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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2010-05-13 Daily Xml
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ADELAIDE HIGH SCHOOL

Ms SANDERSON (Adelaide) (15:20): I would like to congratulate Adelaide High School on its continuing academic achievements. From the 2009 SACE records, 92 per cent of students were successful in gaining entry into university in their first choice career pathway. The school, led by principal Stephen Dowdy, offers a broad curriculum, including a special languages program, programs of excellence in rowing and cricket, and the Centre for Hearing Impaired, which all remain very popular.

Adelaide High School has a proud history and a great academic record, with students from over 85 schools seeking enrolments each year. Increased demands on enrolments at the school are in line with the increased population in the inner city and the popularity of the curriculum and special entry programs. The school is very proud of its diversity, with 70 per cent of students coming from non-English speaking backgrounds.

Adelaide High School's programs are both popular and successful, so much so that at some stages it has had up to 500 students on a waiting list and still maintained a register of interest. Due to this, sibling rights for special entry students have had to be cut to curb the demand. Although it is still felt that sibling rights help develop a community feel within the school they just cannot fit them all in.

Under the government's 30-year development plan, the Adelaide city population would increase by 11,000 people, which will only exacerbate the problem. Currently, there are six public primary schools and only one public secondary school in the Adelaide electorate. This is not satisfactory. The government needs to look to the future, not at the short term, because 250 extra places for Adelaide High School will not even bring it into line with the state asset management plan benchmarks that were given to DECS in June 2001 that indicated at the time that the building area, identified as 10,471 metres squared, equated to a shortfall of space for approximately 226 students. Based on current figures, this would now be a shortfall of 329. How would the government's proposed extra 250 places solve this problem?

To make things worse, on Tuesday 16 March, only days before the election, the government announced an expansion of Adelaide High School by 250 students by 2013. I quote:

By expanding the schools, we can relax the zones, so students from Prospect or Walkerville, for instance, will be able to attend Adelaide High School.

Noting that Adelaide High School is already over capacity by 329 students and numbers are increasing yearly, by adding Prospect and Walkerville the demand could increase by up to a further 650 students. Thus by 2013, Adelaide High School will require about another 800 places. The people of Prospect require another public school option. Every child is entitled to have a local education. The proposed super school in Gepps Cross is not what the people of Adelaide want. I note the quote by Jay Weatherill on the front cover of the School Post:

By listening to what communities have to say, I believe we can together build a responsive school system.

I plead with you, Mr Weatherill, to honour your pledge, and that of your government, to start listening. This is not about Liberal or Labor; this is about a clear and defined unquestionable need for a second school in the inner north city area. The question is whether the government wants to build on the good reputation of Adelaide High School by building a second campus, or establishing a new inner north school with its own identity.

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