A national Newspoll survey of Australian adults, commissioned by the Dusseldorp Skills Forum, was conducted in June 2004, with the aim of measuring community opinion on issues such as the level of government support for education, the role of schooling, and education, training and employment opportunities for young people.

Newspoll surveyed 1,200 respondents aged 18 years and over nationally over the period 25-27 June. The poll confirmed that nine out of ten Australians want education to be a higher priority for governments.

Community concern is particularly high in relation to schools, especially public schools, which are generally viewed as being in need of increased funding and resources. Affordability and access to education also ranked highly as concerns.

Half of all Australian adults say it is most important that governments do more for schools. Significantly fewer, only one in ten adults for each, say universities, pre-schools or TAFE colleges are most in need of government attention. Calls for more government attention to schools were higher among women (54 per cent) than men (47 per cent), and higher than other states in NSW (56 per cent) and lower than other states in Victoria (41 per cent).

Putting a greater priority on assisting teenagers to get an apprenticeship or a traineeship and providing job opportunities for school leavers were supported by more than 70 per cent of adults. Only one in five feel the priority that governments currently place on these areas is about right. Two thirds of adults also say that assisting young people to complete year 12 should be a higher government priority. By contrast significantly less people are unhappy with current levels of assistance to get into TAFE and into university - more than a third of adults feel the priorities in these areas are about right.

Giving young people knowledge and skills for adulthood is the most important thing schools should doing according to one in two adults. Nearly a quarter said preparing young people for work was the most important task for schools. According to Newspoll, "a good education is viewed by many as an asset at both individual level and for the greater Australian community."

To find out more download:

the Summary Report from the Dusseldorp Skills Forum web site here, [532K]

or

download the Full Report for all the Tables and data from the Dusseldorp Skills Forum web site here. [374K]

[Source: Dusseldorp Skills Forum]