WORDS Virginia Small

An alternative learning environment is turning the table on what academic achievement really means.

Drive past any Australian school and you’ll probably spot a sign at the front gate praising a student for a sport award or bragging about high academic results achieved by school leavers. These are praiseworthy milestones, but are they an accurate measure of achievement?

Dale Murray believes there is another way to measure school success and it has more to do with long-term results, rather than meeting short-term objectives and gaining awards.

Dale runs the Flexible Learning Centres for Edmund Rice Education. Prior to this, he taught in a mainstream high school.

His transition to another style of teaching began when he was invited to observe a new type of learning environment initiated by the Christian Brothers in Logan City, near Brisbane.

At the invitation of the Brothers, Murray attended what was then a drop-in centre for students from a nearby state school where he was considering a position as an English teacher. It was Easter 1988.

'I wrote my name on the whiteboard and one by one the class began to disappear,' says Dale. 'One (student) left through a window. When I turned around they were all out the back under a tree. When I followed them outside I was then told by one student, "You’ve got really no idea, have you?".'

The class of four boys and three girls invited Murray to go with them to take a look at their world.

'It was a level of poverty I never knew about,' he shares. 'I saw squats and couch surfers who were sitting in this really disgusting, filth-ridden place.'

It was from that point that he and his class built an understanding. 'I was completely taken by the level of complexity of these really young lives and their resilience.'

He started there as a teacher the following day, and has since led the growth of Flexible Learning Centres around the country. He is currently the Youth Plus Director of Edmund Rice Education Australia.

This role has seen him launch ten Flexible Learning Centres in Queenland, one in Geraldton (WA), one in Alice Springs (NT) and one in North Melbourne (Vic.). Another is proposed for Wollongong (NSW).

The centres focus on young people who have had troubled lives, or have struggled to fit into mainstream education.

The students may be homeless, victims of sexual abuse, or have undiagnosed mental illness. They may be living in families that are substance-affected or third generation unemployed. They may have had recurrent contact with the juvenile justice system. They may be young parents, or gay, lesbian or transgender.

According to Dale, some in foster care have been moved from one family to another. 'Some up to 20 times,' he says. Many of them experience what he calls 'the poverty this nation tends to hide.'

In this light, the role of teachers at the centres can be very different to those in the mainstream.

Moreover, the centres have no rules, instead emphasising the principles of respect, honesty, participation, and a safe and legal environment.

'Students have to commit to common ground', Dale explains. 'These precepts set the bar high and ask students to internalise their responsibility.' Most of them have learned to reject authority, he points out. Teachers have to be able to find a way to help them work within established frameworks.

They try to engage the students in the first place through an integrated curriculum. Dale gives as an example a 'sport maths' class he observed on the banks of the Todd River in Alice Springs, where students were throwing balls and measuring distances thrown and calculating ratios.

There are also cooking classes for families with diabetes, music studios, and outdoor education activities including rock climbing and wilderness walks.

The Flexible Learning Centres teach literacy and numeracy to try to fill the gaps in students' learning, as well as offering training and transition to VET courses. Staff members coordinate with state-based employment agencies in transitioning students to suitable employment or TAFE courses.

Some centres also have the Bridge Program, which aims to re-engage students who are in out-of-home care or caught in the juvenile justice system. The program involves constructing positive relationships with students and their families, supported by social and youth workers. This includes helping students learn to manage anger and talk about problems.

So how does Murray measure success in his students when they’re not being benchmarked with outcomes in the conventional sense?

The centres' 70 per cent attendance rate is one benchmark. 'I’m pretty comfortable with that,' Dale says humbly. He adds that many former students are still in contact with the centres and give feedback on how they are now managing their lives.

'Some attend, some blossom, some manage to stay out of jail, some learn to parent their newborn,' he reflects.

'My definition of success is a young person reaching their full ability, not accepting the structural nature of poverty because that’s where you found yourself. A sense of self is a much bigger measure of success.'

Comment  on this article