The Implementation of Equity Programs in Primary Schools in Rural New South Wales: 'Outputs for Schools' or 'Outcomes for Students'?

Abstract

In rural Australia, the remoteness of many communities from the mainstream creates elements of disadvantage: isolation, pockets of high unemployment, low socio-economic conditions, inadequate infrastructure, parochialism and divisions between communities. In rural New South Wales, the incidence of disadvantage is endemic and there are pockets where disadvantage is intransigent. Disadvantage imposes constraints on the quality of educational provisions for public schooling with cascading consequences for behaviour problems and learning difficulties. In contemporary times, education policy, as a subset of social policy has evolved to address the gap between privilege and disadvantage through the development of 'Equity Programs' for disadvantaged schools – a diversity of supplementary educational provisions targeting students with learning difficulties and behaviour problems, providing broadening experiences for students and professional development for teachers to enhance delivery of the Equity Programs. Many Equity Programs for schools have been formulated, funding provisions created and delivery systems developed in Australia from the 1970's. However, there has been little evaluation of the implementation processes for Equity Programs, and the effectiveness of implementation has recently been brought into question. Accordingly, the present study investigated the effectiveness of Equity Programs currently in use in public primary schools in a region of rural New South Wales, Australia.