One in 10 teaching students is failing Year 9-standard literacy and numeracy tests and new figures reveal that academic standards have slipped for a third year running.
The Conservative Party sees this as further evidence that the billions of extra dollars the federal government is throwing at education funding are not working.
The results from the 2018 Literacy and Numeracy Test for Initial Teacher Education Students, released to The Australian under Freedom of Information legislation, revealed that 9.6 per cent of participants did not meet the required standard for literacy and 10 per cent did not meet the standard for numeracy.
The proportion of those who passed the test, LANTITE, was lower than in 2017, when 92 per cent met the literacy and numeracy standard, and in 2016, when the pass rate was as high as 95 per cent.
The test, which can be sat at any time during the degree, is designed to ensure that graduating teachers possess literacy and numeracy skills akin to the top 30 per cent of the population.
The concerning results are likely to fuel calls for universities to boost the entry requirements for teacher education courses, which have declined in recent years. The latest report from the Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership, released late last year, revealed that nearly 40 per cent of teaching undergraduates had scored a tertiary admission rank below 70.
The LANTITE test was rolled out in 2015 by the federal government to combat the lowering of academic standards required of students entering into teaching courses. Students are required to pass the test prior to graduation and before they can register for employment as a teacher.
However, critics say the test doesn't set a particularly high bar (the standard required for passing is roughly equivalent to a Year 9 level of literacy and numeracy) and students can resit the test three times, or up to five times if they can demonstrate extenuating circumstances.
The Department of Education declined to release a breakdown of results for each university. However, last year some universities had up to 25 per cent of students fail the test.
