Welcome to the CGRIS Roundtable Discussion

Positive achievements at school provide children with vital skills that open up opportunities and offer improved life outcomes. Without adequate literacy and numeracy skills they will find it difficult to take advantage of the opportunities in the mainstream.

It is well established that a minimum of 80% attendance is required to achieve the required educational benchmarks and successful education outcomes to better equip people to have more life choices such as benefitting from economic opportunities that arise from enhanced urban status and connections to the wider community.

The reasons for non-attendance are complex and most jurisdictions have strategies to improve attendance. Due to a lack of rigorous evaluation in this area, however, there is little confirmed evidence of what works. In addition to the issue of school non-attendance, attending school without achieving learning benchmarks is also an issue for some students.

The Coordinator General for Remote Indigenous Services has stressed the importance of education and school attendance to the achievement of the Closing the Gaps targets in his last three reports.

To discuss these issues and help identify programs that are working in remote communities, the Coordinator General convened a Roundtable on August 25. The purpose of the Roundtable was to contribute to the broader discussion on what works to increase school attendance and attainment by building on the work that has already been undertaken by individuals, agencies and organisations and commitments made by government for action in this area.

The following pages provide information on the Roundtable and its outcomes.