Back to Projects

Team Name:

DataFrontiers


Team Members:


Evidence of Work

Pathways to Progress: Supporting Education in Vulnerable Regions

Project Info

Team Name


DataFrontiers


Team Members


Daniel

Project Description


To quantify heterogeneity of post-school education seekers across Australian local government areas, allowing for the development of more efficient and targeted strategies that address multiple regions simultaneously.


Data Story


We integrated 7 datasets from 2021 from the Australian Bureau of Statistics to identify trends in post-school uptake relative to those who did not undergo any schooling in all local government areas (LGAs) within Australia.

Using our own metric, the Study Progress Index (SPI), we identified regions within Australia that had high, medium, and low proportions of people pursuing post-school studies relative to those who did not pursue any schooling. Interestingly, these regions had their own unique characteristics and we identified areas of support required for the low SPI regions, including better housing infrastructure. We identified that for low SPI regions, better living conditions were more highly correlated with post-school education pursuit.

This provided evidence that while soft strategies for encouraging the uptake of post-school studies is beneficial, hard strategies, such as to providing better housing infrastructure would do better for low SPI regions. In other words, soft strategies are unlikely effective in these regions given their basic economic and social needs have not been met.

Nationally, we found that having access was associated with an increase in post-school education participation, irrespective of the SPI category an LGA was grouped to.

In summary, the SPI can be used to identify population level heterogeneity, allowing for the identification of regions that require targeted strategies to promote post-school education, including the factors that drive people to take advantage of these opportunities.


Evidence of Work

Video

Project Image

Team DataSets

Australian Statistical Geography Standard

Description of Use To integrates ABS LGA data with state information

Data Set

ABS Family and community by 2021 SA2 Nov 2023

Description of Use Used as covariates for modelling/inference

Data Set

ABS Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples by 2021 LGA Nov 2023

Description of Use Used as covariates for modelling/inference

Data Set

ABS Persons born overseas by 2021 LGA Nov 2023

Description of Use Used as covariates for modelling/inference

Data Set

ABS Socio-Economic Indexes for Areas (SEIFA) by 2021 LGA

Description of Use Variables used for modelling and inference. Most were removed as Study Progress Index captured similar information

Data Set

ABS Education and employment by 2021 LGA Nov 2023

Description of Use To quantify trends in post-school education in LGAs

Data Set

Challenge Entries

Factors that influence education, skills and training choices of young people

What factors impact the decisions of young people to commence and complete post school studies (Vocational Education and Training or higher education), including those that commence and complete an apprenticeship?

Go to Challenge | 17 teams have entered this challenge.