If we get these school reforms right, children's lives could be transformed

The expert panel has made powerful recommendations that, if properly funded and implemented, will change the lives of children in the ACT for years to come.

The ACT system has prided itself on having school autonomy as a prominent feature.

This means schools and even individual teachers have a large amount of choice over how they teach the Australian Curriculum.

This might sound like a good thing, but it has unintended consequences.

For example, the inquiry heard from teachers who were spending their weekends planning lessons because it was up to them to do everything from scratch.

The inquiry also heard from many parents whose children slipped through the cracks and fell behind.

This is because there is no consistent, systematic way of checking whether children are developing basic reading and numeracy skills.

Many parents spoke of the emotional toll and financial cost of ensuring their children were getting basic skills, such as learning to read. Many resort to private tutoring while being enrolled in the public school system.

The expert panel has managed to ingest a vast amount of information into a lengthy but clear summary of what the top school are doing right.

The test now will be whether the ACT government has the funding and leadership resolve to see through the panel's four-year plan to overhaul the system.

No doubt there will be a few groans of "here we go again" from weary teachers.

But if the plan is followed, they'll likely be doing happy dances as their students achieve beyond what they thought was possible.