This morning I rise to inform the House of the work being done by teachers and parents across Queensland to help improve the literacy and numeracy of our students. On Friday night I hosted a function for the Queensland Council of Parents and Citizens Associations on the occasion of its 60th annual general meeting and conference. I appreciated the opportunity to speak with Margaret Black, President of the QCPCA, members of the QCPCA executive and delegates from P&Cs from across Queensland. It was lovely to see so many life members attending, and I managed to catch up with a couple of them as well. The QCPCA is an important stakeholder in the education system here in Queensland as it represents the views of parents across the state and guides the work done by the 1,258 individual P&Cs in partnership with schools across the state. Educating our students is a collaborative effort between schools, teachers and principals, and parents and communities. As we all know, if we work together we will get the best outcomes for our students, both academically and socially.

As I moved around the function, I had the opportunity to talk to QCPCA members about a number of issues, including educating students about safe behaviour and bullying, school facilities and the work being done in our school communities to improve facilities and programs. I also had the opportunity to discuss the latest NAPLAN results, which were released last week. It should be noted that the number of students at or above national benchmarks has increased in 17 out of 20 areas tested and that we have improved more than the two leading states. We have lifted our rating from seventh to sixth overall with nine out of 10 students at or above national benchmarks. It has been a major effort to deliver improvements and ensure we maintain our focus on the foundations of education in our schools, that is, literacy, numeracy and science.

This government is committed to improving the literacy and numeracy of students across
Queensland, which is why we commissioned the Masters review last year and were happy to receive his report earlier this year. We have started to implement his recommendations fully. It was this Labor government that realised the importance of the early years of learning, which is why we have implemented a full-time prep year across Queensland, which is accessed by about 98 per cent of possible students, and we changed the age that students can start school so that they are commensurate with students from other states. At the last election we promised to build an additional 240 kindergartens over the next four years, so that our three- to four-year-olds can access quality early education, which we know will also have a positive effect on literacy and numeracy outcomes for students in coming years. I made the point to parents that there is still a lot more work to do.

We will see this work on improving literacy and numeracy continue next week with the start of 72 summer schools across Queensland in the September school holidays. These summer schools will provide extra help for students in years 5 to 7 who are struggling to meet literacy and numeracy benchmarks. We have further initiatives such as the recently announced 10 Turnaround Teams who will go into low SES schools and implement strategies to fix problems ranging from curriculum implementation to behaviour management. This will be trialled in Wide Bay from January next year, Moreton and Logan regions from July 2010 and other regions will be phased in from January 2011.

School audits will be conducted by 16 principals who will audit every state school in Queensland to identify gaps in curriculum, learning, teaching or social issues that may be affecting student achievement. This trial will start next month with a preliminary focus on low SES National Partnership schools in the first six months. From October, 80 literacy and numeracy coaches will work with teachers in the classroom to help them teach literacy and numeracy more effectively. Importantly, 30 curriculum advisers, that is, 15 QCAR English project officers and 15 QCAR maths project officers, will help schools implement solid curriculum plans to ensure all students are being taught what they need to know to reach milestones and meet benchmarks. There are a variety of other measures such as additional professional development for teachers, mandated teaching times for literacy and numeracy, graduate teacher testing and continuing practice for NAPLAN tests. I note that the Catholic education system and the independent schools system are also working very hard to improve their literacy and numeracy results, and we have seen some great results from them as well.

There will be huge opportunities and resources available for parents and I know all schools work hard to keep parents involved with their children to benefit their education. All of these initiatives require the support of the entire school community, but particularly the parents. I encourage the members of the QCPCA to continue their already acknowledged support of the work that Education Queensland does and to continue the partnership with us as we steer our young charges through their school years and prepare them for their post-schooling life.