it is not a matter of intensive tutoring to achieve mathematical skill. If the general culture of an education system emphasises language skills over numeracy skills, the tragedy is going to be, as it is already in Australia, that students who might have an innate numeracy ability are overlooked, simply because those who run the system do not themselves have that skill and cannot recognise or nurture it.
The fact that the education system in Australia is now politicised and full of people who have labor leanings has given rise to a "language, humanities-based" perspective, not a numeracy one. The labor side of politics, where most school teachers are from in Australia are big on the talk side of education, but they are crap at mathematics - just look at the labor government as well - can't balance the books, just all talk and credit cards. It's the same malaise in the Australian education system. You people have ruined this country and squandered its innate human skills because of your own blinkered political outlook.

The message given to school students in Australia today, from very early ages, unless the student is an absolute stand-out in maths, is along the lines of "oh, don't worry too much about maths, you won't really need it anyway, you can get enough points to get through without having to go through that".  Students then take the easier humanities subjects and do not *develop* ANY level of numeracy.
Maths has to be worked at and a skill developed to the best of one's ability over the years. It should be mandatory today as it used to be, not dropped simply because there aren't enough labor teachers today who can actually understand it themselves. How pathetic, but worse than that, it de-skills and dumbs down the population and results in industry not being able to recruit enough of the right skills sets.
The laborised Australian education system has seriously failed this country.

shampain socialist wrote on Aug 12^th, 2010 at 11:29pm:


So, remind us again what Howard's excuse was for chronically  underfunding science education, training, research and development - including the CSIRO - throughout an unprecedented period of national prosperity!?

deepthought wrote on Aug 12^th, 2010 at 10:53pm:



You know full well that was a deal stitched up by the coalition with the World Nuclear Association before the 2007 NATO meeting.

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Don't blame one particular party for this poor excuse of an education system - both parties are to blame for dumbing down our kids.

They started using calculators in schools a couple of decades ago - and even some teachers today have to be taught how to spell.

My children went to school during the Howard era and maths just took a back seat on the curriculum - it wasn't considered essential. I taught them Maths and English. Those who were educated during the 60's and 70's were the lucky ones. Teachers were professional educators and physical discipline was used - not only by the schools but by the parents.

I agree with Equitist and Sappho - training needs to start here NOW and we don't need any more skilled labour. Many of them lie on their resumes anyway as corporations have discovered over the years.

skippy. wrote on Aug 13^th, 2010 at 8:24am:


No matter what both major party's say, they are still inclined to the big is beautiful idea (at this time), because they are influenced by big business & Economists, who are convinced that Exponential Growth is not only possible, but that it must happen or the world will end, as was evidenced by the reactions from John Elliott & the big business representative on Q & A last night.  

As Dick Smith repeatedly pointed out, we live on a planet with finite resources, which means that there are limits and we are now approaching many major limitations, as demonstrated by Dr Albert Bartlett in the following series of video's -










1) There is a maximum sustainable Population, for both countries & the planet.
2) The greater the Population, the faster Essential Resources, such as Energy, Food & fresh Water will be used.
3) Population & Energy Growth/Decline ARE DIRECTLY RELATED TO CLIMATE CHANGE.

We are already at Peak Oil, which means that, in all likelihood, the next 20-30 years, will see increasing Demand because the Population is still rising, whilst the great Economic Enabler (oil) will be in terminal decline, as already started in 2005.

The decline of available Supply & the rising Price of our Energy Future, will directly & severely lessen our capacity to sustain our current Global Population, let alone continue to Exponentially increase it!  

In fact, I would suggest the POPULATION/ENERGY problem is not so much a Population Puzzle, it is more a GORDIAN KNOT, which will prove intractable and will finally result in the end of the current Political & Economic paradigm!

Trust me, I'm not a Politician, Economics & Politics can survive without a GROWTH Economy.

However, Economics & Politics will need to adapt, because the human race will not survive any attempt at Extended Exponential Growth!

Btw, VIDEO 3 COMPARES US (HUMANS) to BACTERIA, IT IS APPLICABLE!

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The likes of Elliot would still sing the praises of greed is good.

skippy. wrote on Aug 13^th, 2010 at 12:22pm:



I looked up the history of that Elliott guy, he's a common criminal, ripped off investors then declared bankruptcy when ordered to pay it back. What a jerk!!!!

shampain socialist wrote on Aug 12^th, 2010 at 10:50pm:


Yes I agree that this too is a serious issues... and it seems that this lack of skill in maths and science has bipartisan approval since neither side of politics does nothing to resolve this problem.

Such a despicable thing it is to discourage our own in areas of knowledge that are... lets face it... expensive to deliver, yet mine for minds in poor countries, stripping them of their science/maths based resources.

How are poor nations expected to improve if the means of improvement are always being denied them. How are affluent nations expected to grow their cutting edge, if their people are being dumbed down and their brightest, resulting from their education systems or from the poaching of others, are kept as a scarce resource in high demand.

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Are you expecting a GREENS/Labor coalition ,deepy?