The purpose of this document is to provide background to the text and recommended actions of the Australian School Science Education National Action Plan, 2007-2012. The first part presents a synthesis of the national and international research used to identify gaps and overlaps amongst activities related to school science education in Australia. Where relevant and appropriate, the paper identifies and reinforces actions that have been recommended by stakeholders and recent reports. The second part of this document reports a mapping exercise carried out to scope the range of reports and initiatives that impacted on science education. It is not the intention in this document to examine the whole range of aspects in science education, especially as some of these aspects have been covered by other recent reports. Rather, its purpose is to explain the research basis from which authors developed the Action Plan. (Contains 1 footnote.) [For Volume 1, see ED511041.]