seat to inquiry-based learning. This is not true."

Ms Burroughs said the directorate had a role to play in providing clarity to parents about literacy instruction.

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