The Government proposed to join the four existing high schools into One super school of around 4,000 students. I would guess the Government motivation for this was to reduce education spending in the area.
I've just learnt of a similar action in the NSW city of Murwillumbah - see here.
Shepparton is a case study for many of the themes in this blog-
The hierarchical leadership structure in education & the focus on Hattie's evidence base has meant there is little value placed on teacher, student, parent and community input into major decisions that effect them- see Teacher Agency.
Eacott (2017) in his insightful paper, "School Leadership and the Cult of the Guru: the Neo-Taylorism of Hattie", shows that leaders promote evidence that "suits their administrative purpose". In many cases it is Hattie's, and this is what happened in Shepparton.
Why Hattie?
Hattie makes the claim that systemic aspects like buildings, class sizes, welfare, social status, prior background, etc., do not make a difference to the quality of education & this suits (saves money) politicians and senior bureaucrats - see Hattie's TEDx talk here.
In the case of Shepparton, Hattie was brought in to convince the community that buildings do not make a difference.
For example a teacher from the school Coleen,
"When John Hattie was brought to Shepparton to pep talk teachers and convince the public that a single school was an ideal option we researched him and attended. We knew our community was in trouble from those reviews. Frankly it was more about the great John Hattie's ideology, than proof. I was not impressed, particularly when questioned, he stated how damaging a two-year transition could be if not well handled and there should be a review after 12 months. The damage has happened in spades, the review did not, nor has their been any consideration for the wellbeing of students. Mr Hattie also used the same method of proving our schools were performing badly as the DET, by comparing them to all schools, not with 'like students' where we were performing as well or better than most. He is a pawn of the government... he stated that buildings do not make a school, only good leadership and good teachers do that. We have now lost 80 teachers in 18 months, have a teacher shortage with new graduates and primary teachers on short term contracts as replacements, dropped from an expected enrolment of 2700 at end of 2019 to 2268 in April 2021, lowered academic expectations and outcomes and a toxic culture. Oh but we have a new building and state of the art facilities. Pardon me if I don't think John Hattie is all he is cracked up to be."A number of other teachers were reported in "Australia: Teachers discuss educational disaster at Shepparton super-school."
e.g., Georgia, a long-standing teacher of several decades, explained how teachers had been sidelined.
"From the very beginning in 2019, we were told we weren’t to talk about the plan," she said. "We only knew what was happening after things were reported in the newspaper.Hattie constantly pronounces that it is the teacher we should focus on. In fact, Hattie claims the teacher accounts for 30% of the achievement of students.
The consultation was a joke. All of a sudden it was announced there would be a super-school and as far as I know, no-one knew about it or voted for it. We were shocked when the principal reported it and could not answer our questions. The process was so fast you did not have time to digest the facts.
Robert described how a colleague had attempted to survey staff about their concerns in the early stages of the amalgamation, and how issues could be overcome. 'Within literally minutes of emailing staff, the principal redacted the survey, cut off his internet and allowed him only to contact seven people in the school that she hand-picked… Everyone was saying we have no voice.
This was not a one-off incident, but part of a series of occurrences that led to teacher complaints to the Department, including threats of industrial action."
I analyse Hattie's 30% claim in detail here.
Larsen (2014) in "Know thy impact – blind spots in John Hattie’s evidence credo", takes this further,
"Teachers get identified as the primary and indispensable learning factor and thereby as a public, expensive, and untrustworthy potential enemy. This amounts to scapegoat projection par excellence" (p. 11).Reports
Labour MP - LOVELL: ANDREWS LABOR GOVERNMENT HIDING SUPER SCHOOL RISKS FROM PARENTS AND STUDENTS.
Sue Phillips, Australia: Teachers discuss educational disaster at Shepparton super-school.
World Socialist Website, Australia: Shepparton residents speak with the Committee for Public Education about “super-school” opposition.
Karen Maxwell, Australian state Labor government’s disastrous Shepparton super-school plan.
Sue Phillips, Grandmother denounces Shepparton school amalgamation.
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