Surveying the state of community relations in public schools

An understanding of teacher experiences, attitudes and knowledge is critical for developing multicultural education programs and policy. This paper draws upon the findings of the online Multicultural Education Survey of all public school teachers in New South Wales (May-June 2011). The survey showed an encouraging teacher disposition toward diversity, suggesting a widely held openness to cultural difference. It also found that teachers are supportive of multicultural education and strongly support anti-racism in schools. Teachers were, however, less likely than the general population to acknowledge racism as a problem in Australian society, and only half agreed that racism was a problem in schools. One interpretation of these data is that schools could be sites of less racism, less intercultural tension, or more effective anti-racism than elsewhere in society. This positivity towards diversity and anti-racism is a resource from which to leverage multicultural education. Broadly, schools are crucibles for improving community relations and civility. The dispositions of NSW public sector teachers, as revealed in our survey, are packed with potential for enhancing society.