Our proposed changes to the Education Act will engage Tasmanian children in school earlier and keep them in school longer, improving educational outcomes for generations to come and reducing educational disadvantage.
Lowering the compulsory minimum starting age and increasing the leaving requirements will ensure Tasmanian students have access to as much education as their interstate counterparts. Currently, they can have as much as two-years less.
Importantly, lowering the minimum starting age will ensure more Tasmanians with the greatest need access early learning.
As it stands almost half of our children miss out on high quality learning experiences at a young age because not every family can afford child care or private education.
This is an issue of equity. We must break this cycle of disadvantage and ensure all Tasmanians have access to quality education, no matter how much their family earns.
Our proposed changes to the school starting age would give every child equitable access, and its estimated this could increase the number of three and four year olds accessing early learning to up to 77 per cent.
This means that more children would benefit from high quality early learning programs sooner.
Research in this area is unequivocal; it shows that access to early learning is critical in the all-round development in children and ensuring they have a positive start to primary school, and the many years beyond.
This is the most significant reform in education in two-decades. It will require additional funding and we are committed to this investment - it will be resourced. Preliminary modelling shows the starting and leaving age reform will cost approximately $15 million a year, for government and non-government sectors combined.
Importantly, we have ensured that these proposed changes would have a long lead-in time to allow preparation for the practical implications of this very important structural change.
We are absolutely committed to improving educational outcomes in Tasmania, and we will continue to work with all stakeholders, school communities and families to ensure that we can achieve this together.
More Media Releases from Jeremy Rockliff
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