4 Regional and Remote Students
4.1 Scholarship Support for Regional and Remote Indigenous Students
Section 21 (3) (a) of ‘the Guidelines’ requires that a minimum of 95% of the Commonwealth Equity Scholarship amount paid to regional and remote students in the preceding year (i.e. 2019) be paid to regional and remote students in 2020. For UNE the minimum funds to be offered in 2020 was $142,298 being 95% of total funds paid in 2019. (See Table16). The actual amount of scholarship support offered to regional and remote students studying at UNE in 2020 was $198,000. This represents a funding offer of 132% of 2019 scholarship payment, some 37% more funds offered than is required.
Table 16: Scholarship data for remote and regional students.
LEVEL OF STUDY | Education Costs | Accommodation | Reward | TOTAL | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
$ | No. | $ | No. | $ | No. | $ | No. | |
A. 2019 Payments | 99,734 | 62.0 | 32,054 | 9.0 | 18,000 | 9.0 | 149,787 | 80.0 |
B. 2020 Offers | 140,000 | 50.0 | 30,000 | 5.0 | 28,000 | 28.0 | 198,000 | 83 |
C. Percentage (C=B/A*100) | 132% | |||||||
2020 PAYMENTS | 93,100 | 33.3 | 27,000 | 4.5 | 23,000.00 | 11.5 | 143,100 | 49.3 |
Source: Oorala Aboriginal Centre
4.2 The rise and fall of EFTSL For students From Remote and Regional Areas
Students from regional and/or remote Australia accounted for 310.1 (or 63%) of the total EFTSL of Indigenous students at UNE in 2020 (Table 17). This represents a 4 % decline in the proportion of Indigenous EFTSL attributable to students from regional and remote Australia, relative to the previous calendar year. This represents an apparent steady 10% decline at UNE over the past 5 years in the proportion of Indigenous EFTSL attributable to students from regional and remote Australia (Table 17).
However, declines in total Indigenous EFTSL are not uniform within and between regional and remote student categories (Figures 9-11). The trend in total EFTSL borne by Indigenous students from Inner Regional Australia over the past five years indicates a slight decline in total Indigenous EFTSL during this period. Conversely, the trend for Outer Regional Australia indicates a slight rise in total Indigenous EFTSL in the same period (Figures 9 to 10). Further, the total Indigenous EFTSL borne by students from both remote and very remote Australia at UNE has generally tended upwards over the past five years, and particularly for our very remote students in which a doubling of total EFTSL has occurred in this period (Figure 11). In broad terms this means that UNE is maintaining the total Indigenous EFTSL attributable to Regional and Remote Australia. This strong and continuing engagement with Indigenous students from the regional communities, in which UNE is embedded, is occurring at the same time we are experiencing a surge in the number of students coming to UNE from Major Cities.
Table 17: Study Load (EFTSL) of Indigenous students studying at UNE in 2020 by their location
Study Load (EFTSL)/LOCATION
| CALENDAR YEAR | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | |
Major Cities of Australia | 97.5 | 133.8 | 121.6 | 153.8 | 175.97 |
Inner Regional Australia | 174.1 | 192.3 | 186.6 | 212.6 | 173.24 |
Outer Regional Australia | 83.1 | 91.2 | 79.4 | 100.2 | 114.45 |
Remote Australia | 10.4 | 14.1 | 13.0 | 11.2 | 14.38 |
Very Remote Australia | 3.4 | 3.9 | 5.3 | 5.1 | 7.13 |
Overseas | 1.4 | 2.0 | 1.5 | 1.6 | 1.0 |
Location Data Not Available | 3.3 | 3.9 | 5.3 | 7.8 | 6.88 |
GRAND TOTAL | 373.0 | 441.2 | 411.0 | 493.3 | 495.05 |
Total Regional and Remote | 270.9 | 301.5 | 279.9 | 329.1 | 310.2 |
% Total Regional and Remote | 73% | 68% | 69% | 67% | 63% |
Source: Student Profile Excel Worksheet dated 22/02/2020 prepared by UNE Business Intelligence Unit.
Figure 9: Comparison of total EFTSL of Indigenous students at UNE from Regional and/or remote Australia for the 5-year period 2016-2020.
Figure 10: Comparison of total EFTSL of Indigenous students at UNE from Inner Regional and Outer Regional Australia for the 5-year period 2016-2020.
Figure 11: Comparison of total EFTSL of Indigenous students at UNE from Remote and Very Remote Australia for the 5-year period 2016 -2020.
