That ICPA (Aust) continues to bring to the attention of the Federal Government the impacts the new ‘Direct Measure of Income’ funding model is having on geographically isolated students who attend boarding schools, when advocating for increases to the Assistance for Isolated Children Allowance (AIC).
In 2022, as part of the Quality Schools reforms, all non-government schools completed the transition from the previous area-based socio-economic status (SES) methodology to the Direct Measure of Income (DMI) to determine the capacity to contribute (CTC) for most non-government schools.
In very simple terms, if a school’s CTC score is now lowered as a result of transitioning from SES to DMI, the school’s base funding will increase. If CTC is now higher as a result of the transition, the funding of the school will decrease as of 2022.
As a result of using the Direct Measure of Income parameters many schools throughout the whole of Australia will receive a cut to their funding, this is a major concern for boarding families.
In Western Australia, in addition to families incurring increased boarding costs they are also incurring significant increases to tuition fees. Previously, tuition fees have increased by an average of up to 3% however, data from the current school year has shown an increase of tuition of a minimum of double this rate and in some cases 10% and even 20%.
