The Department of Education is committed to delivering responsive services focused on equity and excellence for Queenslanders and their communities. In practice, this means enhancing education outcomes and investing in our people, infrastructure and technology.
Access to a quality kindergarten provides children with life changing benefits. In January 2024, our historic Free Kindy initiative commenced, providing every child, no matter their life circumstance, with quality early learning the year before Prep and delivering much needed cost of living relief to families across Queensland.
With demand for kindergarten increasing, our new Queensland Early Childhood Workforce Strategy sets out our initiatives to deliver a sustainable, qualified early childhood workforce who are recognised for their contribution to quality outcomes for children.
Throughout the year, we continued to see strong momentum implementing our education strategy, Equity and Excellence: realising the potential of every student (Equity and Excellence), with students benefiting from our focus on creating inclusive learning environments, promoting wellbeing and engagement, and monitoring learning progress to lift student outcomes. It is encouraging to see the strategy delivering improvements in English and Mathematics, increased attendance, strong Year 12 outcomes, and positive post-school destination results.
Being healthy, confident and resilient is a foundation for engaging in learning. Under our $106.7 million Student Wellbeing Package we continued to place General Practitioners (GPs), psychologists, and other wellbeing professionals in high schools to ensure students have access to support at school for their wellbeing. Building on the success of the GPs in Schools pilot, from 2024–25, health practitioners will also be based at 20 high-needs primary schools as part of the Queensland Government's Putting Queensland Kids First plan.
We also recognise that student engagement is essential to educational success. In 2023, we announced our $288 million Youth Engagement Education Reform Package delivering initiatives tailored to the diverse needs of our students. This package has already included the announcement of 34 new FlexiSpaces in schools across Queensland with a dedicated teacher and refurbishment funding, the commencement of 37 Intensive Education Case Managers working across the state, and 12 new Court Liaison Officers and field officers. A new Queensland Pathways State College campus in Toowoomba has also been delivered, with a new campus in Mount Isa to follow.
Literacy is an essential foundation for a student's educational journey. In 2024, we launched the Queensland Reading Commitment providing a consistent, evidence-informed approach to teaching reading. Teachers will focus on the vital components of reading in a logical order, so that our students can quickly move beyond learning the basics.
Through Equity and Excellence, we are embedding future-focused learning practices that connect students and teachers across Queensland. During the year, we established the Queensland Virtual Academy to provide students with access to a high-quality education no matter where they live. This builds on the rollout of network bandwidth upgrades supporting delivery of world-class modern education services.
Sustaining and strengthening the capability of our people was a major focus in 2023–24. We know that good teachers have a lasting impact on the lives of our students and through our new Education Futures Institute, we are delivering high-quality, targeted capability development at key career stages to embed a culture of professional excellence.
As workforce supply remains a challenge for all states and sectors, we are responding through our Teacher Attraction and Retention Workforce Action Plan 2023–2025. The plan identifies fit-for-purpose, contemporary and innovative workforce solutions that support the attraction, recruitment and retention of teachers. We have also commenced work on a comprehensive sector-wide workforce strategy, informed by a series of roundtables held by the Minister for Education, and began co-design of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Workforce Strategy 2024–2027, ensuring our workforce reflects the communities we serve.
In 2023–24, we continued delivering critical educational infrastructure to meet the needs of our diverse and growing communities. In addition to opening 2 new schools in Redland Bay and Bellbird Park, we enhanced our existing education facilities with $1.578 billion in upgrades or new construction.
On 18 December 2023, the government announced that the Office of Racing and the Office of Industrial Relations would leave the department and join the Department of State Development and Infrastructure. We welcomed the Honourable Dianne Farmer MP as the Minister for Education and Minister for Youth Justice.
Our achievements are the result of our committed staff across our state schools, regions and workplaces, working closely with stakeholders and communities across Queensland. The dedication and passion to lift child and student outcomes continues to drive equity and excellence across the state and I thank everyone for their ongoing commitment. I look forward to continuing to work collaboratively to support every child and young person to reach their potential.
Michael De’Ath
Director-General