ABSTRACT
This conclusion presents some closing thoughts on the concepts covered in the preceding chapters of this book. The book focuses on how public schools are being forced to change in the current context, and the toxic effects of such changes – implying that there are some central features of public education which are worth defending. It describes that there are many similarities, and many differences, in developments in public schooling between and across the Australian States and Territories and other countries. The book explores the publicness of public education, starting with the normative idea of the public good, establishing the implications for public schools, and then arguing that current policy directions are resulting in an ‘un-public’ education. It argues that binaries of public and private comprise an analytical dualism which is unhelpful. The book also describes how neoliberal policy reform has played out idiosyncratically in countries such as Sweden, England, New Zealand and the United States.
