Every child. Every school. Every opportunity.
Every Australian child deserves the opportunity to succeed, regardless of their family income, postcode or the school they attend.
But children from different social and economic backgrounds are increasingly being concentrated in different schools. This affects the opportunities available to students, the challenges schools face and the performance of our education system as a whole.
We can change this. The first step is to measure the problem openly. The next is to act on what the evidence shows.
Ask Australia’s Education Ministers and your local MPs to support annual public reporting on socioeconomic diversity across every school sector, as well as a review of the factors that contribute to school segregation and what can be done about it.
What is Every Opportunity asking governments to do?
We are asking every Australian government to support two practical actions:
1. Show us the full picture
Publish a clear national report every year showing the socioeconomic diversity of schools and school systems across the government, Catholic and independent sectors.
2. Act on what the evidence shows
Complete a public review of the drivers of socioeconomic segregation and possible solutions by the end of 2027, then implement effective measures to increase socioeconomic diversity and improve student outcomes.
These are not new or radical demands. They were recommended by the Australian Government’s own Independent Expert Panel.
What do we mean by school segregation?
School segregation happens when students from similar social and economic backgrounds become concentrated in particular schools, while students from different backgrounds are concentrated elsewhere.
It does not mean that individual schools are failing. It means the way our education system is designed is separating students by advantage and disadvantage. This places very different demands on different schools.
Australia’s Independent Expert Panel found that 51% of socio-educationally disadvantaged students attend schools with students from similar backgrounds, one of the highest concentrations in the OECD. It also found that the socioeconomic profile of a school can be a stronger predictor of academic achievement than a student’s own family background.
This is not about blaming parents or pitting one school sector against another. It is about understanding the system we have built and working together to make it fairer for every child, in every school.
Why does social mix matter?
When disadvantage is concentrated, schools are asked to meet greater and more complex needs, often with fewer of the advantages, networks and resources available elsewhere.
Teachers carry a heavier load. Students face greater barriers. The gap between schools grows, and a child’s opportunity to succeed becomes more closely tied to where they live, what their family can afford and which school they attend.
A fairer, less segregated system gives every school a stronger chance to succeed. It also gives children the opportunity to learn alongside people from different backgrounds, helping to build understanding, belonging, a more cohesive society and a stronger democracy.
The aim is not to remove choice or make every school the same. It is to make sure choice is genuinely accessible and that every family has an excellent school within reach.
Why publish the data every year?
Through the work of researchers, we already know school segregation exists. But we cannot change what we do not consistently measure.
Annual public reporting would allow Australians to:
see where advantage and disadvantage are becoming concentrated;
understand how the picture differs across communities, sectors and states;
track whether policies are reducing segregation or making it worse;
direct attention and resources to the places they are most needed; and
hold governments accountable for real, measurable progress.
Clear data creates a shared starting point. It helps replace argument and assumption with evidence. It also shows whether reform is actually working.
What should the public be able to see?
The Expert Panel recommended annual public reporting, but did not prescribe every measure the report should contain. To guide future policy and allow meaningful public accountability, Schools For All believes an effective annual report should make it easy to understand:
The mix of students across places, schools and sectors
where socioeconomic advantage and disadvantage are concentrated;
whether schools broadly reflect the communities in which they are located;
whether there are patterns in segregation by state and territory and by geographic area
how students from different backgrounds are distributed across government, Catholic and independent schools; and
how these patterns have changed over time, using 2012, or the earliest year for which genuinely comparable national data can be constructed, as a baseline.
Barriers to access
how compulsory fees and charges are changing, and why;
the extent to which those costs make schools inaccessible to lower-income families; and
how selective enrolment practices affect access for students experiencing disadvantage.
Differences in resourcing
combined government recurrent funding per student, comparing schools with similar student profiles, size and location; and
total income per student (including government funding and private income) across comparable schools.
The effect on students
how concentrations of advantage and disadvantage affect learning, wellbeing, attendance and school completion.
The information should be clear, comparable and available to everyone, rather than buried in technical reports or accessible only to experts.
Governments have already been told what needs to happen
In 2023, the Independent Expert Panel commissioned by Commonwealth Education Minister Jason Clare recommended that governments, school systems and approved authorities:
track and publicly report every year on the socioeconomic diversity of schools and systems, beginning by the end of 2025; and
review existing policy settings by the end of 2027 and implement new measures to increase socioeconomic diversity and lift student outcomes.
The deadline for annual public reporting has passed.
The Better and Fairer Schools Agreement 2025–2034 now commits governments to investigate socioeconomic diversity, its effect on student learning and possible approaches to address it, with findings due to Education Ministers by the end of 2027.
That work is important. But investigation alone does not guarantee public transparency or political action. We need our elected representatives to commit to the full recommendation: measure the problem every year, publish the results and act on what they show.
Australia can learn from what works elsewhere
School segregation is not inevitable. Comparable education systems have made different choices about funding, fees, enrolment, school planning and accountability, and achieved a more socially mixed school system.
Australia’s 2027 policy review should examine that international experience carefully, including lessons from Canada, and identify what can be adapted successfully here.
This is our opportunity to move beyond decades of inherited policy and build an education system designed for the Australia we want to become: fair, excellent and genuinely open to every child.
Add your voice
Education Ministers and MPs need to know that Australians want action, not another report that disappears into a drawer.
Email your representatives today and ask them to support annual public reporting on socioeconomic diversity and the full 2027 policy review recommended by the Independent Expert Panel.
Every child. Every school. Every opportunity.