Let me dream! Transforming educational futures : some comments on the education of Maltese background students in Australia

Abstract

The issue of under achievement in schooling has been a major concern for educators in recent decades. Yet, despite the work that has been done on this issue, there has been little progress made in addressing the problem, to the extent that significant groups of students still fail to flourish intellectually in school environments. Moreover, whether we are looking at the United States, Europe, or Australia, working class students, students of ethnic minority background and girls, are still over represented in the figures on early school leavers. Of course, we need to be careful about treating these groups as simple and homogenised categories. In looking at the issue of schooling, we also need to recognise the complex and dynamic relationships between class, gender and ethnicity and how these factors combine to determine life chances.