South Australia Education

The South Australian Government is under pressure to reject a proposal that would allow McDonald's to sponsor maths tutoring in the state's schools.

The program is aimed at providing a free maths program to over 1.4 million students.

Under the scheme, the Maths Online tutoring program, which usually costs $40 per month, will be provided free to individuals, classes or entire schools in the government, Catholic and independent systems.

Greens MLC Mark Parnell has appealed to Education Minister Jane Lomax-Smith to stop MacDonald's from "introducing fast food advertising into SA classrooms."

"It's not the job of a school to promote brand loyalty," he said.
"When students open up a new Maths Online tutoring system distributed to schools they will see the McDonalds logo and the words `Proudly provided by your local McDonald's restaurant'.

"There is absolutely no place in the classroom for fast food advertising."
Mr. Parnell said this was nothing but a sophisticated marketing ploy by McDonald's.

"Schools have a huge duty of care. Kids lives today are already saturated with invasive and manipulative marketing tricks."

When they open the program on their computers, students will see the McDonald's logo and the words: "Proudly provided by your local McDonald's restaurant."

McDonald's has the support of Federal Education Minister Julia Gillard and the Australian Secondary Principals' Association and will promote the program to students from Year 7 to Year 12.

Ms. Gillard yesterday commended the company for "encouraging secondary schools and students across the country to utilise this resource".

Leoma M.