Every Monday at Yirara College, just outside of Alice Springs, students become the teachers. They teach both academic and administrative staff their many languages. Yirara is among the 10 Australian schools that have recorded the biggest growth in the percentage of students from non-English speaking homes.
Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) data suggests the school went from having 14 per cent of students from non-English speaking backgrounds in 2008 to 100 per cent in 2022. School principal Wesley Meurant told SBS News it was important to the way the school delivered education to take into account that English was a second, third or even fourth language for students. However, he said the make-up of the school had likely not changed as drastically as the ACARA data suggested. To get a national picture of how the make-up of Australian classrooms has changed, SBS News reviewed schools that had more than 200 students enrolled — but behind the data, something else was reveale