The Standing Council on School Education and Early Childhood of New South Wales has announced the education divide between urban and rural children to be a key priority.

 

Recent statewide testing has shown in Year 3 reading, one in 20 city students are below the minimum standard – compared to one in seven remote students.

 

The main considerations of the council are to be as follows

 

  • reviews of school funding will need to consider the costs of schooling outside of the cities
  • initiatives to boost teacher quality will need to address the specific needs of those schools in more remote areas that struggle to attract and retain staff
  • in meeting the 90 per cent attainment target of Year 12 or equivalent, governments will need to consider more options to enable rural students to complete their studies.

 

The findings come as New South Wales achieved the majority of the Coalition of Australian Governments Reform Council’s benchmarks for literacy and numeracy, scoring the highest percentage of ‘A’ results in the nationwide COAG testing.

 

Of the 12 assessments made across the state, 11 scored the highest ‘A’ rating. Entitling the state to the next round of $46 million in funding from the Federal Government under the COAG benchmarks.

 

The acting director-general of the NSW Department of Education and Communities, Pam Christie, has welcomed the results published by the COAG

 

"The reward payments, if granted to us by the Commonwealth, will fund further education initiatives in NSW schools." Ms Christie said.

 

The full report can be found here: http://www.coagreformcouncil.gov.au/reports/education.cfm