Noel Pearson Speeches, Writings and Media on Education

More than 700 educators from across the nation have convened for compelling webinar titled ‘The Power of Direct Instruction’, presented by founder and director of Good to Great Schools Australia (GGSA), Noel Pearson.

5 July 2024

On Wednesday, June 19, 2024, Noel Pearson presented a compelling webinar on Direct Instruction. Hosted by McGraw Hill Australia in collaboration with Good to Great Schools Australia (GGSA), the event was titled The Power of Direct Instruction and featured insights from GGSA’s founder and director, Noel Pearson.

19 June 2024

Video of Noel Pearson’s address to the First Nations Brilliance Conference in November 2023, where he outlines indigenous education success in Cape York.

November 2023

The academic and passionate advocate for back-to-basics teaching used a speech at a Canberra education conference to exhort the explicit teaching approach that favours clear direction from teachers over student-led learning.

30 January 2023

The escalating waves of alcohol-fuelled mayhem on the streets of Alice Springs can be explained, in part, by education authorities’ abandonment of the Indigenous underclass and their rejection of evidence-based theories of teaching, activist, lawyer and intellectual Noel Pearson says.

30 January 2023

Mr Pearson issued the warning that a failure to rethink the education system threatens to “fail children” and “destroy lives”, particularly for those coming from disadvantaged backgrounds in the keynote address at the Archdiocese of Canberra & Goulburn Catholic Education system day.

30 January 2023

The steadfast refusal of systems and educators to accept evidence and implement change is failing children and destroying lives, according to the Indigenous leader and chairman of non-profit Good to Great Schools Australia Noel Pearson.

31 January 2023

Good to Great Schools Australia founder Noel Pearson has delivered a powerful address to the National Boys Education Conference 2023 held on 9 October 2023 at The Kings School in Sydney.

1 November 2023

In his fourth lecture, Noel Pearson addresses the educational barriers facing young Indigenous people, and the critical need to raise literacy and numeracy rates through transformational school programs.

27 November 2022

Noel Pearson delivered the PMSA annual leadership lecture with a speech entitled Australia in 2041.

20 April 2021

Mr Pearson provided a pre-recorded speech and was as captivating as ever as he credited Catholic Education Tasmania and Catholic Education Canberra and Goulburn for their work within the Science of Learning through their respective projects, Insight and Catalyst.

6 April 2023

Indigenous leader Noel Pearson says teachers in Australia’s most remote schools are not properly equipped to ­provide the quality teaching that disadvantaged students need, arguing that the country’s educational establishment has thrown the challenge in the “too hard basket”. .

16 May 2021

Noel Pearson: Rather than letting teachers teach, states and territories are delivering social constructivist pedagogies that leave students behind.

12 March 2021

Noel Pearson is resolute: we “need no more evidence” about what constitutes effective teaching pedagogy – we have known for 50 years what works in the classroom.

15 June 2021

Addressing the Centre for Independent Studies, Noel Pearson outlines his insights and observations from decades of experience supporting education in remote majority Indigenous schools and communities.

8 July 2021

Video recording of Noel Pearson’s address to the Centre for Independent Studies, Pearson outlines his insights and observations from decades of experience supporting education in remote majority Indigenous schools and communities.

8 July 2021

Noel Pearson: One of the most important papers on the subject of student learning was published this week explaining a complex subject as clear as a bell. University of NSW Emeritus Professor John Sweller wrote a paper for the Centre for Independent Studies ­entitled Why Inquiry-based Approaches Harm Students’ Learning. If you are a parent with questions about the progress of your child at school, I urge you to read this paper. Then take it to your child’s teacher and principal and ask them whether they are using inquiry-based learning with your child, and show it to them. If you are a teacher using inquiry-based learning, you should definitely read this paper. If you have concerns about the progress of your students, this paper will be a revelation if you are prepared to consider it. If you are satisfied with their progress, the implication of Sweller’s research is that they could be making much more progress when you consider the evidence that favours explicit instruction above inquiry learning.

14 August 2021

In the journal article Did DI do it, Guenther and Osborne(2020) compare schoolwide NAPLAN reading scale scores for 25 Very Remote Indigenous schools implementing Direct Instruction through the LRS program, to assert the program has not improved literacy outcomes. Good to Great Schools Australia (GGSA) undertook an analysis of the same school data for Reading, Writing, Spelling and Grammar and Punctuation scores. Our findings contradict theirs, showing significant growth in all NAPLAN literacy areas.

27 November 2020

Addressing a range of stakeholders at the launch of Literacy for Remote Schools in Western Australia in 2019, Noel Pearson outlines Good to Great Schools Australia’s approach to explicit instruction and school reform.

2019

Noel Pearson: This gap won’t close until black fellas take charge of our lives and governments allow

and enable us to do so with their support

17 February 2018

Noel Pearson speech at the commencements of the Literacy in Remote Schools program in Darwin.

28 March 2017

Indigenous leader Noel Pearson has defended his education model and says he’s astounded the closure of Aurukun’s school is being used as “a scapegoat” for policing and law and order problems.

27 May 2016

Noel Pearson: The Queensland government has the commendable practice of regularly presenting data- quarterly and annually – in a transparent way on important social indicators in indigenous communities. The third stage of reform is to provide high-quality primary education to community children and make sure they continue to high-quality secondary education.

18 December 2010

Noel Pearson speech at the commencements of the Literacy in Remote Schools program.

10 June 2015

Noel Pearson welcomes John Hollingsworth and Silvia Ybarra to the DataWORKS Explicit Direct Instruction (EDI) training and program launch in Perth, Australia in January 2015.

8 April 2015

Submission by Cape York Partnership to the Deloitte Access Economics review into disability policy in Queensland state schools being conducted for the Queensland Government.

24 October 2016

Noel Pearson is calling on governments to overhaul the way truancy is dealt with and insisting on much more ambitious targets to improve indigenous education.

21 February 2009

In this essay Radical Hope, one of Australia’s most original and provocative thinkers turns his attention to the question of education. Noel Pearson begins with two fundamental questions: How to ensure the survival of a people, their culture and way of life? And can education transform the lives of the disadvantaged many, or will it at best raise up a fortunate few?

September 2009

Pearson argues powerfully that underclass students, many of whom are Aboriginal, should receive a rigorous schooling that gives them the means to negotiate the wider world. He examines the long-term failure of educational policy in Australia, especially in the indigenous sector, and asks why it is always “Groundhog Day” when there are lessons to be learned from innovations now underway.

2009