Parents lack life skills, means, time: Stanley

ONE in five Australian parents are poor caregivers because they don't have the means or life skills, child health expert Professor Fiona Stanley says.

she said many others could not devote enough time to their kids because of excessive job commitments.

"If we don't respond to these challenges ... we will be looking at our generation, my generation, as being the last generation that lives longer than its parents," Prof Stanley said.

"If you look at the overall trend in many problems, they are actually showing no improvement and some of them are getting dramatically worse."

Mental illness, obesity, asthma and substance abuse were the biggest health risks for Australian kids.

"Family life has changed a lot," Prof Stanley said.

"You've got more hours of work, you've got more women working, but without men, or the business world or government, actually coming forward with really good childcare.

"So who's responsible for the children when a high proportion of women are working?

"That's been very detrimental to children."

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Education forum: focus on employability?

Education researchers say developing a student's employability skills are just as important as teaching them how to read and write.

[But more students would be even more employable if they could equally get the social skills they need to get a job after leaving school and to stay employable. That is just as important as teaching them how to read and write. If one misses that opportunity, then 5 per cent of them fall over. People with social skills are more cooperative and have more respect for each other. Therefore learn more, take fewer risks and use fewer resources. People with social skills will stay in the job longer.]

The annual Australian Council for Educational Research conference is being held in Brisbane over the next two days.

The council's Professor Geoff Masters says he wants to see national minimum benchmarks set for high school students.

"The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Business Council of Australia have called for greater emphasis to be placed on what they're calling employability skills, and they are things like communication, problem solving, planning and organising, teamwork, developing skills for life," he said.

"What we're hoping for today is to start a conversation nationally about what we should expect every student to achieve, what are the basics, how can we set minimum expectations for all students.

"It is our belief that a significant proportion of students are getting through the school system and not meeting basic standards."

Quote: What about a greater emphasis on social skills? They are things like communication, conflict resolution, self preservation, street wise, vulnerability, self-worth, self presentation, efficacy, mentoring. Because up to three generations of parents don't have social skills to pass on to their children. Corporate interests already reap from the academics but what about the tens of millions spent on the 5 per cent of people who don't make it? The money spent on those people make up a very large sum of taxpayer’s money spent on police, prisons, courts, hospitals, the morgue, and the victim industry. Those 5 per cent of children don't get a life or become a corporate asset if they don't make it!

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Hillsong hits schools with beauty gospel

EVERY Tuesday afternoon during the first term at Matraville Sports High School, a group of young women take part in classes intended to boost their self-esteem. Some have personal problems, others have behavioural issues, while a few simply go because their friends do.

For the next two hours they learn a range of skills including how to put on make-up, do their hair and nails, and walk with books balanced on their heads.

The program, called Shine, was created by the Hillsong Church. It is being run in at least 20 NSW public schools, numerous small community organisations and within the juvenile justice system.

Hillsong describes Shine as a "practical, life-equipping, values-based course" and its website is awash with glowing testimonials from young women whose lives have been improved by learning about "being a good friend" and "learning about myself".

But serious concerns have been raised by teachers, adolescent developmental experts and parents groups. They say the program is inappropriate for troubled young women, that the under-qualified facilitators are reinforcing gender stereotypes. and that some parents have not been properly informed.

Shine was originally developed by the CityCare arm of Hillsong as an explicitly religious program. The church says it is now "community-based, not religious-based" but, as recently as 2005, promotional material referred to young women's "created uniqueness".

"Through skin care, natural make-up, hair care, nail care girls discover their value and created uniqueness," the material says.

The term has been omitted from more recent material but the beauty classes remain, as do etiquette and deportment lessons.

The program has set alarm bells ringing for psychologists such as Dianna Kenny, an adolescent development expert at the University of Sydney. "They are essentially saying you are not appropriate as you are and we're going to show you how to be appropriate," Professor Kenny said.

"We don't have control of our physical characteristics. To emphasise that takes away from the autonomy of people as individual human beings. That runs completely contrary to what we know about adolescent development.

"We do want our young people to feel good about themselves, but what [they] need is help from professional counsellors."

[Not just professional counsellors. Parents, professional educators, mentors with wisdom that can teach Social Skills and LiFe Skills that include Communication, Conflict Resolution, Self-Worth, Street Wise. When the corporate media say professional counsellors it's just a shit fight about professional counsellors versus sects for the corporate dollars $$$$$. But the community has other ideas... and that is that the community is responsible. Not just for professional credentials but also for learning from past mistakes. People who have failed also have a deep insight and input into thinking, adjusting, surviving, crime prevention, and having fun. We all have an investment in society and we can all think for ourselves.]

Most of the facilitators who deliver Shine in Sydney classrooms have no university counselling qualifications, although Hillsong says they must have some qualifications or experience.

In some schools, Matraville Sports High included, the program is run by careers or physical education teachers. At other schools, including Alexandria Park, Glenwood and Cheltenham Girls, it is run by young recruits from Hillsong's leadership college.

Schools pay Hillsong to run the program, with parents asked to pay for books and materials such as hair spray and make-up.

"Over the last two or three years teachers have been coming to us with concerns about Shine," said the president of the Hills Teachers Association, Sui-Linn White. "It is the gender stereotypes that they are imposing. The focus on skin care, nail care, hair care - it objectifies women … These are things women fought against for centuries - they've got no place in a public school."

One teacher from a Hills district school, who asked not to be named, said Shine facilitators had run activities that undermined other teachers. "They were asking the kids to talk about which of the teachers they didn't like."

He said parents may not have been properly informed. "I don't know whether the parents, knowing what we know now, would have put their kids in. I don't know whether the school would have hired them in the first place."

Parents groups from Queensland and the Northern Territory have complained that their schools have tried to sneak Shine in almost unnoticed.

"In our view, this is a way of getting religion into schools through subterranean means," said one parent, Hugh Wilson. "The principal or the chaplain decides it's a good idea and, next thing you know, your kids are being taught about make-up by the Hillsong Church."

The church says parents have been overwhelmingly supportive of the program.

Quote: These sects are a bi-product of the John Howard, Family First type government. Family First is a party associated with religious votes like in the USA or God won't help you? This is just indoctrination of children to hold a belief other than their own thinking which is very dangerous. All children need to learn social skills to reduce their vulnerability to all manor of things including the influence of sects and greed.