Meeting with Mt Isa School of the Air, 6 October 1999 - notes
The Inquiry met with the Director of the School of the Air and two of the School's teachers, one primary and one secondary.
Some basic facts about the School of the Air
The Mt Isa School of the Air services approximately 250 children from 150 families.
The School only goes up to year 10 because there is little demand for distance education beyond that level. In fact, there are relatively few secondary students, only 47 in years 7-10. When children reach high school level, their parents generally prefer to send them to boarding school because of the social interaction.
The School provides an integrated program involving printed material, on-air tuition and field activities.
For a primary student, a typical day involves one half-hour of on-air tuition with the child spending the remainder of the school day working at home with the parent/home tutor.
Secondary students normally undertake five subjects involving two half-hour sessions per day, Monday to Friday. In addition, they do life skills training once a week.
The School is flexible with the scheduling of on-air tuition to fit in with the needs and circumstances of families on remote properties and communities.
Extra-curricula programs
With limited resources, the School of the Air operates a variety of programs to bring isolated students together for activities. They provide activities that students don't have ready access to in their home environment. The emphasis is on encouraging students to mix with their peers and develop social skills. Activities include
- citizenship camps
- leadership training
- sport programs e.g. absailing, skating
- sport days covering a particular region
- city weekends
- vocational training programs for secondary students.
The School encourages students and their families to implement some of these activities in their local communities when they return.
Some of the funding for these activities is provided by the Priority Country Area Program (PCAP). Other funding comes from the School of the Air and from local communities.
With camps and other activities that involve travel and accommodation, financial assistance is provided to cover some of the costs to students and their families.
The role of parents and families in distance education
"Parents play a crucial role in the delivery of distance education. The School of the Air provides the technical and academic support while parents have the responsibility to provide the work space and encourage the student to put in the hours."
"Parents are critical to the success or failure of their children in distance education."
"It is not easy for parents and other home tutors working in isolation to provide support for students undertaking distance education. Without easy access to feedback, it is difficult for them to know if they are doing a good job. It is also hard to assess their child's progress and performance. Parents are particularly apprehensive about secondary education. They often don't feel confident that they have the skills or the education for that role."
"Parents, especially mothers, are the "unsung heroes" of distance education."
"Where students do have a sufficiently supportive environment they have very little chance of succeeding academically. The School of the Air will not admit students if it is not satisfied that there is sufficient support in their home environment."
"The supportiveness of parents is indicated by their close involvement in activities such as P& C groups. On average 40-50 people turn up at most P & C meetings."
"There is a perception that the Government takes home tutors for granted. The Isolated Children's and Parents Association (ICPA) has attempted to provide some limited remuneration."
"Home tutoring is especially difficult with youngest children experiencing their first few years of distance education. It is also more difficult as later children often learn a lot from and get support from their elder siblings."
Resources
"The resource material for distance education is quite costly. For example, the Secondary English material costs several hundred dollars per student."
Educational curricula
"The School provides mostly standard academic subjects. We need to provide more practical subjects for students who are not academically inclined."
Indigenous children
"The School of the Air needs to cater more adequately for Indigenous children. The curricula could be more relevant to their needs."
Technology
"We would like to make greater use of teleconferencing. Telephone is about 20% better in sound quality than radio. However, we see it as some thing to supplement radio but not to replace it. Ideally, we would like to combine the best aspects of radio and telephone. Also, telephone is very expensive and in remote areas there are major problems with access to telephone lines. We would like to make more use of e-mail and telecommunications generally in our delivery of programs"
Vocational education
"The School of the Air does not have a lot of contact with TAFE. This is regrettable because there would be great benefit in sharing resources. It would enhance the School's ability to provide good vocational training."
"Employers should give more recognition to the vocational education country kids receive working on properties, doing mustering and other activities."
Children in difficult circumstances
"Increasingly, children excluded from mainstream education are coming into distance education. This is a problem because many of these students are from dysfunctional families and do not have strong parental support. Yet with distance education success is heavily dependent on parental support. This district office is generally reluctant to admit students in these circumstances but other offices are less so."
Home schooling
Some families who favour home schooling seek to utilise distance education even where they have access to a mainstream school in their area. This occurs for a rage of reasons. Some families do it for religious reasons but increasingly it is being done by parent who are personally very committed to having a close involvement with their children's education. Some do it because they are not satisfied with local schools. These cases require approval by thew Director-General of Education. They also require a special fee of $1,000. This can be problematic for families with limited resources, particularly where there are serious issues relating to the local school.
Last updated 2 December 2001.
