Bridging The Distance
Raising Awareness Of Regional Australian Education
OUR VISION
To advocate for the systematic inequalities widely faced by regional students across New South Wales.
PRESSING ISSUES
POST EDUCATION LIMITATIONS
After school, regional students face great hurdles in accessing further education and lack opportunity in workplace environments. In 2022, only ~1 in 2 students completed Year 12, compares in ~4 in 5 students in urban areas. Of the high performing regional students with an ATAR ≥75, 40% do not attend university after. Despite taking time off after school, youth unemployment in regional areas is 24%, triple of Sydney city. Few options and great costs make transition from school difficult.
MENTAL HEALTH AND WELLBEING
Regional students in NSW face greater mental health challenges although are faced with a lack of support in services. Youth suicide rates in remote areas a ~2x greater than those in urban areas. ~30x of rural teenagers face depression however the majority of schools use telehealth as a result of staffing shortages. Only 1 in 4 rural teens with concern for mental health reach out, compares to 1 in 2 in metro areas. Vast distances, social stigma, and scarce resources leave students without the care they deserve and need.
TEACHER SHORTAGES
The chronic shortage of qualified teachers in rural and regional NSW is a significant issue that negatively impacts students' learning. It is challenging to attract and retain educators, leading to frequent vacancies and out-of-field teaching. In late 2023, NSW data showed nearly 2,000 full-time teaching positions were unfilled across the state's public schools, with the highest vacancies in regional and rural areas. Over 1,050 schools had at least one teaching vacancy, and some remote schools were desperate. This staffing gap results in limited subject offerings, such as no specialist language or advanced STEM classes, or temporary substitutes and merged classes. The teacher shortage directly affects educational quality, with many regional schools having a 70% shortfall in the needed casual teachers.
TECHNOLOGICAL GAP
A 2024 NSW study revealed that only 39% of students in regional NSW have adequate access to digital devices for learning at home, compared to nearly 60% of students in Sydney. This gap is exacerbated by rural families' inability to afford multiple computers or living in areas with poor broadband. The National Broadband Network has improved coverage, but connectivity can be slow or patchy in remote towns, forcing some students to rely on mobile data or go without internet after school. Despite the NSW government launched the Rural Access Gap (RAG) program to improve tech infrastructure within schools, the gap persists outside of school hours, with many country students still doing homework on a parent's phone or not at all due to lack of digital access.
WHERE ELSE IS THIS HAPPENING
Whilst Bridging the Distance focuses on regional NSW community, this issue of systematic rural educational disadvantage is widespread globally.
India
Rural Indian students face drastic educational disadvantages compared to urban students as a result of systematic inequalities in infrastructure, teaching quality, and resource availability. According to the 2023 ASER report, over 42% of rural students aged 14-18 cannot read a fundamental English sentence and more than half face difficulty with basic arithmetic. Such inequalities are driven by lack of school resources where rural schools are systematically creating a negative difference. Only 43.5% of rural schools have computers, further, a general lack of professional teachers and far distances to travel to school. This causes rural Indian students to be discouraged from pursuing higher education.
China
Within rural China, in provinces such as Shaanxi (山西), tens of millions of "left behind children" (children who have parents who have migrated to urban areas for work) face significant educational disadvantages due to systemic and social challenges. Under the Chinese hukou (household registration) system, these children are denied access to superior-resourced urban schools and forced to remain in under-provided village schools; such village schools often have one teacher across multiple year classes. A study from Stanford University indicated that rural students in Shaanxi are two to three grade levels below their urban colleagues in arithmetic and reading. Only 30–40% of them finish middle school, whereas over 80% of urban students do. Up to 40% of rural Chinese students exhibit signs of depression, and 30% suffer from unaddressed vision problems.
Nigeria
Rural students, particularly in the northern states such as Borno and Yobe face major educational disadvantages compared to urban students. Only ~30% of rural female students attend high school, compared to over 70% in urban areas. Many rural schools don't have electricity, bathrooms, or competent teachers. They are also often affected by violence; for example, Boko Haram assaults have destroyed hundreds of classrooms and made people afraid to go to school. Youth literacy in northern areas are below 30% whilst urban areas are above 85%. Even with government programs, rural pupils are still at a big disadvantage because of bad infrastructure and ineffective implementation.
Ethiopia
In Ethiopia, there are systemic problems with access, infrastructure, teacher quality, and gender inequality that make it hard for people in rural areas to get a good education. Students in rural areas typically have to travel a long way to get to school, which makes them less likely to go and more likely to drop out, especially girls. Rural schools don't have enough infrastructure as only 39% of them have access to appropriate sanitation, while 85% of metropolitan schools have. A large portion of the time, there aren't enough teachers since talented teachers don't want to work in remote places with bad living conditions. This leads to overcrowded classrooms and poor learning outcomes. Gender differences make the disparity much bigger. For example, only 27% of women in rural areas can read and write, compared to 66% in urban areas. This is because women get married young and have to perform a lot of housework. Government programs like GEQIP have tried to make education better, yet rural kids still have less access and do worse than students in cities.
OTHERS FOCUSING ON THESE ISSUES
Many NGO's are focusing on the issue; particularly, these organisations are making a recognisable change both domestically and internationally and stand out.
WORDS FROM
OUR NSW AUSTRALIAN REGIONAL SCHOLARS
"The issue needs more focus. Hopefully this project will shed some light on the issue."
T.W. - Year 12 HSC Student, Southern Highlands, NSW
"We’ve got assessments and we’ve barely got any idea what we’re doing. Some of the distance teaching isn’t really that good, so we’re really struggling."
K.P. - Year 12 HSC student, Upper Hunter, NSW
"We’re otherwise... at home by ourselves, with a bad internet connection and essentially isolated."
Senior year college student, Broken Hill, NSW
ABOUT ME
My name is Marko M. I am an international student in high school as a senior. I believe advocacy for rural students is a vital step toward advancing education not only in New South Wales, Australia, but also globally.