Secondary education

LAUGHTER The reason I wanted to bring it up is when you reproduced that 1972 essay in True Stories, you said, the article appeared anonymously, but I was pathetically easy to trace.

On the second last day of that school year, I was summoned to the Education Department in Treasury Place and carpeted by the Deputy Director of Secondary Education.

He asked me if I'd used four-letter words in the classroom.

Transparent to the end, I replied that I had.

When a parent hears the word dyscalculia for the first time, and I mean properly hears it because it's now attached to their own child, the question that follows almost immediately isn't really about maths at all.

It's what does this mean for them? What does it mean for exams, for secondary school, for the job they'll eventually do, for whether they'll manage money on their own one day? That jump from a diagnosis to a lifetime is completely understandable.

It's the response I'd expect from any parent who loves their child and wants to protect them from unnecessary struggle.

If you've felt that pull to skip straight to adulthood, you're not overreacting.

It's never meant to be read as the whole of it.

So where does that leave the question you actually came here with? I hear five things over and over from parents in this position, the really specific worries.

Will my child get into the secondary school I want for them? What should I actually be looking for when I'm choosing their next school? Will they cope once they're there? What happens if they don't do well in their GCSEs? And behind all of that, what does this mean for them as an adult, for work, for money, for managing life on their own? Those are the five questions this episode is built around.

I'm not going to pretend I can answer all of them completely.

My guests today are Hannah Maiden and Catherine White.

Hannah is a Teaching and Learning Officer at the Department of Education in the Northern Territory, and Catherine is a Teaching and Learning Coach in Secondary Education.

Hannah and Catherine collaborated on an exciting project we will hear more about today.

Before we begin, I would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land Macquarie University, my institution, is located on, the land of the Wollongong clan of the Darug Nation, whose cultures and customs have nurtured and continue to nurture this land.

I'll get Hannah to drag me in if I go too deep or too far with this because I'm very passionate about it.

I would like to start by mentioning Hannah and I are very lucky to be part of a team of eight other, nine other people who are part of the roadmap team within the department who we all get to work very closely and play in this space each day, which we feel very privileged to be part of.

So the review of secondary education was completed in 2023 in the Northern Territory and it analysed the unique context of the NT and outlined some key recommendations for improvement into secondary education.

I'm not going to go through all of them as there is quite a few, so I'll just summarise.

Scott specializes in advanced mathematics instruction, curriculum design, and creating structured high-expectation learning environments.

He earned his degree in secondary education from Alabama A&M University and holds a master's degree in educational leadership from Trevecca Narveen University.

So Scott brings nearly three decades of experience in mathematics education, along with a strong perspective on educational leadership and preparing students for what's next.

So thank you, Scott, for joining the conversation.