“That ICPA (Aust) lobbies the Department of Education to ensure Schools of Distance Education are meeting their legal obligations under the Disability Discrimination Act 1992, the Disability Standards for Education 2005 and international treaties so that the learning and well-being needs of every rural and remote student are properly met at their level wherever they live.”
Schools have legal obligations under the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (DDA) and the Disability Standards for Education 2005 (the Standards). The DDA and the Standards are federal laws that protect the rights of students with disability. The DDA supersedes all state and territory legislation. Further, Australia is a signatory to international treaties including the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities that protect human rights and have agreed that all children including those with a disability can access education and training to reach their full potential.
Since 2008, Schools of Distance Education (SoDE) in Queensland have experienced huge increases in enrolment. For example, from 2008 to 2018 one SoDE had a 415% increase in enrolment and another SoDE a 505% increase. A large proportion of these increases are due to medical enrolments moving to distance education for help as students are not able to access suitable education to meet their needs in mainstream face-to-face school settings. For one particular SoDE in Queensland, in 2021 medical enrolments were 24% of total full-time enrolments and in 2024 are 32.5% of total full-time enrolments. SoDE are not adequately equipped and resourced for this changing demographic in terms of the mindset of school leadership, school policies, level of understanding of medical conditions and their complexities, as well as suitably qualified staff and access to disability workers and professionals to appropriately support the needs of these students. This is despite them making up a third of full-time home-based enrolments. What is happening in practice does not always meet the standard Education Queensland has set, let alone legal obligations under the DDA, the Standards and international instruments. Geographically isolated students with disability and specific learning needs are “doubly disadvantaged” in this system.
The DDA states that: Indirect disability discrimination occurs when a person with disability
• is required to comply with a requirement or condition but they cannot comply because of their disability, and
• that requirement or condition is not reasonable in the circumstances. … a failure to make reasonable adjustments to assist the person with disability to meet requirements or conditions is indirect disability discrimination.
Case Study 1
A geographically isolated distance education student was assessed by teachers and the parent was advised that their child was intellectually impaired. The school never followed up on the assessment, with the odd teacher making adjustments to the student’s learning program. Later, when the student was diagnosed with visual processing disorders the parent sent reports to the school but no adjustments were made to the student’s learning program, the only additional support provided being reading lessons with a teacher aide. Despite the parent/home tutor contacting the guidance officer and support staff, no direct learning support was provided and no one really took responsibility to provide support, despite the huge pressure put on the student and home tutor that the student meet expectations for each year level.
Case Study 2
A rural and remote student with multiple medical diagnosis has been subjected to indirect disability discrimination from the school where they are enrolled. An early PLR stated only how the parent/home tutor should support the disabilities and did not include any specific requirements of teachers. Some individual teachers made necessary adjustments but none seemed to know about or follow through with recording those adjustments via the NCCD*. No teachers seemed to be aware that there was a PLR in place. The home tutor approached the school’s Special Education Services for additional supports for their child, explaining that they had to do school seven days a week to get through the work and it was placing enormous strain on their family. They were told they needed to just submit work returns and assessments by the due date and let their child fail in order to get supports. For a student that is intellectually capable of succeeding, this is very damaging to mental health. In another example, a drama assessment required students to watch a video with sound turned off and analyse non-verbal communication. The home tutor contacted the teacher to explain their child is autistic and is specifically disabled in reading non-verbal cues and this task was not a suitable assessment. The teacher explicitly said there would be no adjustment.
Case Study 3
A rural and remote student suffering from trauma and anxiety, and later diagnosed with ADHD, had a teacher in year 6 refuse to mark an assessment that was submitted late. The parent/home tutor was in regular contact with the teacher so was aware of the student’s condition. The parent/home tutor had not applied for an extension ‘as a precaution’ as to do so for every formative and summative assessment for every subject is an unreasonable expectation on home tutors/parents. When the home tutor requested the teacher provide additional support to the student in a short one-on-one tutorial session they were told “that’s the home tutor’s job” and they didn’t have the time. This was a reasonable adjustment to support the needs of the student but it was refused. In another instance, when the student questioned the new format for on-line lessons (increased 45 mins to 1hr), the teacher proceeded to tell the student that they had to attend the lesson for the full hour or they would get a D. Later, when one-on-one tutorial support was requested of the teacher to help understanding of live lessons, the student’s concerns were dismissed and they were told to watch the lesson recording. This heightened the student’s anxiety and they have since disengaged from the subject. Case Study 4 A geographically isolated distance education family with two children who previously had been provided learning support were advised by the school that the system for supporting students with learning support needs had changed and it was now up to the subject teacher to decide whether the child needed learning support. Despite reports and evidence from previous years, it got that difficult to get support that the parents/home tutor gave up in the end.
Case Study 5
A rural and remote parent of a student with multiple medical diagnosis has had to fight the school year after year for access to case management and support for their child despite an established history and multiple specialist reports. Without these supports and reasonable adjustments for their child’s disabilities, the learning environment is not equitable. There is a lack of knowledge amongst teaching staff on how to support students with ADHD and autism, yet they decide who gets support and what reasonable adjustments, if any, are provided.
*The Nationally Consistent Collection of Data on School Students with Disability References: https://www.nccd.edu.au/wider-support-materials/australian-law-0?parent=%2Fdisabilitystandards-education&activity=%2Fwider-support-materials%2Four-rights-0&step=0
