By CASEY NEILL
Dandenong High School will miss out on more funding than any secondary school in Victoria if the Gonski funding doesn’t continue.
The Australian Labor Party’s Bruce candidate Julian Hill said it would receive up to $3.3 million more a year from 2018 if his party won government at the 2 July election than under a Coalition government.
But Liberal Bruce candidate Helen Kroger said: “It actually makes me really cross the way in which Labor are misrepresenting this.
“I totally reject the suggestion that the funding is being taken out of individual schools,” she said.
“What Julia Gillard did when she was Prime Minister, when she introduced the so-called Gonski funding model, she did it without actually funding the program.
“She had the benefit of announcing this so-called great program which was going to increase funds in all sorts of ways, but it wasn’t backed up by the funding.”
Ms Kroger said the Coalition had pledged to continue current funding levels for the next two years.
“No university is going to miss out on any funding in that regard,” she said.
“Gonski is actually in relation to universities, tertiary funding.
“What the government has been doing is reviewing how was can maximise investment in education but on a sustainable footing so that it’s actually paid for.”
But Mr Hill clarified that “the Gonski funding relates to schools” and was a needs-based model.
“The Liberals’ cuts to universities are an entirely separate problem,” he said.
“The quality of any child’s education must not be determined by where their family happens to live or what school a child goes to.
“A Labor government will fund the final years of the existing school funding agreements for 2018 and 2019.
“Funds should be targeted to the schools that need the most support.”
Dandenong High School principal Susan Ogden said it was too soon to know what would happen.
“Obviously nothing is guaranteed yet because we’re in the middle of an election.
“I’ve been told that there may be the removal of Gonski funding but nothing has been set,” she said.
“Obviously for any principal, reduction of funding is challenging.
“It will have an impact on the programs that we offer, but at this school we’ll continue to do what we’ve always done which is provide the best environment we can so that every one of our students reaches their potential and achieves success.”
