Rural Views: Schooling in Rural/Remote Communities

Abstract

This study is based on data collected for a large project that investigated social literacies and various aspects of the literacy culture of members of three rural communities in Queensland. This study draws on ideas from current critical literacy theory and research and post-structural writings. It reports a distinctive set of observations which aim to contribute to social and educational knowledge in respect of centre-margin relationships, literacy-empowerment relationships, the changing socio-economic and political landscape in rural Australia, and the need for a new conceptual landscape to define the foundations of a 'postprogressive pedagogy'. This study delineates some of the distinctive features of rural communities, and investigates the connections that people construct between schooling and economic change and the future, and between literacy and schooling and various aspects of the culture of the community. It interprets how schooling and literacy are socially constructed by members of the rural communities studied. One hundred and fifty-eight residents of three rural/remote communities were interviewed and their responses recorded and analysed. The residents represented the full range of ages and occupations. A selection of data from these interviews is taken for this study, based on themes and issues emerging from the data. A theoretical and empirical framework for the study is provided by reviewing current literature on rurality and rural living, on communities and schooling and cultural practices; literature on qualitative research methodology, specifically ethnomethodology, methods of interview analysis and the application of these methods, is also reviewed. Ethnomethodology is used for this study and the specific analytic procedures of Membership Categorisation Analysis. This specific type of qualitative research methodology is chosen because of its power to take the everyday conversations of community members and, through analytical procedures, to make explicit in those members accounts the interaction of their experiences with the organisational and social forces (the social realities) which permeate their relationships with one another and with the context of the community where they live, work and recreate. This study makes use of recent systematic procedures developed for interrogating interview data. It adds to the research literature on ideologies of family and community literacies and social practices in Australian rural communities. The study provides information relevant to rural development planners, and education policy developers and curriculum writers, for the purpose of enhancing schooling for rural students and better understanding of rural lifestyles. This study's focus on rural communities has highlighted the complexities and diversities of the rural communities that are studied. The different approaches and debates about 'defining rural' must continue, and researchers must avoid promoting a unidimensional category of 'rural'. The changing and developing nature of the rural communities has also been prominent in this study. The implications of these complexities and changes are that rural communities should be studied regularly so that the effects of the changes can be traced and documented. There is a varied set of understandings among rural dwellers about education. For some, education is bringing knowledge and skills to life in the rural location and enabling residents to avail themselves of the urban offerings that may enhance their occupations and leisure activities thus utilising the benefits of two cultures to their best advantage. For others, there are the expectations that education will enable them to move away from the rural areas, to go to the city, to take up other careers, to lead a different lifestyle. Hypotheses and generalisations that express negative approaches to rural cultures and to rural education must be reduced and the positive aspects promoted. Any centre-margin discourse must be scrutinised for its relevance and the feasibility of the assumptions on which it is based. Education policy developers, social researchers and rural policy planners need to re-evaluate the philosophical premises on which the current concept of success is based: success for the individual school student, success for education and schooling, and success in adult life. A number of recommendations are developed in an attempt to make a vision of excellence in rural education a central part of rural agenda. Curriculum in rural schools needs to be matched to rural resources and rural occupations and lifestyles, and to encourage enterprise. While education remains a centralised provision, it needs to provide a context for training in the communication skills that shape rural people's views of their communities. Rural secondary students may be disadvantaged by not having access to a wide range of curriculum offerings, and at tertiary level by inequities (mostly financial) of access, but technology could be used to assist in broadening the range of offerings at secondary level, and library resources across the country could be better utilised. Social and education research could benefit from further studies using this methodology, for example, studies in mining communities, rural ethnic communities, rural tourist communities.