Funding schools

Q. Do you approve or disapprove of each of the following ideas for future funding of schools?

	Total approve	Total dis-approve		Strongly approve	Approve	Dis-approve	Strongly dis-approve	Don’t know		Total approve Jun 2015
Giving the states and territories full responsibility for all schools	42%	34%		12%	30%	24%	10%	23%		38%
Making states and territories fully responsible for funding public schools while the Federal Government funds non-government schools	29%	48%		8%	21%	25%	23%	22%		20%
Reducing Commonwealth involvement in schools, but without significant structural change	30%	41%		6%	24%	25%	16%	28%		28%
Making the Federal Government the main funder of all schools.	49%	27%		18%	31%	22%	5%	25%		51%
Means testing – charging high-income parents fees for children to attend public schools.	42%	40%		16%	26%	23%	17%	18%		37%

Nearly half of respondents (49%) approve of the proposal of “Making the Federal Government the main funder of all schools” and a nearly half (48%) reject the proposal of “Making states and territories fully responsible for funding public schools while the Federal Government funds non- government schools”.

They were split on “charging high-income parents fees for children to attend public schools“ – 42% approve/40% disapprove.

Since the question was asked in June last year, there has been an increase in approval for “Making states and territories fully responsible for funding public schools while the Federal Government funds non-government schools” from 20% to 29%.