[ournal of Research in RuralEducation, Spring, 1994, Vol. 10, No.1, 48-57 A Background to Rural Education Schooling in Australia Andrew H. Higgins Department of Education, Queensland Iintroduce abriefhistoryofrural education in Australia byfirst providing ageographical description ofthecountryand thenbydiscussing thedevelopment ofeducation in remote areas. I then consider thehistory ofrural education in onestate, Queensland, as an illustration of developments elsewhere in the country. I conclude by considering the impact the Commonwealth government had on Australian rural education since the1960s. Introduction school buses. Secondary education is provided by adding secondary teachers to a primary school This article sets an historical perspective on secondary department when there are sufficient rural education in Australia. Australia's educa­ students to warrant the provision of at least five tion began by copying the English system, famil­ secondary school teachers. The minimum num­ iar to the first white immigrants, until factors of ber would be about 40 students. Most places great distance, harsh climate, and sparse popula­ having 300 secondary-aged students would war­ tion produced a peculiarly Australian education rant the establishment of a secondary school. Dis­ system. It is based on centralised state bureaucra­ tance education services may be provided to any cies which supervise and administer the human, student who lives too far away to attend a school, physical, and financial resources comprising edu­ and to the smallest secondary departments when cational service delivery. They also determine the curriculum expertise for specialist subjects cannot curriculum. Australian rural education has been be found among the four or five secondary teach­ characterised by the themes "free, secular, and ers. It should be apparent from the following compulsory." Pragmatism, and a consideration description that each state government is respon­ for efficiency and economy, also shape rural edu­ sible for providing education to all students and cation in Australia. Rural educators, in their at­ that distance education is a method of ensuring tempts to overcome the difficulties of remoteness that provision. There is no significant involve­ and isolation, have become world leaders in adopt­ ment of the non-government schools sector in the ing and modifying a range of techniques to cater provision of distance education, except for the for their clients. establishment of boarding schools (Common­ Anyone who writes in the area of rural educa­ wealth Schools Cornission. 1988). tion must come to grips with the problem of defi­ nitions. For the purpose of this article, and in Geography keeping with the pragmatic nature of Australian educational administrators, the following may Australia is a low, slightly oblate, continent­ suffice. States have attempted to provide the characterised by a dry interior and a tropical north­ minimum one-teacher primary school where ap­ ern third. Running down the eastern edge is the proximately 10 pupils could be guaranteed to at­ Great Dividing Range. To the west of this range tend daily. This usually meant that those children lie rolling plains drained by the Murray-Darling lived within a radius of five kilometres of the river system. Further to the west, the land be­ school in rural areas when the horse transported comes even drier to the point where it no longer students. The same regulations apply today but supports large trees. On the western side of the many families travel up to 90 minutes daily to Nullarbor lies the Archaean Plateau and a hot, attend a school, using either private vehicles or Andrew H. Higgins is Senior Policy Officer (Regional Operations) in the Department of Education, 30 Mary Street, Brisbane, Queensland 4000, Australia. He also lectures in rural education at the University of Queensland. 48 Higgins Schooling in Australia dry, western coast. The dry inland is characterised nists settled the land, dispossessing the by weathered low ranges and deserts, brought to Aboriginals in the process. Blainey (1975) esti­ bloom by infrequent rainfall. Monsoon rains flood mated that there were 300,000 Aboriginal people the land in the northeast, but most of this water in Australia in 1788. Today, there are 17 million drains away from the inland. That which finds its Australians. way south evaporates in the large inland basins. Meinig (1972) schematised the development The Kimberley mountains in the northwest are of remote communities. Australia passed through heavily dissected and very sparsely populated. A its frontier development stage by 1900. With the small island, Tasmania, lies off the southeast coast. movement of people through the outback came Australia's distance from west to east is about the spread of an education system, based very 4000 km and a little less from north to south. much on the beliefs and cultures prevalent in the Before white people arrived in numbers, Aus­ United Kingdom. tralian indigenous people lived off the land in a The history of education in Australia is cov­ nomadic manner. Historical records suggest that ered well in standard texts by Barcan (1980), Aus­ Aboriginal people have lived in this way on the tin (1972; Austin & Selleck, 1975), and Goodman (1968). Pictorial histories can be found in continent for upwards of 60,000 years. The white -: population is concentrated in a crescent from Burnswood and Fletcher (980) and HoIthouse Brisbane on the mid-east coast through Sydney (975). These publications provide detailed histo­ and Melbourne in the south to Adelaide on the ries of the most significant themes and events mid-south coast. The city of Perth lies on the affecting the entire educational spectrum for the lower west coast and Darwin on the mid-north periods in question. coast. In addition, there are the north coastal Distance education is a sub-set of general edu­ cities of Cairns and Townsville and the inland cational provision and has been influenced by the cities of Mt. Isa, Alice Springs, Broken Hill, and same factors, albeit much compounded by geogra­ Kalgoorlie. Population in the remainder of the phy and sparsity of population. This paper will inhabited country is found in small townships on consider some of the broader implications of the transport lines or in stations and properties (i.e., development of distance education services, espe­ large farms). Most Aboriginal people live in ur­ cially as such provision had, and continues to ban cities or towns. Only a few maintain a tradi­ have, a great impact on teachers working in rural tional lifestyle. Torres Strait Islanders live on areas. islands to the north. Educational provision in rural and remote ar­ The size of Australia, the characteristics of its eas has been a matter of providing teachers and landforms, the sparsity of inland rainfall, and the schools to places where sufficient students could colonial history of its political boundaries explain, be brought together for the purpose of instruction. in part, how Australians see themselves. They do By definition, then, there have always been places so not as urban dwellers, but as rugged outdoor where there were insufficient students to warrant individuals capable of enjoying life in both the the provision of a teacher as the first priority, or bush and the surf. The Australian rural myth, the establishment of a school as a second priority. centred on songs like Waltzing Matilda and poems This does not mean that there was no educational like Dorothea MacKellar's My Country ("1 love a provision in Australia, even before the arrival of sunburnt country"), perpetuate the quintessential Europeans. Australian image. This Australian image commenced in 1788· Early History when Captain Arthur Phillip disembarked some 1,030 British migrants at Sydney Cove. The main Prior to the arrival of white people in Austra­ problem during the first 30 years of British settle­ lia, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people ment was to keep the convicts, soldiers, and offi­ provided education to children. The curriculum cials alive. The historical records of Australia consisted of detailed knowledge of the social sys­ showed the English government's neglect to send tem, factual knowledge of nature, vocational skills, regular food supplies. This, when combined with and knowledge of ideology and beliefs. Each loss of seed during the shipment and drought, group of people used instructors to impart knowl­ resulted in what might be called the "hungry edge, success being indicated by rites of passage years" (Greenwood, 1968). Nevertheless, the colo- or initiation. Methods of instruction involved 49 Higgins Schooling in Australia repetition of songs and dances, storytelling, imi­ to provide education for its followers, but found it tation of elders' behaviour, and ceremony. difficult to accommodate needs in the rural areas. The arrival of white people's education in 1788 The Anglicans, being the predominant English meant the importation of an English system based religion, attempted to monopolise educational on the capacity of churches to organise education for provision, but were unable to do so. young children. The first schools taught children of The Anglican Church sought to establish its military and convict families the rudiments of literacy educational monopoly through the Church and and numeracy, often using the Bible as the basic text­ Schools Corporation, using funds the church hoped book. Various governors found teachers among the to receive as income from one tenth of the land. soldiers and convicts, especially among the women, This money did not materialise and opposition whose incapacity for heavy labour precluded them from other religious sects quickly arose. Gover­ from early colonial work. For example, in 1798 the nor Bourke adopted a tolerant view towards vari­ Anglican Reverend Richard Johnson combined three ous religions in Australia by abolishing the Church classes under one roof to teach between 150-200chil­ and Schools Corporation, establishing state aid to dren (Barcan, 1980). By October 1798, convicts suc­ schools, and favouring non-denominational edu­ ceeded in burning the school.