By Matilda Crosbie, Mietta Symmons-Joyce and Kahlil Grocott
Young people are rarely included in decisions that will shape the future, despite being the ones who will inherit the consequences. As Community Associates at Learning Creates Australia, we were excited to buck this trend by hearing from more than 100 young people about their experiences as learners and their hopes and concerns for the future.
Looking ahead to Australia’s education future
The Future Teacher Future Leader initiative, delivered by the Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership (AITSL), explores what the future could hold for Australian education. AITSL gathered perspectives from a range of stakeholders to develop four plausible scenarios for how Australia’s F-12 education could evolve by 2040. These scenarios can now support strategic decision-making on approaches and policies shaping Australia’s education systems.
We worked with AITSL to ensure young people’s perspectives helped shape the future scenarios. We engaged 103 young people aged 18-22, representing independent and government schooling experiences. Participants included recent school-leavers, tertiary and vocational students, pre-service teachers and those pursuing alternative pathways.
What’s shaping our future?
Here are five key issues young people raised with us repeatedly:
Accelerating technology
Young people warned that AI and other digital technologies are being centralised within our education systems faster than we can discern. Participants flagged opportunities too, particularly in allowing rural students to access specialised subjects. Other participants expressed deep concern over “outsourcing thinking” to AI, and the power that tech companies could wield over schools. “The whole practice of targeting vulnerable children and exploiting them… they lose their critical thinking, they lose their opinions and voices,” said one participant.
Deepening inequality and social fragmentation
Young people highlighted massive disparities in the Australian education system, particularly regarding resources and a rural-metro divide. “My last school was very much at the mercy of what funding they would receive,” one participant said. Rural students said they hadn’t always recognised their disadvantages, including missing out on camps or specialist subjects, until they moved to metropolitan areas. Young people also flagged a perceived stigma against non-ATAR pathways, and an over-emphasis on ATARs as the metric of success. “I feel like there’s only one standard of success in high school academically, and that is getting a good ATAR,” a participant shared with us.
Living among crises
Young people are not only aware of climate change and global instability, they are also increasingly living with the direct social, emotional, and ecological impacts. Participants spoke of climate change and resource scarcity as an existential threat that “could actively destroy the planet”, making this a higher priority for some than individual wellbeing. Some participants also pointed to the fuel crisis and corresponding cost of living crisis as directly impacting student mental health and their ability to focus on their education.
The future of work
Participants said they viewed the job market as increasingly unstable, requiring students to be more adaptable. Young people said the traditional pathways to “success” followed by previous generations no longer existed, or at least no longer led to financial security and wellbeing. Participants also raised their perspectives on a workforce funnel of schooling that did not necessarily prepare them as citizens. “There’s a purpose at the start… creating a human being. And then at some point that becomes creating a grade machine.”
Young people as co-leaders
With student agency largely ignored in traditional education systems, school leaders must understand that co-designed futures can lead to better outcomes. Young people who said they were engaged with decisions described their roles ranging from “tick box” consultants to genuine co-designers who felt they could influence their learning. One participant shared how a student-led proposal changed how a subject was delivered across the state, proving that centering young people’s perspectives can influence real change.
Looking forward
When we asked young people about the future they hoped to shape, at times, they painted a hopeful picture. They spoke of a shift away from “institutional” schooling toward a model where schools are intergenerational centres that integrate local community expertise and solve real-world problems. “A focal point of the community,” one participant explained. “Instead of just being like, kids go there, kids come back… it’s community involvement more, like volunteering and working across different relationships.” They also hoped to see an education system where student success is predicated on fully-funded support for basic needs and mental health and wellbeing.
It was a privilege to engage with young people on this project, and to help embed their perspectives into AITSL’s Future Teacher Future Leader initiative.
