Book Review: Sources in the History of Australian Education 1788–1970

This chapter is aimed at setting the scene for the whole book. We commence by exploring an evidence based view that all school principals need some understanding of legal principles as they pertain to the educational setting. The arguments suggest that having a basic understanding of legal matters, should enable principals to be better equipped to recognise and more appropriately respond to a legal problem. We then explore developing trends of this topic over the past two to three decades by examining what legal matters have intersected with school authorities. A consideration of what level of legal understanding principals do possess is then mentioned. Data drawn from a recent research study undertaken on this issue followed by considerations and implications that stem from not having a basic level of literacy are also revealed.

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The Need for an Understanding of Education Law Principles by School Principals

Educational Documents provides a valuable introduction for students of education and others to some of the leading passages from reports which run to many thousands of pages. The main theme is the creation of an administrative framework - a genuine national education system. This in turn leads to the subsidiary themes - the relations between Church and State in public education, the training of teachers, the progressive development from elementary to primary and secondary education for all, the growth of technical education from a private to a public activity. This book was first published in 1965 and is a reissue of the fifth edition published in 1986.

England and Wales, 1816 to the present day

and exemptions contained in the statutory schemes reveals severe tensions between antidiscrimination and entrenched educational objectives. It will be argued that these stresses strike at the very heart of the efficacy of the laws. The pressure emerges most clearly in the juxtaposition of the radical, catalytic face of anti-discrimination laws, especially age discrimination laws, with the entrenched historical, social, political and economic assumption of the connection between chronological age and education. The social supposition of the link between youth, and childhood in particular, and opportunities for formal education can be illustrated clearly in the consistent form in which compulsory education statutes have been enacted in the Victorian era and the twentieth century. This analysis raises serious questions about the appropriateness of existing age discrimination in education legislation to counteract perceived ‘discrimination problems’ and the policy vacuum which attends the introduction of novel grounds of discrimination. 2 Most state and territory jurisdictions in Australia make unlawful age discrimination in a variety of areas of public life. 3 Age discrimination is one of the ‘new generation’ of grounds of unlawful discrimination introduced in the 1990s to augment the scope of equal opportunity protection. As with other grounds of discrimination of longer standing, such as sex, race or disability, legislative provisions against unlawful age discrimination also support a range of exceptions and exemptions from the operation of the scheme for types of behaviour deemed to fall outside the legitimate realm of legal protection. The provision of education and educational services in the public sphere 4 is one area regulated by anti-discrimination statutes. Several jurisdictions have chosen to enact prohibitions on unlawful age discrimination in education, subject to a range of exceptions.

Katherine A Lindsay

Papers

Age Discrimination in Education: A Critique of Law and Policy 1