Last week I travelled to Canberra to attend a workshop exploring the measurement of wellbeing as it applies to children and young people. In particular the workshop focused on wellbeing as it relates to school-readiness, children at school and young people preparing to leave school.

The workshop was organised by the Commonwealth Data Strategy Group and is part of their work in supporting the development of evidence-based education policy. A major challenge in building an evidence base to support school programs in wellbeing is the lack of agreement on the definition(s) of wellbeing and engagement, the domains within wellbeing and their relative importance at different stages in a young person’s educational journey, and, importantly, possible valid and reliable data sources to measure wellbeing.