Supporting Social Research

"Since 1995, full-time jobs for older Australians have risen by more than one million but declinded by 14,000 for teenagers and 52,000 for young adults."

Asia-Studies Full-text Online is a comprehensive database for research on the Asia-Pacific region. The database brings together full-text reports covering over 50 countries on many governmental, economic, and social issues. Subjects covered include, trade, finance environment, human resources development, media, best practices in government, resources, tourism, education and women's studies. Annual statstistical overviews are also included from the database.

A new report released by the Public Education Alliance'Making Federalism Work for Schools: Due Process, Transparency, Informed Consent' by Dr Lindsay Connors is now available from the New South Wales Teachers Federation website. The report covers issues relating to funding, disadvantage, federal arrangements for schools and the need to reform these arrangements.

Recently released reports and papers have again put teaching and education in the media spotlight. The Future of Schooling in Australia – a report by Australia's States and Territories produced by the Council for the Australian Federation, reviews the Adelaide Declaration on National Goals for Schooling in the Twenty-First Century. The report includes sections on benchmarking, challenges to schools in 2007 and action plans for varied aspects of schooling and educatiion.
The Australian Council of State School Organisations (ACSSO) has just released the first paper of the Blueprint for Tomorrow's Schools.. The paper entitled Paper One: Training and Professional Development includes discussion on merit based incentives for teachers.

The Federal budget papers 2007-08 are available online www.budget.gov.au . You can also download budget papers via the Library catalogue, or one of the several official mirror sites. These include the Department of Finance and Administration, Australian Taxation Office, National Library of Australia and the Parliament of Austalia
The Budget website includes all documents relating to the budget including the Budget Overview, Budget Speech and Budget at a Glance.