Educational Disadvantage Essay
The issue educational disadvantage can be referred as the obstruction towards education that happens due to economic and social disadvantage that averts students from obtaining proper benefits from education in schools (Bradley, Draca, Green & Leeves, 2007, p. 548).
The problem of educational disadvantage is strongly related to the issue of poverty. A wide range of studies in Australia has indicated that people from low level income and poor socio-economic communities and backgrounds are most likely to stay less fortunate in educational system compared to the individuals belonging to superior socio-economic backgrounds.
Usually, educational disadvantage happens due to situations that are ahead of an individual’s control and that have previously put an impact upon satisfactory educational outcomes. Some of these situations are:
- Situations connected to equality of chance in educational system, for instance, gender, ethic, language demands, culture and expectations.
- Health and disability, for instance, hearing and visual impairment, problem in reading and writing, problem in speaking, complexities associated with physical mobility and psychosomatic disorders which includes depression or anxiety, impact of medication, and any other form of severe and persistent medical state.
- Sympathetic and other situations, for instance, impacts of trauma, surgery, abuse, neglect, divorce, grief, violent behavior, relocation, etc and any other form of unexpected situations.
However, issues such as incompetency to adapt to school or university life or coping up with studies, changing subjects etc are not considered as educational disadvantage.
Australia contains one of the highest gaps between its best performing and worst performing children in educational system (Teach for Australia, 2014).
It has been reported that only 15 percent of students in universities belong to the most socio-economically underprivileged segment of the population in comparison to the 42 percent of those belonging to privileged background (Schnepf, 2007, p. 528). An enormous 40 percent of the aboriginal children do not get the chance to meet the minimum math and reading standards.
Currently, if children are born within wrong post code, has parents who could not complete their high school education, or lives in household having low income, then the child is less likely to obtain quality education and perform well as the school.
This issue of educational disadvantage contains huge negative consequences as children who could not complete school or are not provided with the same level of educational opportunities compared to those children belonging to privileged background are most likely to lag behind and would not be able to find suitable employment (Kilham, 2010, p. 512).
These children would have to highly depend upon the benefits given by government, have the possibility to become homeless, are more likely to engage in crimes and go to jail as well as could face sever health complexities.
This issue is highly disadvantageous as it not only affects the individual children but also adversely affects the society as a whole by means of declined productivity, forming a huge burden on social and health services, along with its affect on families, kids, friends and fellow societal members.
In Australia one of the significant aspects of educational disadvantage is the matter of equity. With the rejection of the federal government towards making commitment to the Gonski Review and the latest declaration in Victoria State regarding additional cuts to already disadvantaged students and schools, the matter of equity within education system requires close consideration (Appa.asn.au, 2014).
The shortfall in the Gonski Fund can hit the educational choices of the disadvantaged children by a great extent. Equity makes one portion of the much bigger frame of the educational system in Australia (ABC News, 2014). When making comparison of the education system in Australia with those in other nations, there are several features that are unique.
Some of such features work towards the countries advantage but some of the aspects do not weigh constructively (Pc.gov.au, 2012). Australia comprises the one of the most competitive educational system throughout the world. Here, family having practically superior degree of disposable income holds the ability to exercise broader options (ABC News, 2013).
But Australia also contains a major amount of equity problems as schools in the community having low socio-economic conditions (SES) makes the most under resourced organizations both in terms of proficient teaching professional and educational facilities. The students in such schools frequently require targeted support and assistance in order to meet certain specific needs.
The significant relation between student’s educational performances at school and their socio-economic background has been established long back. Educational disadvantage represents a function of the socio-economic features of the students as well as the average socio-economic attributes of their schools (Education.gov.au, 2011).
Investing in such schools in which there is large amount of educational disadvantage needs to have urgent attention for preventing downward spiral. It resonate self-evidently that disadvantaged children are most possibly to be in disadvantaged schools (Bradley, Draca, Green & Leeves, 2005).
This trend is mostly prevalent in Australia compared to other OECD high performing nations. In Australia, there is more proportion of children in schools in which student’s socio-economic conditions in an average is under the national average (Oecd, 2006).
In Australia education is segmented into three discrete sectors, all of which contains a major market share which includes almost 21 percent for Catholic, 63 percent for government, and 16 percent if independent. This is quite atypical in comparison to other OECD nations for having such massive independent or private sector.
In reality, most possibly Australia includes the biggest non-governmental school sector throughout the globe. Educational leaders in other OECD nations such as Korea, Singapore, Finland, and Hong Kong contains comparatively less private or independent schools that chiefly cater the international students.
School funding arrangement and the structure of the educational system can significantly promote or hamper equity (The conversation, 2012). It has been suggested that with the aim to facilitate equity, funding in educational facilities needs to be directed to schools requiring most assistance and support, so that basic and minimal values of achievement are fulfilled all over the place.
It had been also recommended that funding arrangements must facilitate accountability and transparency by investing on recipients mainly non-government and government schooling system, for allocating resources so that the affect of addressing the aspect of equity and enhancement of educational results could be assessed.
Although funding play a vital part towards the improvement of equity within educational outcome, allocation of accurate degree of resources in the appropriate place makes one element of the challenge. Another significant aspect within it is to ensure that added resources are being utilized in the most educationally effectual manner.
The explanation towards attaining higher equity in school hence lies not just in an enhanced funding in disadvantaged students and schools, but also in making sure that the supplementary resources are being utilized for employing strategies in an integrated, comprehensive and sustainable way.
The issue of educational disadvantage severely affects the student’s life and their career. The hindrance towards education because of poor socio-economic conditions and low income level significantly puts impact upon the length of school, orientation, success, health, and career choices of the student (Slee, 2006).
The higher the students are socially and economically disadvantaged, higher are the possibility of the student to discontinue from obtaining education from school. Disadvantage in education drives students to leave school at an early stage and restrains them from obtaining educational qualifications.
Disadvantaged students fail in junior cycle exams due to lack of appropriate facilities and expert teachers in school. Due to unequal treatment of students belonging to poor socio-economic class and low income group, they suffer from defiance of equal access to educational facilities, and they develop the tendency to leave school at primary level and stay devoid of obtaining higher or university educational qualifications.
Due to disadvantages in education, student’s career choices get affected to a great extent. Such disadvantaged students fail to access good employment opportunities compared to privileged children belonging to high income level group (Coram, 2008, p. 2).
Due to the reason of educational disadvantage, students are more likely to experience the interrelated issues of poverty, homelessness, dysfunctional family, and several health issues. Because of this reason, a large part of disadvantaged students become inclined towards substance use and get involved in crimes (Pridmore & Jere, 2011, p. 514). It has been studied that, crimes by teenagers and young adults are closely related to lack of education as well as socio-economic concerns.
Another significant impact of educational disadvantage is that students face severe numeracy and literacy difficulties and experience underachievement. The students even undergo emotional and behavioral turbulences. According to a report by Australian Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, educational system in remote and rural regions of Australia is highly inadequate and the country students faced considerable amount of disadvantage, which included inequity (Doolan & Zimmer, 2002).
It had been stated that the students were exposed to severe disadvantage compared to their city counterparts and they were less likely to go to school, more probably to stay absent and less likely to finish their obligatory school years, less probably to get involved in tertiary schooling and training and there is fewer chance of even completing year 12. There were reports that approximately a million of the Australian students are disadvantaged due to the place where they live.
This report signifies the issue that, still geographical positioning leads to disadvantage in education in spite of the innovative developments in transport and communication that have helped to transform the meaning of distance. In addition to this, kids of the farm laborers, rural poor, miners, rural workers, shearers and unemployed parents were even more disadvantaged (Hirsch, 2007).
Evidences from various investigations substantiated the key role of the aspect of social inequality in making educational disadvantage massive. The high income level segments were capable of overcoming the issue of distance by admitting their kids to boarding schools, on the other hand cash needy rural household, anticipated for meeting a larger share of education costs as government cut back funds, and experienced a vicious cycle of declination.
It has been observed that the greatest disadvantage in education experienced by underprivileged people in remote and rural areas is about gaining access to education. For attaining access to any education they have to pay a great amount.
There are provisions from government for giving financial assistance, but parents have reported that the funding fail to meet the educational cost and some family find the burden too enormous and their children drop out of school too early.
However, in order to enhance the life opportunities and improving the education system for the children coming from low socio-economic backgrounds, the low SES School Communities National Partnerships has been developed (Research.acer.edu.au, 2011).
This organization aims to improve the conditions by introducing various reformations such as quality of teacher, strengthening school leadership, optimum and better utilization of assessment data, and strengthening partnership arrangement amongst parents and schools, higher educational sector and local communities (Lowsesschools.nsw, 2014).
The government of Australia has taken this initiative for enabling all the children to have access to best possible education and a fair treatment. More than a quarter of every Australian school has participated in the National Partnership for Low Socio-Economic Status School Communities and Numeracy and Literacy, while each and every school leader and teacher are directed in the National Partnership for the Improvement of Teacher Quality.
The Australian Government has also made investment in numeracy and literacy pilot initiative. More than 400 schools have dynamically taken part in evaluating what would work for improving the numeracy and literacy outcomes for the children who are highly in requirement of assistance (Smarterschools.gov.au, 2014).
The government of Australia, in partnership with the territory and state governments, is involved in creating a data bank of numeracy and literacy facts based teaching pedagogies for the improvement of educational outcomes (Une.edu.au, 2007).
Furthermore, even though the Australian government is making extensive initiatives in addressing the issue of educational disadvantage, but along with it the correlated factor of equity in education needs to be taken care as well. Without fair treatment no such initiative would be effective in diminishing the issue of educational disadvantage and enable all the Australian children from accessing their fundamental right of obtaining education and improve their quality of life and get better employment opportunities.
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