Make a Difference

Before UNE’s Associate Professor Pep Serow began work in Nauru in 2013 - the nation’s 10 schools were almost entirely staffed by expatriate teachers.

Since then UNE’s Nauru Teacher Education Project has supported dozens of Nauruans gain a degree-level qualification and start working in the Pacific Island schools.

Associate Professor Serow said the teacher training is tailored specifically to the needs of Nauruan teachers and includes units unique to their schools, which commonly include multi-lingual students, asylum seekers and refugees.

“UNE is skilled at delivering education online but for it to be effective on Nauru we realised we needed an in-depth understanding of the trainee teachers, their motivations and the day-to-day environmental, cultural and community factors influencing their studies,” she said. “Teachers on Nauru work in a very challenging environment, but we’ve shown that qualified teachers and role models can come from within their community.”

“Many of our trainee teachers had received only basic secondary schooling or had been out of the school system for years; most are pioneers, as the first in their family to study at university,” Pep said. “We have got to know them personally and connected with their families, because their family and community play a vital role in supporting them to complete. Some women have had one, two and three children throughout their studies. It’s a relationship that has become so close that children from two families have been named after UNE team members!”

“The biggest advantage of our program is that it has facilitated equity and access to education for people who would have been unable to relocate to Australia – like one of our teachers, who has six children. By educating Nauruan teachers locally and increasing teacher quality, the project is contributing to the development of local role model teachers, who will inspire more school leavers to become teachers and the Nauruan community to become lifelong learners.”