ABSTRACT
A major impetus for the current major reconsideration of general education in Australia has been the changing situation with respect to employment and, in particular, the very high incidence of youth unemployment. The paper looks briefly at major periods of change in Australian education and concludes that the current situation will bring changes at least as significant as those in any period of Australian history.
While there is substantial agreement on the need for change, there are still major differences as to the proper directions. It is clear that one effect of recent changes will be greatly to increase the retention of pupils in secondary education. This change will make even more crucial the nature of the programmes to be provided in secondary education. While one pressure is for the period of general education to be more vocational and more practical, this is seen as an incidental response even in terms of vocational needs. Two other types of role are seen as being as important as the vocational role itself, and the implications of these are developed.
