`New' literacies for `new' times? Shaping literacy curricula for the post-compulsory years.

This paper considers tensions associated with constructing literacy curricula for students in the post-compulsory years of schooling, where discourses of work, higher education and school accreditation jostle for prominence. Using an Australian state as example, the paper demonstrates how students are channelled towards different versions of English literacy in the senior secondary school, and how literacy curricula become complicit in the hierarchical sorting and streaming of young adult learners. Students seeking immediate post-school employment are offered a literacy program which emphasises practical, routine literacy skills and procedures, whereas students preparing for higher education entry are offered a curriculum which emphasises public, formal, theoretical analysis and imaginative and creative language play. The paper argues that post-compulsory students need access to a literacy repertoire that extends beyond such simple differentiation: a flexible and intelligent repertoire of literacy practices that prepares students for the changing and dynamic face of contemporary literate practice.

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In this paper I consider how English literacy has been defined and appropriated by various discourses operating in the post-compulsory schooling arena. Although the paper will consider in particular the situation that applies in one Australian state--Queensland--the issues that I raise are relevant throughout Australia. My argument is that the English literacy curricula that have been developed in Queensland for post-compulsory learners reflect the tensions of being drawn from a set of potentially oppositional discourses, as concerns for workplace relevancy jostle with traditional concepts of secondary school curriculum. Literacy at this post-compulsory level has become a highly contested and politically charged arena where the nature and purpose of post-compulsory schooling become of critical concern, and where literacy practices become complicit in the social differentiation of young adult learners in terms of economic and social privilege.

The result is unfortunate for young adult learners (and for their parents and carers), who need to make curriculum choices that will have profound effects upon their post-schooling lives. What comes to count as literacy at this level matters. It matters what literacy repertoire young adults have access to, to buffer them in their post-schooling lives. It matters whether or not they exit school with an acceptable form of `literacy' certification or accreditation. And it matters whether they understand how various constructions of literacy will be used hierarchically to stream and sift and sort them, not only in their schooling lives, but also in their future workplace, family and community lives.

Policy construction is always a pragmatic discursive endeavour. The production of the policy text is directly linked to its institutional and cultural contexts (Fairclough, 1989): to the voices who have been positioned to `speak'; to the knowledges allowed and valued; to the political and social agendas of government departments. And the production of literacy policy texts is particularly problematic. Literacy, as Hodgens, Green, and Luke (1996) remind us, is a `highly volatile and political term'.

   Literacy is the point at and around which interest groups stake powerful
   claims on schooling in general and the curriculum in particular. It is a
   key point at which media opinion--and with it, public opinion--comes to
   bear on schooling. (p. 10)

In this paper I plan to scrutinise the assumptions that underlie literacy syllabus construction for post-compulsory learners: to examine how syllabus documents attempt to build a coherent story about literacy, and the literate subject for whom they are designed, and how these stories and subjectivities then become politically and socially significant in young adults' futures. In particular, I want to unravel the possibilities of construction of various literacy syllabuses in the post-compulsory years in Queensland. Why, for example, has Queensland developed the particular literacy syllabus hierarchy that it has: a choice for post-compulsory learners between a university-endorsed, mainstream core English syllabus or a workplace-endorsed English Communication syllabus? How has literacy been appropriated by different agendas here? And what does such a hierarchy indicate about assumed futures for students and about the differentiation of literate knowledge in terms of class and economic privilege?

Constructing literacy curricula for post-compulsory learners: Queensland as a case study

At present, students in their post-compulsory years in Queensland secondary schools make a literacy curricular choice at the end of Year 10 (age 15) which is predominantly based on their assumed post-school destinations. They either choose a core English literacy subject, which explicitly promotes the study of how language works in particular social and cultural contexts, and engages students in formal, analytic literacy tasks; or they choose a workplace-based Communication literacy syllabus, which emphasises functional, operational and vocational uses of literacy in workplace settings. More significantly, the choice they make has implications for their post-school options. The functional, operational and vocational literacy syllabuses are not designed for direct higher education access. The choice becomes initially a choice of post-school destination: higher education or the workplace.

Students considering direct university entrance in Queensland must take two years study (four semesters) of the core tertiary entrance subject, English. In addition, these students can take an English Extension subject--Literature--in their final year (this is a one-year, two-semester, exit course). Students who have completed four semesters of English are eligible for an Overall Position (OP) number, which is used for determining university entrance.

Students, however, who decide they do not want the option of going to a tertiary institution directly from school, choose from the right hand side of Table 1: a subject from the English Communication Study Area, or the Literacy and Numeracy Study Area. However these two right-hand side study areas will not count towards a tertiary entrance score. They consist predominantly of vocational communication modules, and are intended as an alternative English program to tertiary entrance English. Although the English Communications syllabus advises schools to build more general units of work around the vocational workplace modules, and to make school programs more broadly focused, the main focus of the syllabus is its workplace potential.

More than three-quarters of Queensland state high schools now offer, in addition to tertiary entrance English, some version of an alternative `English' or Communication subject like those in Table 1, although, as the figures in Table 2 indicate, numbers of students enrolled in these alternative forms of `English' are still quite small and are noticeably gendered.

Whereas females outnumber males in English enrolments--and strongly outnumber them in the extension subject Literature--males outnumber females by 2 to 1 in the alternative workplace literacy curricula.

Building a literacy hierarchy

These curricular choices available to post-compulsory learners in Queensland inevitably result in the construction of a literacy hierarchy where different literacies are made available to different cohorts of students. And class is strongly implicated in the differentiation of these two cohorts, as Fullarton and Ainley's (2000) analysis of the background characteristics of Year 12 students who select vocational education subjects as part of their schooling demonstrates (p. 37).

In simplistic terms, students aiming for higher education are seen to need English studies, and to have an option on Literature studies. On the other hand, students headed for the workforce--often working-class students from government schools--are seen to need Communication studies and workplace training modules. Students are provided with different literacies, dependent upon their perceived post-school options, and, indirectly, their access to socioeconomic privilege (Lamb & Ball, 1999). As a result, there is a clustering of values, skills, knowledges and attitudes around the two forms of literacy.

Cultural privilege, intellectualism and ideological critique can be identified with the left-hand side English syllabus in Table 1, whereas workplace competency, instrumentalism and operational compliancy are more readily identified with the right-hand side English Communication syllabus. This can be seen to some extent in an examination of the 'Aims' of the English and the English Communication syllabus texts (see Appendix), and in a subsequent consideration of the student 'subjects' constructed through these two documents.

The aims for both syllabuses bear some similarities. Both are concerned with `lifelong learning'; both emphasise participation in the diversity of Australian culture; both aim to develop knowledge, understanding and appreciation of language. However there are some subtle yet significant differences in the discourses that both syllabuses draw upon to develop their full set of aims. The literate subject constructed by the Senior Syllabus in English is aligned with literary discourses, and with cultural heritage models of English education (Freebody & Gilbert, 1999). Students' `engagement with worlds real and imagined' and `identification with characters, places, events and experiences in texts' are emphasised. In addition, the Senior Syllabus in English constructs a literate student who will develop a `fascination' for language and `enjoyment' in its use, and engage in `critical reflection' on the ways in which language is used. There is an emphasis upon language for entertainment and leisure--and a silence about language in the workplace. This literate subject is located within traditional English discourses.

By comparison, the discourses from which the English Communication subject is drawn suggest some important differences. Literary discourses are silent, as are traditional discourses about the curriculum subject, `English'. The literate subject at the heart of the English Communication syllabus is located within practical, functional discourses of language in use. The syllabus aims make special mention of developing in students `skills, knowledge and understanding to communicate appropriately and effectively', and refer to the knowledge and skills needed to `plan and work as members of a group and to accept responsibility for the outcomes of the group'. The aim of this syllabus is to produce a literate subject who can work collaboratively and co-operatively with others, using appropriate and effective language. The aim of the Senior Syllabus in English, by comparison, is to produce a literate subject who engages in solitary encounters with texts, and who can engage in critical reflection and discussion on the ways in which language is used.

This differential construction of literate subjectivities flows through from the aims of the documents into several other aspects of the syllabus construction. Consider, for instance, these different ways of referring to technology in the body of the policy documents. While the English syllabus students are encouraged to `use and critique current and emerging technologies' (Board of Senior Secondary School Studies (BSSSS), 1999e, p.5), the Communications workplace students are encouraged to become competent in 'operating and adjusting communication equipment' (BSSSS, 1999c, p.34).

This division in terms of intellectual, theoretical work and physical, practical work, can be seen in the general domains of subject matter covered by the two documents. The English subject is inserted into a literacy syllabus, which claims to expect, for example:

* use of language for increasingly complex purposes;

* textual study of a set of literary texts (to include a range of analytical, expository and aesthetic prose; drama texts [in most cases one Shakespearean play]; and 20-30 poems);

* preparation of formal analytical writing assessment tasks that are anywhere from 600 to 1000 words in length.

This is in marked comparison to the English Communication student, whose primary focus is likely to be a series of Workplace Communication modules, which demand up to 160 hours of time in a 220-hour program of study. These workplace modules comprise a series of learning outcomes statements which call for `simple', `routine' tasks of no specific length, completed in relatively informal settings. For example, consider these four learning outcomes for NCS001: Workplace Communication (a 40-hour module which is core to English Communication Strands A and B):

LO1: Gather, record and convey simple and routine information.

LO2: Give and follow simple and routine instructions.

LO3: Participate in small informal work groups.

LO4: Deal with clients about simple, routine matters.

The two syllabus documents clearly draw upon different discourses in their construction and, in so doing, construct different human subjects at the centre of their texts. The subject at the centre of the English syllabus becomes linked with formal, analytical literacy tasks--studying literature, critiquing texts, constructing complex written texts. This subject is not located in the language practices of the workplace or of daily social communication. This subject is engaged in studying language for its own sake: not for instrumental, functional and practical purposes. By comparison, the English Communication student is linked with practical, functional literacy tasks, focusing oil the satisfactory completion of workplace texts and purposes. Oppositional paradigms, like those constructed in Table 3, are implicit in the construction of the two curriculum documents.

Both syllabus constructions here are problematic in their narrowness. The English student, for example, is positioned in an individualistic, solitary, theoretical, intellectual exploration of literacy and literate practice, and assessed predominantly in terms of formal, public analytical writing competence. Literary texts are high status texts; analytical prose is high status competence; individual achievement is preferred to collaborative production. It is not surprising that many students would claim to find such a syllabus experience irrelevant, uninteresting, and imprisoning (see Teese, 1999)--and that one in six students fail to achieve a `sound' level of achievement in the subject (BSSSS, 1999b).

The English Communication student is offered a different--but not necessarily more appealing--version of literacy. Communications literacy, as in the workplace modules selected for post-compulsory learners in Queensland, asks to be read as practical and relevant. It assumes that the particular types of work futures its participants will be inserted into are ones where compliancy, correctness and subservience are desirable. It pays only lip-service to non-workplace texts, and does not construct its subjects as needing to be engaged in intellectual, critical or aesthetic textual activity.

Literacy for the workplace

Relevance and practicality are centrally important to English Communication literacy and provide its authority and legitimacy. Although schools may build a range of more general English units within this subject (and are encouraged to do so by the syllabus guidelines), many students taking this syllabus will be engaged in 160 hours of workplace modules within their scheduled 220 hours of school literacy time. The modules, therefore, inevitably dominate any school interpretation of the syllabus. The subject at the centre of the English Communication syllabus is clearly a job-seeker, but it is interesting to speculate on what `worker' is envisaged here, and what sort of jobs this worker will seek.

The type of worker assumed within the modules is a worker who can perform simple, routine workplace tasks, in a compliant, obedient, efficient and loyal fashion. For instance, within the core module NCS001: Work-place communication, three of the four learning outcomes are described as `simple and routine'; two of the four specifically list `efficient use of time' as an assessment criterion; and the outcomes frequently refer to `correctness' or 'accuracy' (in using procedures, completing forms, giving instructions). This worker is not expected to be innovative, rule-breaking, imaginative, critical. Such words do not appear in the documents--nor do the words `complex', `analytical', `creative'. The literacy required by the subject at the centre of this set of workplace modules is simple, routine and conformist.

The English Communication syllabus lists six selected workplace modules for students to complete if they want to acquire CNC02: Certificate II in Communication for the Workplace:

NCS001: Workplace Communication

NCS002: Writing Skills for Work

NCS003: Job Seeking Skills

NCS004: Work Team Communication

NCS007: Presenting Information

NCS018: Dealing with Customers and Clients

The key descriptors within all six of these modules are `simple', `routine', `clear'. The literacy tasks are basic, and the literacy expectations of students are low. The level of difficulty of the tasks is hard to assess, but it is worth comparing the outcome statements of these modules with the national set of English outcomes developed by the Australian Education Council (AEC) in the mid-nineties: English--A curriculum profile for Australian schools (AEC, 1994). This English curriculum profile document lists eight levels of outcomes for English literacy competency at school, across three broad areas: speaking and listening, reading and viewing, and writing.

These AEC profile outcomes levels were later used in the development of national benchmarking tests for students in Years 3 and 5 as part of The National School English Survey (Department of Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs, 1997). In defining students' `language control' in writing for the benchmarking exercise, the survey team decided upon six indicators for successful achievement of Level 4 (in an eight-level framework). It is interesting to compare these six Level 4 achievements of Year 5 students, with the writing competency expectations made of post-compulsory learners in the workplace modules. It could be assumed that we expect levels of literacy competence for 16- to 18-year-olds that are not more difficult than those achieved by a third of 10- to 11-year-olds (see Masters & Forster, 1997, p.26).

Although it is obviously difficult to compare the two sets of competencies, it is salutary to consider the competencies that are achieved by 33 per cent of primary school children in comparison with the set of competencies expected of the post-compulsory learner in late adolescence. The workplace modules are context-specific, but the competencies they look for are obviously achievable by young literacy learners. Although the workplace competencies are expected to be completed in actual or simulated `adult' workplace environments, the literacy repertoire expected is minimalist.

Consequently it is hard not to regard the English Communication syllabus as a remedial, simplified literacy syllabus, that provides `make-up' literacy work, within a vocationally focused context, for students at risk of adult illiteracy. However the issue is: Could it be more than this? Does it do its job of preparing young adults for workplace literacies and cultures? And what might students lose by choosing such a vocational English Communications literacy pathway?

Given the changing shape of Australia's work cultures--where competence with information technology is seen as crucial (O'Brien, 1999), where job-training is unlikely to be provided, and where many young adults will be employed in casual, unskilled work (Spierings, 1999)--young adults now need, more than ever, access to a broad and sophisticated range of literacy repertoires and workplace `identities' (see Black, 1997). The current repertoire constructed in these state literacy syllabus documents is too narrow. And the silences in both documents are problematic. Where, for instance, in the English syllabus, is there a serious attempt to construct literate practice outside the realm of literature and formal, analytical textual work?

Where, in the Communications syllabus, is there recognition of the importance of applying different reading practices to different workplace reading contexts, of adapting written conventions to specific workplace contexts and demands, of interpreting power relationships within workplace exchanges? Although many teachers may well build such a critical dimension into their communications work program, the syllabus guidelines do not stipulate such an emphasis. And where is the explicit and mandated emphasis on accessing and using technology in the English Communications syllabus--in the gathering of information, the storage of information and the preparation of 'simple work related documents'? References to information technology are sparse in the set workplace module material. There is a passing reference to `electronic data storage' (BSSSS, 1999c, p.98), to electronic mail (voicemail, fax) (p.99) and to the Job Search website (p. 127). However there is no strong and explicit focus on the impact of technological change on communication practices. Given that IT is obviously regarded by the majority of workplace employers as fundamental to employability, and the responsibility of individual job-seekers (see discussion in Gilbert, 2000), this seems to be a curious and dangerous omission.

The English Communication syllabus framework encourages students to use technology for leisure: to participate in activities like `surfing the net and playing video games' (BSSSS, 1999c, p.20). However the impact of communication and information based technology upon a broader range of literacy practices--notably workplace literacy practices--is barely mentioned in the 160 hours of workplace modules.

By comparison, the English syllabus and the English Extension Literature syllabus make frequent and diverse reference to technology. In the Senior Syllabus in English (BSSSS, 1999e), students are expected to study the emergent technologies of hypermedia (p.1), to use and critique current and emerging technologies to construct texts (p.3), to have access to electronic technology (p.12), and to use the Internet for assignment preparation (p.26). In the English Extension syllabus (BSSSS, 1999a), students are actively encouraged to be part of a virtual classroom via the Internet (p.7), to engage with presentation software (p.12), and to submit assignments in multimedia and hypertext form (p.36). The binary divide here seems clear. The `workplace' English Communication student is situated within old technologies; the English (higher education) student is inserted into new technological practices. This is particularly noticeable in some of the workplace modules available in another of the workplace focused literacy subjects: the Literacy and Numeracy Study Area (see Table 1). In this study area, the modules actually insist on old technologies. Students are advised to `use appropriate technology', and `phone, fax, pen, paper' are provided as examples. In the frequent exhortation to `show evidence of corrected drafts' and to `use correct grammar, spelling and vocabulary', there is no suggestion that electronic production of text--and proofing of texts--is a possibility (see BSSSS, 1999d).

Implications for post-compulsory literacy curricular construction

What are the implications of this binary, hierarchical construction of literacy for post-compulsory learners, and in what predicament does such a binary construction leave literacy educators and post-compulsory students?

In reporting on Queensland research conducted in 1996, Teese (1999) has argued persuasively for the urgent need to rework the curricula for post-compulsory learners, to take account of the huge dissatisfaction such learners frequently experience in the face of academic failure and perceived curricular irrelevancy. Teese claims that whereas `only about 7 in 100 of the top achievers in the senior certificate describe their schools as a "prison"', the numbers increase dramatically for students at lower ends of the academic scale.

   Every third boy who is a low achiever claims to be in prison, in a place of
   negative confinement, governed by teachers who are no more than gaolers.
   And this relates to those who did actually reach Year 12. Amongst girls, we
   find the same pattern, though the proportion of prisoners in every band of
   achievement is lower. (Teese, 1999, p.1)

School obviously is regarded as a prison for many post-compulsory learners and, as Teese also rightly argues, this is not a socially random phenomenon. Scholastic failure and low school retention are experienced far more frequently by children from lower socioeconomic status families than by children from professional and managerial backgrounds (Ainley, 1998; Teese, Davies, Charlton, & Polesel, 1995). Although academic curricula provide a stepping stone to economic privilege for some, they make for a prison for others.

Schooling in the post-compulsory years is not only a failure in these terms. It is also a failure in its provision of useful literacy certification for many young adults. Not only do post-compulsory learners too often drop out of school before they complete Year 12, but many of those who do stay are likely to receive such poor Year 12 English results that their time `in prison' serves as double disadvantage. Many students complete 12 years of schooling and leave with no formal qualification or certification of value. In 1998, for instance, approximately 5000 Queensland students (almost 16% of the students who stayed on to Year 12 and completed a Year 12 English subject) received what is commonly regarded as a `fail' result: a limited or very limited level of achievement. In addition, another 3600 students, who had commenced Year 11 English in 1997, were no longer in the Year 12 cohort to be eligible for a Year 12 certification in 1998.

This is, of course, why the embeddedness of VET modules in school literacy curricular development has appeal. At a time when disenchantment with the academic nature of schooling is high, when young adult unemployment is a serious issue, when particular social groups of young people are systematically disenfranchised from work and economic privilege, the possibility of sending potentially unhappy, disengaged young people out from school with some form of vocational certification is attractive and highly desirable. It is obviously attractive to have post-compulsory learners engaged in school work that they enjoy, regard as valuable, and have good chances of mastering. Yet the formal theoretical focus of the Senior Syllabus in English does not easily promote this. For many students, the analytical focus, literary preoccupation and restricted literacy repertoire of the syllabus are seen to be irrelevant, and for many boys, undesirable (see Martino, 1995). Not surprisingly, it is predominantly male students who choose the workplace focused English Communications syllabus and who avoid the English Extension literature subject (see Table 2).

However the English Communication syllabus described here does not necessarily provide a valuable alternative for post-compulsory learners. The English Communication literacy repertoire is narrow and not in step with contemporary workplace cultures and needs. The English Communication classroom is likely to be seen as a remedial classroom, populated by boys who are disenchanted with the academic curriculum and with schooling; and pedagogies used in English Communication classrooms are likely to make assumptions about student subjectivities that could potentially restrict knowledges, values and skills made available to young adult learners (see Freebody, Ludwig, & Gunn, 1995; Jones, 1991). Syllabus writers, as Teese (2000, p.4) notes, have an implicit view about the ideal student at the centre of the curriculum, and this view affects the choices that are made about what in the field is to be valued and what is to be excluded.

Syllabus policy construction is always, as I argued at the beginning of this paper, a pragmatic discursive endeavour. Choices must be made about what in the field is to be valued, and what is to be excluded. However such choices tend to become exaggerated within the binary construction of literacy curricula that has developed in Queensland. The literacy repertoires that young adults will need for the new millennium are broader and more flexible than either syllabus assesses. The Senior Syllabus in English is clearly the curriculum area with greatest potential to meet the literacy needs of young adults in `new times', but it has to avoid being taken up predominantly as a theoretical, literary and analytical study of language. English Communication, on the other hand, tries to establish a broad, functional and relevant rationale for `communications study', but the impact of 160 hours of VET modules in its possible 220 hours of study inevitably moves it towards narrow and restricted literacy repertoires that do not equip students well for the dynamics of post-school life.

As always, however, it will be teachers in classrooms who take documents like these literacy syllabus statements and--despite the ideologies implicit in their framing--turn them into practice that is equitable, forward-looking, and understanding of changing literacy needs. However teachers who attempt to work within the literacy curricular frameworks in Queensland schools have to make determined and deliberate efforts to resist the hierarchies implicit in the documents, and to construct good and appropriate practice resistant to the politics and subjectivities produced by these two different constructions of literacy. There are certainly many examples of teachers who do exactly that: who construct responsive, broad-ranging communications programs of work that promote a range of literacy practices.

It is not too difficult, however, to construct a scenario within which English literacy for post-compulsory learners is configured differently. In a changed scenario, most students would exit their post-compulsory schooling years with statements of literacy competence that were useful to industry and the workplace, yet not exclusive to industry and the workplace. Given the simplicity of industry demands, many students should be eligible for prior learning recognition (RPL) here so that school literacy time could be more productively--more broadly--engaged.

This is important. Literacy study in the post-compulsory years is a crucial and vital learning area for young adults. English literacy as a curriculum area is a designated site for examining the play of language in personal, social and cultural contexts; for interrogating textual construction; for developing competence in the creation of new textual forms. It has to be much more than the simplistic reproduction of workplace forms and procedures--and much more than the preparation of analytical literary essays. Literacy at this level needs to be fully responsive to the dynamic shape of contemporary literacies, particularly in their newer technological forms. And literacy curriculum development at this level must also tackle the needs of adolescent literacy learners who lack basic coding and decoding skills in literacy, and not conflate the needs of these students with the needs that all adolescent students have for workplace responsive, contemporarily relevant language practices.

Literacy curriculum development which falls into the simplistic divide of academic, theoretical English versus practical, workplace Communications English will be inappropriate and inadequate here. As this Queensland story of literacy hierarchies demonstrates, there are dangers inherent in constructing literacy curricula for students in terms of presumed post-school pathways and presumed student subjectivities. In a recent analysis of academic success and social power, Teese (2000) argues that `how the curriculum is constructed over time, the values that animate it and the demands framed within it are all crucial in the production of social inequality' (p.4). A binary construction of literacy--as discussed in this paper--can feed directly into the production of such inequalities. There are implications that follow from such curriculum development that affect the way in which students are perceived as learning subjects in the literacy classroom, that affect the way literacy is taught and constructed in the classroom, and that affect students' perceptions of themselves as workers, as students, as language users.

Literacy curriculum development in the post-compulsory years needs to resist oppositional hierarchies like these with their implicit social and cultural implications. It has to produce curricula that can be seen to be more directly relevant to the literacy repertoires young adults will need in their post-schooling lives, more focused on versatility and flexibility of literacy competence, and more attuned to the changing face of literacy in new times.

Keywords

failure

literacy

literacy education

secondary school curriculum

technological literacy 

work experience programs

Appendix A comparison of aims

Trial-pilot Senior Syllabus           English Communication Study Area
in English                            specification

A course of study in senior English   Aims
aims to develop students':            This study area specification
* understanding and use of the        emphasises the processes of
  English language                    learning in English Communication
* appreciation of language and        and aims to develop in students:
  enjoyment in its use                * positive attitudes and
* appreciation of language for          strategies for engaging in
  entertainment and leisure             life-long learning as
* engagement with worlds real           reflective learners
  and imagined                        * respect for all people,
* identification with characters,       knowledge, understanding and
  places, events and experiences        appreciation of Australia's
  in texts                              linguistic and cultural
* development of a fascination for      diversity
  language, its origins, its          * skills, knowledge and
  diversity, its dynamism               understanding to communicate
* engagement in critical                appropriately and effectively,
  reflection and discussion on          using non-discriminatory
  the ways in which language            language
  is used                             * knowledge and appreciation of
* participation in the diversity        how individual its and
  of Australian culture and             collective cultural identity
  contribution to its enrichment        is formed and valued
* participation in life-long          * knowledge and skills to plan
  learning as active citizens in        and work as members of a group
  shaping the future.                   and to accept responsibility
                (BSSSS, 1999a, p4)      for the outcomes of the group
                                      * self-confidence as language
                                        users
                                      * knowledge, understanding and
                                        an appreciation of language as
                                        used in various forms
                                      All of these are developed
                                        through speaking/signing,
                                        writing, listening, viewing
                                        and reading and are enhanced
                                        by critical thinking
                                                   (BSSSS, 1999b, p.12)
Table 1 Literacy curricular choices at the end of Year 10

Higher education option       Workplace option

1 English (a)                 1 Study Area specification: English
  (4 semesters--2               Communication (c)
  years of study)               Can be studied in one of three strand
                                forms over two years.
                                Strand A (Workplace):
                                leads to Certificates I or II in
                                Communication for the Workplace
                                Strand B (Practical):
                                leads to Certificate I in Communication
                                for the Workplace
                                Strand C (Studies)
                                Contains no embedded VET modules
2 English (4 semesters) +     2 Study Area specification: Literacy and
  English Extension:            Numeracy
  Literature (2 additional      Can lead to Certificate I in Vocational
  semesters of study in         Communication (d)
  Year 12) (b)

(a) The Board of Senior Secondary School Studies in Queensland has
approved an extended trial-pilot senior syllabus in English
(BSSSS, 1999d)--which is being worked with across the state. It is
this new trial-pilot syllabus that I use in discussion. The previous
syllabus was produced in 1987. The new 1999 trial-pilot syllabus
provides a more obvious reflection of contemporary thinking in
Queensland about what should be included in an English literacy
syllabus for post-compulsory learners.

(b) The Board of Senior Secondary School Studies in Queensland has
produced a draft English Extension syllabus (Literature) for trial
(BSSSS, 1999a). It is this document that is being referred to
throughout the paper.

(c) The Board of Senior Secondary School Studies in Queensland has
recently approved a Study Area specification in English Communication
(BSSSS, 1999c) for trial. This 1999 syllabus is the one referred to
here.

(d) This Study Area was in trial-pilot mode in 1998 for Year 11, and
Year 12 enrolments for 1999 are not yet available.
Table 2 Student enrolments in literacy curricula, Queensland, 1998

                                No. of     Males    Females   Total (b)
Syllabus type (a)               schools   (Yr 12)   (Yr 12)    (Yr 12)

English                           306     15 776    18 256     34 032
English Extension: Literature       9         17        74         91
English Communication
Study Area                        141      2 003       902      2 905
Other Board-registered
Communication or Applied
English style subjects             96        860       426      1 286

(a) The enrolment numbers include students taking the new trial English
syllabus, as well as the existing 1987 English syllabus which the trial
syllabus will eventually replace.

(b) The subjects, English for ESL students, Journalism and Media
Studies have not been included in this count.
Table 3 Literacy curriculum binaries

English                                  English Communication

Leads to higher education                Leads to the workplace
Theoretical                              Practical
Intellectual: engage the `mind'          Physical: perform the `body'
Imaginative                              Correct
Critique                                 Compliance
High `culture'                           Work `culture'
Innovation and reconstruction            Appropriateness and routine
Study of literature                      Study of workplace documents
Complex tasks                            Simple tasks
Rule-breaking and risk-taking            Rule-following and obedient
`New' technologies                       `Old' technologies
Formal, analytical written assessment    Workplace performance-based
                                           assessment
Table 4 Writing competencies--Year 5 students and post-compulsory
students

National English Literacy Survey:    English Communication Syllabus:
Level 4 Writing                      Writing competencies expected of
Competencies achieved by 33%         16-18 year olds
of 10-11 year olds

* begins to adopt organisational     NCS001: Workplace Communication
  conventions of structured format   LO1: Gather, record and convey
* contains a variety of sentence     simple routine information
  forms                              NCSO02: Writing Skills for Work
* uses appropriate punctuation       LOI: Employ effective writing
  most of the time                   skills and strategies to write
* shapes writing with a clear        simple work related documents
  beginning and end, and possibly    NCS003: Job Seeking Skills
  paragraph divisions                LO2: Prepare and apply for a job
* uses appropriate vocabulary        NCS007: Presenting Information
  most of the time                   LO1: Prepare and present a docu-
* spells most words correctly        ment relevant to a specified task

References

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Pam Gilbert is a Professor of Education in the School of Education at James Cook University, Townsville, Queensland 4811. Email: Pamela. [e-mail]