Week 11

Social Class and Education

In this topic, I would like to share about the factors that contribute to the underachievement of students in rural schools. In fact, schools in rural areas should play a significant role in helping a nation educate its people. However, the bitter truth that we have to take is they often receive less attention from the government in its reform agenda. This situation undoubtedly affects the teaching and learning process to run smoothly. Johnson and Strange (2005) defined rural school as “the school which is located in a place inside or outside the metropolitan area and has a population of lesser than 2,500 people". The majority of students in these rural and remote schools come from low-income families in which parents are less educated and cannot afford their children sufficient educational resources. In addition, parents are not open to education reform, especially in matters involving the use of money. Teachers in rural schools said that it is difficult to introduce the use of ICT to students because of the parents' negative perception of the use of technology. This is because, from the parents' perspectives, the use of advanced technology in the classroom is only suitable for students in urban schools. Other than that, most of the school in rural areas does not only have limited access to facilities such as well-equipped libraries, media centres, and laboratories but the existing school infrastructure are most likely in poor conditions. Last but not least, the schools in a rural area often have problems with teacher shortages and less qualified teachers. This is because the majority of teachers that were sent to the rural areas are the new teachers that have less experience in teaching. As a result of all these shortcomings, students from rural and remote schools perform significantly worse in academic compared to students from urban schools.

In reality, however, they often receive less attention from the government in its reform

agenda.