Despite the relative material affluence in Australia, they seem to have 'missed the boat' to equip the population for the 21 century. Digital literacy and digital citizenship are not a common practice of the systemic educational institutions. "The physical ICT infrastructure that has developed since the 1990s has not been matched by a concomitant investment in education - public or private - to promote creative uptake of digital technologies by entire populations."While some young people enthusiastically acquire the skills of digital natives, the system, their educational guardians seem to hinder their development. "For the most part the education system has responded to the digital era by prohibiting school-based access to digital environments, apart from walled gardens under strict teacher control...Kids also learn that formal education's top priority is not to make them digitally literate but to "protect" them from "inappropriate" content and online predators."
Meanwhile their parents devote themselves to their impeccable (and unsustainable) lawns and passionately trim edges.
