'I was a teacher for 20 years. This is why I'm not sending my kids to mainstream school in 2026.'

Now that my five-year-old is about to start school, I've made a decision that shocks other parents: I won't send her to our local public primary school.

Not to any mainstream school, actually — public or private. You couldn't pay me to do it.

This isn't because our local school is failing. It's ranked in the state's "Top 100" schools. I even used to work there.

The problem? I know what really happens behind those impressive test scores.

Like most schools today, ours has become obsessed with academic data. Parents see high NAPLAN results and think "excellent school." But as a teacher who helped generate that data, I've seen the cost.

I want my daughter outside. Playing. Developing social skills. Building her attention span naturally. Problem-solving creatively. Thinking independently.

I'd rather her do that than become another data point in a school's KPI dashboard.

You might find this surprising, coming from an academic. But that's exactly why I know better.

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"We've gone backwards."

It's like Bill Gates refusing to give his kids smartphones until 14. He knew the dark side of his own industry.

I know the dark side of mine.

After 20 years teaching across multiple states — public and private schools — I can tell you Australian mainstream education isn't just failing our kids. We've gone backwards.

We are churning out test scores, more than individuals prepared for the rapidly shifting world. We've turned schools into data factories, and our children into the workers.

The curriculum expectations that teachers are required to meet have increased exponentially in the past decade. These extra demands on teachers are then assessed, reported to families and included in whole-school data analysis. This has shifted the way that subjects are taught and the day-to-day operations of schools.

Science experiments aren't about sparking curiosity anymore. There's no time for wonder. They're conducted purely for assessment data.

And while data might look flash from a parent perspective, what I've seen is the shift from schools that focus on helping kids, to schools that focus on improving data. And while all schools are doing both, the balance has shifted.

Sure, the data looks impressive on school websites.

But I've watched the shift happen in real time: from schools that prioritise helping kids grow, to schools that prioritise improving spreadsheets.

Here's an example: At the start of my career, Term 3 English meant one simple thing: writing stories.

The term would unfold organically. We would likely be interrupted by an excursion or two — where no 'work' or assessment would take place, no curriculum links would be ticked off, and the kids would have an excellent day out.

I still remember the Luna Park excursion where a seagull targeted one student's hair with remarkable precision. The entire class rallied around their mortified classmate, armed with wet wipes and solidarity. That moment of collective problem-solving and empathy? Pure gold.

By term's end, students had workbooks filled with stories. And honestly? All they'd remember was that bird poop incident and how they'd helped their mate through it.

I'd argue that they'd learn more in that one excursion than all of their English lessons combined.

Following where creativity led us.

We would also spend at least one lesson per week outside, half writing, half enjoying the sunshine. Often, we'd write poetry in these lessons and forget all about story writing. Because, why not? How wonderful to follow where creativity led us.

Special events regularly replaced lessons—no curriculum links required, no assessments attached. Just experiences worth having.

Some of the students' stories would be given stickers or stamps — whether they were completed or not. Students beamed with pride over their ideas, even when their pirate adventure somehow became a lunar expedition. The joy mattered more than the accuracy.

Over the course of their schooling, their writing would improve naturally, with feedback, maturity and occasional assessments. They would gain confidence through practise, with gentle adjustments over time. But what mattered more was that they had something to write about: the bird poop drama, for example.

Now, we focus on timed writing that satisfies marking criteria. We want students to be able to complete a story in 40 minutes (ready for NAPLAN).

We often focus on stories twice throughout the academic year, so that students are prepared for the NAPLAN writing assessment, in Term 1. To squeeze this in, we might drop poetry or minimise it, at least, because, well, it's not really tested.

Add onto that internal school assessments to track growth, ready for reports. We keep spreadsheets that track their individual achievement of skills. And we report on their progress, regularly. They self-assess, peer-assess and are teacher-assessed often. Almost no excursion or incursion occurs without direct curriculum links and some explicit learning tied to it.

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We guide students through marking grids, assigning grades to their creativity. Some of these grades are reported home. Others are inputted into spreadsheets to track growth. And regardless of what we tell ourselves: we do not write stories for pleasure or to improve writing skills – we write them to improve results.

We are data driven, whether we admit it or not. Whether we like it or not.

At the start of my career, I spent nights in front of the TV cutting out pictures from magazines, to use as story stimuli for my English lessons.

In 2025, teachers spend nights marking student stories with marking grids, collating data ready for the next data collection analysis meeting, or uploading grades to online reporting systems, preparing end-of-term reports.

While students write stories in class, I roam to correct them and take photos to post on digital platforms.

I tell them to "stay on task" because "you've only got ten more minutes before it's time to proofread" or "this story will be used in your portfolio to be assessed for your next assessment."

And it isn't just me.

This is the nature of most Australian primary schools in 2025. They are fast-paced, data-focused and results-driven. We've systematically scheduled out the bird poop moments.

So, where am I sending my daughter?

To a school that doesn't fit this mould. The school is small. Their NAPLAN results don't "rank highly" and they are not concerned about this, at all.

They go outside a lot. Students do not regularly sit at desks. Most importantly, children progress at their own pace, rather than according to the standardised expectations of NAPLAN or A-E grading.

Feature Image: Getty.