If Australia is truly to become a ‘clever country’, it must first address inequity in access to education across all socioeconomic sectors of the community, writes 2008 Fulbright Scholar Professor Brenda Cherednichenko.
Brenda Cherednichenko, Dean, Faculty of Education & Arts, Edith Cowan University
The Australian spirit of generosity is clearly alive and well. As a nation, we are known for our willingness to respond en masse in supporting those less fortunate than ourselves – a phenomenon illustrated recently by the nation’s reaction to those facing unexpected hardship and trauma following the Victorian bushfire disaster.
In times like these, qualities like empathy and benevolence are widely valued and celebrated. Despite this, on a daily basis many Australians live alongside people who are clearly financially, educationally and socially disadvantaged. Although community support mechanisms do exist to enact change and improvement in the lives of these citizens, few Australians are aware of them. Arguably the single most applauded act to empower Aboriginal Australians – Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s apology to the Stolen Generations – has still not yet instigated any significant shift in engaging Aboriginal peoples in mainstream Australian society.
It seems it is easier to respond quickly to a large-scale single event than to commit daily to enacting gradual changes in our own immediate environments. The inequities in everyday life can be invisible. However, this cannot justify ignoring the private failure of our communities to help those in need in favour of congratulating popular public expressions of support.
Equity past and present
Without doubt, government, industry, school and university leaders are aware of the need for a better educated Australia. In 2005, then Executive Director of the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER), Barry McGaw, announced that OECD results indicate Australian schools are of a high quality, appearing near the top of global comparative rankings. Yet Australia performs poorly on equity indicators – a fact associated with social background rather than economic disadvantage. This indicates that familial education is just as significant as the impact of economic, employment and social capital factors on the educational achievements of young people.
The recently released Bradley Review of Australian higher education called for the Government to implement initiatives that ensure universities are inclusive and address equity issues effectively. Despite these and other efforts, there has been little or no change in the engagement of lower socio-economic community members in post-compulsory education in the past two decades in Australia. In the case of Aboriginal Australians, one of the fastestgrowing population groups in some states, real participation has actually declined. Some of this can be attributed to the increase in highly-paid work opportunities arising from the resources boom. But by all accounts, these opportunities have now passed, leaving a greater problem in their wake.
A collaborative approach
ECU Students and Staff collaboratively planning access initiatives
A number of challenges must be overcome if Australia is truly to be celebrated as a nation that cares enough to enact real change.
Without argument, education is a single determinant in improving life choices and therefore life chances. Those who complete secondary education earn far more on average across their working life than those who do not. Secondary school completion rates rose in the 1960s, but have been steady since at about two-thirds of the population, with even fewer completing post-compulsory education. These figures are low when compared to those of other developed nations.
The most pressing issue we now face is how we should behave in this context. Initiatives to promote social inclusion, the redress of inequity, can be added to the work already being done via compensatory, remedial or catch-up educational programs, or it can be embraced as a new foundation for the way the community works. That is, rather than relying on those who already have the resources and opportunities to lead initiatives to ‘close the gap’, we should embrace an approach that is inclusive, respectful and collaborative.
Partnerships for progress
Learn, Dream, Achieve! is a modest but ambitious project that seeks to learn from and promote educational innovation with the goal of a more inclusive Australia. It investigates how communities, industries and educational providers are working in collaborative partnerships for educational achievement in both Australia and the United States.
With the significant support of a Fulbright Commission Senior Scholar award (see box), the project compares practices and outcomes of community engagement for educational equity at Edith Cowan University (ECU), Victoria University (VU) and the University of Texas, El Paso (UTEP).
All three universities serve disadvantaged communities, but within quite distinctive social contexts. Each is unique in terms of its student population, community expectations and aspirations, educational profile and the relationships it fosters with local schools and other education providers. Yet, each university has deliberately decided to make equity of educational outcomes a priority. The Learn, Dream, Achieve! project sets out to discover how achievement is identified, how individuals and organisations are changing and ultimately how communities are developed as a result of the active relationship between universities and their communities.
Time to make a move
This work is providing new insights into innovations that build capability to enhance capacity. Enhancing the aspirations, access, participation and success of individuals in turn strengthens their communities. Universities must move beyond benevolence towards inclusive engagement with people, industry and professions. This project will inform a vision for Edith Cowan University as a university for all, where learning starts with the learner, and the process and practices are in place to enable differentiated delivery so that all have the opportunity for success.
Brenda Cherednichenko is the Executive Dean of the Faculty of Education and Arts and the Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Equity and Indigenous) at Edith Cowan University, WA. A 2008 Fulbright Senior Scholar, her particular research interests lie in educational reform, equity and student responsive learning.
Aspiration to Access – Quality Entry to Teacher Education
Over the past five years, Edith Cowan University’s School of Education has moved to develop close partnerships with local primary and secondary schools from low socio-economic communities. One outcome of this relationship is the opportunity for year 12 students and their teachers to work closely with ECU to develop portfoliobased applications for teacher education programs. As a result, eager applicants can be offered a place at ECU in October of year 12, pending the successful completion of their secondary studies.
The program has been operating for just two years. In 2007, 20 partner secondary schools participated and 48 of the 62 applicants were enrolled for 2008. In 2009, 91 school-leavers from an expanded group of 30 partnership schools are entering their first year of teacher education.
These applicants come with more than a year 12 score. They have already demonstrated to their school teachers and ECU’s teacher education selection panel that they have an understanding of and a commitment to young people and their learning, and also have the capacity to develop as quality teachers.
Fulbright sparks
The prestigious Fulbright program, created by U.S. Senator J. William Fulbright and the US Government in 1946, is the largest educational scholarship of its kind. Aimed at promoting mutual understanding through educational exchange, it operates between the US and 150 countries. In Australia, the scholarships are funded by the Australian and US Governments and corporate partners, and administered by the Australian-American Fulbright Commission in Canberra.
Professor Cherednichenko’s project, LEARN, Dream, Achieve!, is an international Australia-US partnership investigating the educational access initiatives of the University of Texas at El Paso. The Fulbright-supported program will research and study UTEP’s successful practice and provide a basis for Australian reform and joint research. It will be used to inform equity practices at Edith Cowan University.
Access to Success – The Humanities and Community Capacity Building
Edith Dirksey Cowan, in whose honour Edith Cowan University is named, was a remarkable woman: teacher, law reformer and first Australian female Member of Parliament at the age of 60. Committed to educational equity, she was also an avid campaigner for women’s and children’s rights.
Edith Cowan University’s mission continues to reflect these ideals today. For example, the School of Communication and Arts has successfully initiated and sponsored a community learning project in partnership with Mission Australia and Woodside. Participants are individuals who have been identified by Mission Australia as having missed out on access to formal education.
Through the program, they apply for the University certificate and study four higher education Arts subjects in their community setting. After just one year, retention and completion rates are at 60% and two students from the 2008 intake have been accepted to undertake further degree studies at ECU in 2009.
republished from Australian Innovation 2009 – the print publication
