Funding half the fix for education

While developments like these have been welcomed, there were still calls for further important work to be accomplished.

For instance NSW Teachers Federation western region organiser Brett Bertalli, Broken Hill, said there was room for improvement when it came to teacher consultation and communication.

Furthermore, he said while the NSW government had led the way in terms of implementing the Gonski funding reforms, the performance with regard to TAFE teaching positions had been “terrible”.

“They have slashed and burned a lot of TAFE positions, and this will be a problem for us in the future.”

The cutting of 800 full-time equivalent TAFE positions across NSW was announced in 2012 (in what was then a planned reduction of five per cent of the TAFE NSW workforce over a four year period).

Mr Bertalli said the axing of 800 TAFE positions could have substantial economic consequences.

He said TAFE also had to compete with private enterprises offering cheaper courses.

In spite of these areas of concern, Mr Bertalli agreed the rural and remote education blueprint was a “fantastic” development; “we have been calling for many of these things identified in the blueprint for years”, he said.

NSW president of the Isolated Children’s and Parents’ Association (ICPA), Duncan Taylor, Nimmitabel, was also supportive of many of the government’s recent initiatives with regard to education in rural areas.

“I think the NSW government has been very conscious of the issues surrounding rural and remote education,” Mr Taylor said.

He cited the release of the release of the Rural and Remote Education Blueprint for Action last year.

“I think the movement by the government toward creating schools that have a wide curriculum with great teachers and great principals has been good, as well as making sure country kids don’t fall through the cracks,” he said.

“We’ve got to be very grateful for any extra funding, and the $80 million funding package was a very pleasing development.”

“I do think the NSW government has been out there doing its best to return education funding from the federal government.

“The funding models are great, but more needs to be done.”

He cited as examples of this the fact that while rural and remote education had been moving toward needs-based funding, there were still some issues with those models, with some issues needing to be ironed out.

“Conceptually, needs-based funding is good, but areas with regard to funding which still need to be addressed include issues like socioeconomic status, as well as the different levels of support for schools depending on remoteness.”

He said there was still an issue surrounding disparity of education outcomes, such as NAPLAN testing results, between metropolitan and rural schools.

“I think there’s a number of things that could help address this, including more support for students to get great teachers, and trying to retain these great teachers in schools.”

He said better curriculum choice for rural and remote schools could be another way to help address education outcomes.

Mr Taylor said it was pleasing Education Minister Adrian Piccoli had put together the Rural and Remote Education Advisory Group, on which the ICPA has a seat.

Another benefit was the release of the Review into Agricultural Edu-cation and Training, which he said was a step in the right direction to addressing the need to promote agriculture as a subject.

“Our members have a very keen interest in agricultural education and training,” he said.

Federation of Parents and Citizens Association NSW spokeswoman Rachael Sowden, Uralla, also felt there were still some areas of concern.

“As with all governments, it has been a bit of a mixed bag,” she said.

“There’s been some really great things, such as signing up to the Gonski reforms, which gives better support for students in public schools – we were very excited with that.”

She said among the areas of concern was the removal of $1.7 billion of funding to education across four years; “that definitely has been a big worry to parents”.

“We like the idea there is more of an ability to make decisions at a local level, but we do have some reservations as to how that will work.

“The biggest room for improvement comes down to communication and consultation.”

Ms Snowden said there was the need for more face-to-face consultation with regard to policy revisions.