Mansfield State School

Location: Brisbane, Queensland

Mansfield SS has a stable enrolment pattern of over 900 students. 20 per cent of its students were born overseas in 44 different countries, many of them coming to Australia from India, South Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand and the Philippines. Many students whose first language is not English require additional English language support. Mansfield has a small percentage (around 2%) of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students.

How Mansfield has used its Gonski funding

Mansfield State School received approximately $720,000 in Gonski funding in 2015 and 2015.

Mansfield has invested in additional teaching staff and teacher aide support for English language and literacy, numeracy and Information and Communications Technology programs, increased levels of quality professional development for staff, and quality new resources to support its new programs and initiatives.

A part-time teacher has also been employed to develop Gifted and Talented programs across the school, and a particular focus of Gonski expenditure has been on increased investment in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) programs and equipment and digital learning.

How Gonski funding has made a difference for students

Mansfield’s principal, Bronwyn Campbell, says the benefits of the additional funding cannot be underestimated. The school has been able to give much greater individual support to students and reduce class sizes.

It has also done what the principal calls “investing in its people” by providing more professional development, and inspiring and training teachers in STEM areas to give students more opportunities.

Ms Campbell says that “investing additional funding in professional learning and developing a school’s ‘people resources’ is essential as in the long run they are the most meaningful resource a school has.” She believes that all schools should be resourced at levels which enable them to “be the best they can be in every way because we can’t afford to let one Australian child down”.

What Mansfield could do with Gonski in the future

With the full six years of Gonski funding Mansfield would expand the individual support offered to students and reduce class sizes, provide additional teacher professional development, increase its investment in inspiring and training teachers in the areas of science and maths to broaden student opportunities, and improve digital learning through increased teacher training and provision of digital resources.