12. Education
The LCAS Report highlighted the pivotal role of education in ‘solving (or at least ameliorating) the incidence of child sexual assault in Aboriginal communities'.46 Education is also a key social determinant of heath and wellbeing. Thus the fact that there are an estimated 2000 Aboriginal children in the NT who are not enrolled at school and a further 2,500 who are not attending regularly, and that the educational standards and literacy levels of parents is also low, represents a huge challenge for government. A significant part of this challenge is to address the significant shortfall in classrooms, equipment and teachers that has developed as a result of past government policies.
It is therefore welcome that significant additional resources are being provided to boost education outcomes through the NTER and through the NT Government's ‘Closing the Gap' strategy. This includes funding for an additional 200 teachers as well as funding for new classrooms, and programs for accelerated literacy and numeracy, school nutrition and quality teaching.
While these new resources are significant, they will not be sufficient to address current unmet need.
In Section 9, we raised concern at the proposal to link welfare payments with school attendance. We noted that there is no evidence that suspending a family's income support will increase school attendance but that evidence does suggest that factors affecting lack of school attendance include the inability of parents to change their children's behaviour (in not attending school), poor teacher quality and school culture, and housing overcrowding (and consequent lack of sleep, disruption etc).
In light of this it seems questionable and potentially unfair to focus the government's response so heavily on a trial of what will be a very expensive and uncertain solution (linking income payments with school attendance) while continuing to withhold commitment to provide sufficient schools, teachers and housing to address the current levels of need.
It is also clear that the additional education-related programs currently committed to do not include programs around the issues of school culture and curriculum, where there is currently evidence around their importance in school attendance. A recent analysis of school attendance in Indigenous education47 recommended the following kinds of programs that have already proved successful:
- Breakfast and lunch programs in school;
- Bringing members of the Aboriginal community, particularly elders, into schools;
- Training Aboriginal teachers and teacher aides;
- Developing a culturally-appropriate curriculum that engages Aboriginal children;
- Programs, such as that developed by Aboriginal educationalist, Chris Sara,48 that combine building confidence and self-esteem through cultural programs and sport, with programs focusing on attaining academic excellence.
Other gaps in current government provision of Aboriginal education programs include the lack of adult literacy programs, the provision of pre-schools in all communities and the need for supervised boarding hostels for young people who want to go to high school in regional centres.
AMSANT urges the Review Panel to recommend that the Australian and NT governments provide funding for the following additional resources and programs:
- Increased funding for schools, teachers and infrastructure to meet current unmet need;
- Increased training of Aboriginal teachers and teacher aides;
- Effective Adult literacy programs to assist adults to become more employable and to help develop better understanding and commitment around the need for their children to attend school;
- Pre-schools in all Aboriginal communities to ensure that all 3 year old Aboriginal children can attend pre-school;
- Supervised boarding hostels for young people who want to go to high school in regional centres;
- Programs bringing members of the Aboriginal community, particularly elders, into schools;
- Developing a culturally-appropriate curriculum that engages Aboriginal children;
- Programs, such as that developed by Aboriginal educationalist, Chris Sara, that combine building confidence and self-esteem through cultural programs and sport, with programs focusing on attaining academic excellence. [See Recommendation 17].
46. LCAS Report, Recommendation 57.
47. Larissa Behrendt and Ruth McCausland, Jumbunna Indigenous House of Learning, University of technology Sydney, Welfare payments and school attendance: An analysis of experimental policy in Indigenous education. An issues paper presented to the Australian Education Union, August 2008.
48. From the Indigenous Education Leadership Institute.