Albany’s Vital Signs: Barriers to entry key to contextualising and improving education and employment outcomes

The recent release of the Albany Community Foundation’s Vital Signs report was the culmination of more than a year’s work collating information about the community. As the first of its kind, the report serves as a baseline for future reporting and a catalyst for change. Earlier in the project’s development, four themes most relevant to the Albany community were identified: health and resilience, housing and financial stress, belonging and education and employment. In this four-week series, the Albany Advertiser is diving deeper into each area by talking to those involved in the focus groups behind the report. Education and Employment For those in the know, the data found in the Education and Employment section of ACF’s Vital Signs report was not surprising because they were already on the ground working on solutions. To others in the community, figures such as a 44 per cent high school completion rate might be surprising. Another figure showing 11 per cent of Albany’s population aged between 15 and 24 are disengaged — meaning they are neither earning nor learning — might be disappointing. The fact that the health care and social assistance sector employs 16.5 per cent of Albany’s workforce to make it our biggest industry, might be eye-opening. Albany Chamber of Commerce and Industry chief executive Kristen Pyrz-Brown said the figures could become a lot less surprising once they were placed within the proper context. “The difference is that these census results took in the whole population and once you think about the ageing population we have here, you think about how university wasn’t an option because it meant leaving family and lots of money to pay,” she said. “There is an ageing population who didn’t have access to that degree pathway or were not even being encouraged to finish high school. “None of these are a surprise once you look at them a bit more.” It has been compulsory since 2008 for those aged up to 17 to either remain in school or undertake training or work, which means high school completion is naturally expected to rise. Ms Pyrz-Brown said individuals in the education sector hoped the figures, particularly the 11 per cent disengagement figure, would “galvanise” decision makers “to think outside the square” when different proposals are made. “Let’s be honest, the school system is not for everyone,” she said. “What I would hope is that it is used as serious reference material when we see decisions being made.” Vital Signs project co-ordinator Katie Arbuckle said that as the figures were drawn out, it became about understanding the underlying barriers to education and employment. “Why is it that this cohort of 11 per cent are not earning or learning?” she said. “What are the barriers for the more than 40 per cent not in the workforce?” ACF’s James Leiper said he got a better understanding of some of those barriers during conversations with several Albany school principals in recent weeks. He said he was almost brought to tears hearing how many families were struggling to the extent that they might send children to school without food. “I did not realise the schools had breakfast clubs,” he said. “Pretty much all the schools do it and they rely on volunteer time from teachers, some might get paid to go in earlier to do it but then there’ll be the chaplain going off to get the food from stores. “It’s amazing that there are people in the community that do that, but the fact it is needed is harrowing.” He said an inability for some families to afford uniforms, transport options to school and school supplies was an immediate barrier to education because it left students feeling like they did not belong. “ACF are looking at a program where we can get uniforms to kids or help kids take part in extracurricular activities like school camps or excursions,” he said. “It’s also compulsory in some areas to have your own device like a computer, which is great if you can afford it. “So we got about $15,000 worth of funding to Albany Senior High School last year to get refurbished devices which are a lot cheaper than new devices but are still perfectly functional. “We’re going to do the same sort of thing at North Albany Senior High School next year.” Clear barriers also exist to Albany’s workforce with data from the 2021 census indicating a participation rate of 57.3 per cent, but figures from the June quarter of this year show the City at just 2.1 per cent unemployment. The split between full-time work (52 per cent) and part-time work (37 per cent) is also noticeably different to regional WA (58 per cent full-time, 29 per cent part-time), Geraldton (56 per cent, 32 per cent) and Australia (56 per cent, 51 per cent). Some of the barriers to education flow into the workforce, while others, such as a lack of available childcare, have already been identified and are starting to be addressed. For every four children in Albany, there is only one available childcare placement. Ms Pyrz-Brown said we can no longer think of the primary carer just being the mother because many households require both parents to work, but factors like childcare unavailability often lead to both parents working less than full time. “So there isn’t full participation from either of them,” she said. “I feel like the childcare issue is moving incrementally forward, but I also think there is a participation rate issue potentially around mental health or people who are not deemed to be fully employable that needs addressing. “What can that look like in terms of job carving or being more inclusive in the workplace for people who can’t do a 40-hour/week job in an office staring at a screen?” Ms Pyrz-Brown said other stats she would have liked to see in the report would have drawn out underemployment rates and a breakdown of the participation rate by gender, but both stats were tough to drill down to get. “As a first attempt at a Vital Signs document, it has been phenomenal and great to be a part of,” she said. “I definitely think that for us and all the other go-getters connected to it, we want to know how we can do better and how we can build on this to put it on steroids — metaphorically.” The full report can be found on the ACF website.