Results gap narrows
GOLD COAST private schools are outmatching their public counterparts in almost every subject in NAPLAN testing but public school results are improving faster.
Data released this week by the Queensland Curriculum Assessment Authority reveal the city’s private and independent schools have consistently beaten public schools in reading, writing, grammar and numeracy in the national test.
This year, however, the Gold Coast’s year 9 public high school students are more likely to have achieved a better result in spelling with an average result 1.9 per cent higher than those in private education.
Overall, Gold Coast private primary schools produced an average result on their NAPLAN test that was 5.7 per cent higher than those in public education.
In high school, those attending non-government schools were on average 2.4 per cent better.
The city’s primary schools have improved in most areas, while those in a private high school have stagnated.
A 2015-2018 comparison of NAPLAN results revealed Gold Coast public primary school students improved in all areas except writing.
Years 3 and 5 students in the public system had an overall improvement of up to 5.7 per cent in the reading category, far outstripping that of their private counterparts.
Private primary schools recorded subtle improvements in all subjects, other than writing.
Assisi Catholic College at Upper Coomera produced one of the largest improvements among the city’s private schools with a 2.08 per cent overall increase between 2015 and this year. The school’s high school grades also improved during the same period.
Principal Michael Laidler put the improvement down to the adoption of consistent teaching methods and com- munication across subjects and year levels.
“Also we have short-term planning cycles – where our teachers get together once every three to five weeks rath- er han every term,” he said.
“We find we can better keep in step with how the kids are learning and cater to them.”