IN THE scheme of things, Australia is not a large country. Sure, we have a large land mass, but our population is small in comparison to many other nations.
And our people are concentrated in relatively few cities along our coastlines, serviced by major road, rail and air transport routes.
It is not uncommon from residents to move from state to state in pursuit of careers.
On that basis, it shouldn't be hard for us to adopt a national approach to areas of common interest between the states and territories. Like education, for instance.
As it stands in this country, each state and territory has its own education system with their own curriculums and methods of assessment.
In this day and age, when travel between states is so easy and convenient, it makes sense to look at a single education system across the board.
The Federal Government has part-recognised this, with its move towards a national curriculum from 2011. That will mean school across the country will be teaching essentially that same thing.
There will, however, still be variations between syllabus and assessment programs.
Victoria will, for instance, retain its VCE, while New South Wales will have the HSC, each assessed using different methods that aren't easily interchangeable.
The OECD has taken the national curriculum plan a logical step further and has recommended that Australia develops a national certificate for students finishing secondary education. This one qualification would be recognised
across the country and would make transferring from one educational institution to another - or one job to another - less difficult than it currently is.
For its part, the government says it in not considering such a proposal, nor is it likely to be on the agenda any time soon.
Certainly, there are more pressing priorities for the government at the moment.
But, given that it has embarked on its own ``education revolution", now would seem the ideal time to at least start a debate around a national school certificate.
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