The Draft National Curriculum: A Model for Policy Feedback Online?

This morning, the draft K-10 National Curriculum opened for public feedback, comments, and discussion. This represents a significant improvement in large-scale online policy participation on an issue of wide appeal. And rightly so, as there are few families who will not be affected in some way by the standardisation of the K-10 curriculum.

Usually, I am not a fan of standardisation. But an issue which does need to be sorted out is the differences between states. And not just in the curriculum.

As a ten year old, I experienced the joy of moving to Queensland from NSW. I left NSW in Grade 5, and landed in Queensland in Grade 5. One sister left Grade 3 and landed in Grade 4, whereas another sister went from not being at school to being forced into school halfway through the first year. Different ideas about grades and commencement ages and so on played havoc during the foundational period of our education.

The curriculum was very different in a number of ways, too. The only real similarity was that we sang 'God Save the Queen' followed by 'Advance Australia Fair' with both the British and Australian flags unfurled every Monday morning. Our idea of the world was pretty much wrapped up in that weekly indoctrination process.

With the draft national curriculum up for feedback, I was quite concerned about how history will be taught. History is an important subject, but I was really worried that a particular view of history would be included to reinforce a nationalist idea of Australian identity.

By using the intuitive search functions, I was able to discover that my fears were unfounded. Although there are certain aspects of Australian history covered, this has not swamped other aspects of history. There is plenty of scope to broaden aspects of the history curriculum, but it does not resemble the Howardian view of Australian brain-washing that I envisaged.

Although there seems to be an ambiguous mix of copyright and Creative Commons 2.5, it is pleasing to see the use of the Creative Commons licensing in the online consultation portal.

The website is quite good, too. One feature of the National Curriculum website I like is that it requires you to provide your personal details and to login to view the content. I understand that feedback can be provided anonymously, but at least there is some control over how people participate.

Others might suggest that this is a bad thing. But I am fast being converted to the idea that if anyone is going to participate in public life, then their identity should be clear. Indeed, the anonymity of the Net is not as self-assured as it once was, as an 'anonymous' Perth reputation-slammer just found out.

Conversely, recent attempts to restrict political comment in South Australia were quickly terminated by a backlash of public opinion. But is political blogging the same as policy participation? I think not.

I argue that political blogging is more about the debates that occur before and after an item finds its way onto the policy agenda. But once an item is on the agenda, and indeed is about to be implemented, the rules need to change. Political bloggers and anonymous commentators can influence policy implementation and voters' decisions, but it makes little sense how anonymity is helpful when engaging in participation that is supposed to be meaningful.

Why? Well, it is one thing to live our private lives publicly (to paraphrase something I heard on the radio recently about social media), and another to actually participate in public life. Facebook are dealing with this problem right now.

But surely participation implies that others know who they are actually engaging with?

It might be appropriate for anonymity during the early stages of the policy cycle where a solution is being sought to a policy problem, but once an item is firmly being addressed by a particular policy, it makes little sense why anonymity should be required to take part in public debate.

Voting, surveys and opinion polls are obviously a different matter. And of course, journalism and 'the fourth estate' as means of keeping governments in check should not be confused with direct policy participation.

Clearly, there is a time and place for anonymity in the policy process. And there is certainly some way to go in enabling greater participation in deciding which policy problems find their way onto the policy agenda.

In short, the draft National Curriculum consultation provides a useful working model on how governments should enable public input on important policy issues. For me, the openness has allayed my fears of government-mandated history infiltrating primary and secondary education.

The opportunity to provide comments and feedback on the draft National Curriculum ends on 23 May 2010.

Staying up to date with broadband policy

I have been looking into open source applications which can provide a single page to preview the media releases from the major broadband policy actors. What I wanted was a start page where I could determine which links appear, and then share the page in a way that others could see the start page just as I did.

Applications such as Feedly tend to predetermine your preferences and are difficult to share. On the other hand,  Google Reader allows you to share feeds and updates in real time, but only as individual articles which are not 'sticky'. Fortunately, I have found a solution using an application called iFound.

iFound is useful as it enables me to add only the links I wish to monitor, and I can then share the link so others may do the same. It also provides a preview screen when you hover over each webpages' snapshot. The preview is large enough to identify any recent changes to the site.

I am hoping that my iFound page will enable me to keep up to date with the major policy actors in the broadband 'industry'. I am still updating it, and I intend to do the same for each country I compare. In the meantime, any comments or suggestions are most welcome.

Participation & Communications Policy

Things are certainly looking up when you receive an email linking to the Minister for Broadband's press release, and then when you visit the site, you are able to use the ShareThis functionality on the page to automatically blog about the press release.

See: Draft Legislation Released for NBN Co Operations | Senator Stephen Conroy | Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy

While there is still a long way to go, those interested in communications policy now have greater access to the policy process than in pre-Web 2.0 days. Nonetheless, it takes a great deal of discipline for the casual observer to keep abreast of issues as they arise.

For example, submissions on the Digital Dividend Green Paper close tomorrow. The submission guidelines are quite useful, especially the questions at the end of each section which provide some structure for potential submitters. But you would have to know that the Green Paper was being developed last year and that it opened for submissions in mid-January.

At least in theory, it would be quite possible for the non-expert to have their say in certain elements of the policy process. But industry knowledge is essential if you are to stay informed.

In addition, the available technologies make it possible for interested citizens to be involved, but the trick is to know how. A simple model for the casual observer is to subscribe to the Media Centre of the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, monitor items of interest which appear from time to time, and then note the deadlines for submissions where relevant.

It is hard to imagine how the average citizen could ever have been involved in such a process in a paper-based system. However, there is still some way to go.

Being able to comment on the Green Paper is fine, but what about being involved in the drafting of the Green Paper? One of the biggest problems with public consultation is that it often occurs after the important decisions have already been made.

There were opportunities to participate in the Green Paper process through industry groups such as AMTA (and I am sure there were others). But how can we monitor all that is going on. And, how can the casual observer do this for free?

I am finding Feedly quite useful to monitor numerous websites in an easy-to-follow format. But I am not aware of a convenient 'map' of the industry to help others do this. Ideally, I would like to see something like LobbyLens freely available to citizens for relevant industries.

Nevertheless, participation in communications policy means much more than writing submissions. But should  it be the government's responsibility to enable participation in detail? Creating accessible resources for interested participants may be the most important contribution citizens can make to the policy process. I am currently working on such an industry 'map' and will make it available in the coming weeks.