Deborah O'Neill (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to share this evening some thoughts about the future of education across the Central Coast region, which I represent in this place. The Central Coast is a growing region close to Sydney and it has historically looked either to the north or to the south to supply many of its infrastructure needs and leadership. Certainly this is the case in terms of higher education, but that situation is really no longer acceptable for a region that is a region in its own right. I have come to the conclusion that the Central Coast of New South Wales needs to have an autonomous education region, both for school education and for vocational and tertiary education. I base this conclusion on the following personal experiences.

My experience of almost 30 years in the education system on the Central Coast gives me a real insight into the nature of the kids that we have in our schools and the types of families from which they come. In fact, parents in our region who have attained a TAFE qualification are much overrepresented by comparison with other parts of the state. So, without having had the experience of seeing their parents in a university context, many of our students do not know what that might look like, do not know how to access that opportunity and do not know what they might be able to do if they engaged in that tertiary context. So easily accessible tertiary education is really important for them.

I add to that my experience as a lecturer at the Central Coast campus and Newcastle campus of the University of Newcastle. I have gained very different perspectives in terms of the relationship with the university in its Newcastle campus and the campus on the Central Coast. Newcastle has been there for a much longer period of time and it has provided great support to the Central Coast campus, but the reality is that Newcastle has dominance in most of the conversations about how the university advances. The Central Coast campus and the other campus, which is situated in Port Macquarie, have much less prominence as they are affiliated campuses, not the central campus. This is a key structural problem that is impacting on the advancement of educational opportunities for people in the region that I represent.

I speak from the personal perspective of a mother on the Central Coast—the mother of one who has just begun her engagement with the tertiary sector and one who is about to commence at the end of this year. Students on the Central Coast need to have a geographical capacity to get to further education. The cost of transport to Sydney and to Newcastle is significant. Also, people returning to work—not just young men and women who are starting out in tertiary education but older people, many of the mums, who are returning to study—have choices that are limited by what they can fit around the other parts of their established lives. They need to be able to access a really wide range of courses. This simply does not seem to be the case. As a local federal member I have had a number of representations—just recently from one young Aboriginal student who has been successful in gaining a place in law in the University of New South Wales and is struggling with the reality of trying to travel to access a course that is not available to him on the Central Coast. At present, in terms of school education, we are part of the Hunter-Central Coast region of the New South Wales DET. For vocational education, the Central Coast comes under the auspices of the TAFE NSW Hunter Institute. For tertiary education I have explained that we have a campus that is attached to Newcastle. There is great status in a degree from the University of Newcastle, one of the top 10 universities in the country, but I need to advocate for people in our region for a better deal.

I regret to say that, at all of those levels, I do not think that there has been an allocation of equitable distribution, a voice and representation for the people of the Central Coast. This is certainly a belief that has been crystallised in my view as I have met with many training providers and visited a number of key agencies who are interested in education on the Central Coast. We have locals who are passionate about enabling young people and older people to get the very best education at all levels.

We are working as a region in many other senses. The census this year was the first time it has measured the Central Coast as a region. We have our own regional development authority. We have the Central Coast Local Health District. We have a division of general practice for the Central Coast. We even have the Central Coast Mariners and a bid for the Central Coast Bears. But it is time for the Central Coast to stand on its own as an educational region, to have all the opportunity and to have a voice and participation that that structural reality will allow.