This document summarizes Geraldine Ditchburn's article which critiques the development of a national curriculum in Australia. The summary identifies several key points: 1) Ditchburn argues that the Australian curriculum is primarily designed to meet the needs of global markets and the economy, sidelining issues of diversity and local context. 2) The idea of a national curriculum has been validated and legitimized through references to economic interests and global competitiveness in documents like the Melbourne Declaration. 3) While consistency and economies of scale are cited benefits, the national curriculum adopts a "one-size-fits-all" approach that eschews celebration of difference. Equity concerns are secondary to improving Australia's international

1. Highlights on Ditchburn’s article
by Ferry Tanoto
Geraldine Ditchburn (2012) A national Australian curriculum: in whose
interests?, Asia Pacific Journal of Education, 32:3, 259-269, DOI:
10.1080/02188791.2012.711243

2. Australian curriculum: Whose
interests are being served?
Gramsci’s cultural hegemony  applied by
critical theorists including Apple (1990, 2006),
Giroux (2010),MacLaren and Kincheloe (2007).

3. Australian curriculum is intentionally
positioned to primarily meet the needs of
global markets and the economy.
•
•
•
•
•
Global neo-liberalism
Economic interests under neoliberal conditions
Sidelining the issues of diversity and local context
Disconnected from local realities
A decontextualized edifice (a complex system of beliefs),
depersonalized and homogenized;
• It has eschewed (to abstain or keep away from; shun;
avoid) the celebration of difference and adopted a one-sizefits-all approach

4. The importance of national unity in
times of “crisis” (Giroux, 2010), or
curriculum consistency and
economies of scale that a national
curriculum might provide

5. How have neo-liberal interests been
validated and legitimated through
the idea of a national curriculum?
Melbourne Declaration on Educational Goals
for Young Australians (Ministerial Council on
Education, Employment, Training and Youth
Affairs [MCEETYA], 2008)

6. Curriculum provision such as
providing a meaningful curriculum
for diverse student populations or
multiple future life trajectories has
not been the center of the discourse

7. There has been little vehement, or
even subdued, opposition to the
idea of a national curriculum in
Australia. Opposition has taken the
form of criticisms of the detail, not
the idea of a national curriculum.

8. Gramsci’s concept of cultural hegemony has
been described as “the nexus of material and
ideological instruments through which the
ruling class maintains power” (Hawkes, 2003,
p. 114), or a dominant “worldview” that is
“internalized” and “unchallengeable” so that
it becomes part of the “natural order of
things” (Boggs, 1976, p. 39).

9. ACARA has articulated the four stages
of the development of the
implementation of the Australian
curriculum:
• shaping (including a broad outline of the K–12
curriculum and curriculum design and advice),
• writing,
• implementation and
• evaluation and review

10. It declared the two key goals of
schooling in terms of “equity and
excellence” and that students become
“successful learners, confident and
creative individuals and active and
informed citizens” (MCEETYA, 2008)

11. Australia’s capacity to provide a high
quality of life for all will depend on the
ability to compete in the global
economy on knowledge and
innovation . . . [and that] . . . schools
play a vital role . . . in ensuring the
nation’s ongoing economic prosperity.
(MCEETYA, 2008, pp. 7–8)

12. A national curriculum will have “many
benefits” including:
• giving young people the knowledge and skills
they need “to effectively engage with and
prosper in society and compete in a globalized
world and thrive in the information-rich
workplaces of the future”;
• giving parents and teachers a “clear
understanding of what needs to be covered at
each year level” while also allowing for
considerable “flexibility” for teachers; and,
• “overcoming the barrier of curriculum variation”
for mobile students and families(ACARA, n.d.)

13. McGaw (2009) listed two key reasons
for a new curriculum.
• The impact of “globalization” where “international
comparisons are more important than intra-national
comparisons” because “interstate competition has not
yielded great benefits”. Referring to the fact that “a
nation as a whole can do better than its parts”,
McGaw alluded to the efficiencies brought about by
“working together” as a nation rather than as a
federation of states.
• The international context to provide “clear evidence of
*other+ countries on the move”. Using data from the
PISA tests, he showed how Australia’s international
ranking had been challenged by some other
countries.

14. The issues of equity are secondary to
the main game of improving Australia’s
overall international ranking – and to
be “world class” (McGaw, 2009).

15. PISA Effect (Programme for
International Student Achievement)
International measures of educational
attainment, like PISA, has been increasingly used
to measure, monitor, and even construct
curriculum systems and their policies.

16. Klenowski and Adie’s (2009) argue that
“teachers and schools view them
[high-stakes tests] as accountability
measures” (p. 11) rather than as a way
to inform teaching and learning.

17. Economic competition within global
contexts is defining national
educational agendas and priorities and
alongside of this is the importance of
students developing necessary
knowledge and skills to “compete” in
this market-driven context.

18. A direct link between the economy
and schooling, where schools produce
skilled workers able to function within
a global context, is acknowledged to
be a central and an assumed priority
and focus of schooling.

19. The provision of curriculum is more
than ensuring that young people leave
school with the necessary knowledge
and skills to work in changing
economic circumstances.

20. Approaches to national curriculum
collaboration are doomed to fail unless
they are first thought about in
curriculum [rather than political or
economic?] terms (Reid, 2005).