Australia's Sustainability: A New Policy Front for Rural Education?

Abstract

Rural education and its policy agenda has for many decades primarily focussed upon responding to decline to keep things going; keep things open‘. While this has been understandable and much has been achieved, it is now opportune—essential?—that rural education and its leaders embrace a new challenge, sustainability, and use it to pursue new policy fronts. The 25th anniversary of the Society for the Provision of Education in Rural Australia is a timely occasion to consider this. Five issues critical to national sustainability, and a program to engage city and urban youth in living and learning in rural communities, are presented to stimulate new policy and operational possibilities for rural education under the umbrella of sustainability.

The Perennials and Trends of Rural Education

“…Community is also intrinsically linked to rural sustainability (Downes & Fuqua, 2018;White et al, 2011). Halsey (2009a) makes a strong claim for the important role of education at the nexus between community and sustainable rural community futures. Regardless of the theoretical conception of community, it is clear from the Journal's literature that community is central to the delivery of education in rural contexts (Ledger, 2020;Yarrow et al, 1999).…”

The spatial implications of academic achievement in Year 12: Rethinking discourses of disadvantage in rural locations

“…However, concerns about issues of knowledge and the curriculum have moved away from questions of relevance towards standardisation and achievement in a standard curriculum. Consequently, the Country Areas Program was discontinued in 2009 under new funding agreements with programs to address disadvantage in rural schools now predominantly addressing socioeconomic disadvantage in accessing the curriculum, rather than school-based curriculum reforms (Department of Education, Science and Training, 2003; Halsey, 2009). This is unsurprising given there are higher concentrations of socioeconomic disadvantage in rural communities (Australian Bureau of Statistics [ABS], 2018b; Gonski et al, 2011).…”