Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Jo Malcolm-Black: Graeme Dingle Foundation CEO on thousands of students not enrolled in school for more than a year

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Jo Malcolm-Black: Graeme Dingle Foundation CEO on thousands of students not enrolled in school for more than a year · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Some pretty grim numbers around truancy out this morning. Around
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  Speaker 1: one thy one hundred and ten students weren't enrolled in
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  Speaker 1: school for more than a year in twenty twenty four.
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  Speaker 1: Two thirds of those ages between twelve and fourteen years old.
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  Speaker 1: Students are put down as not enrolled if their absence
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  Speaker 1: is unexplained for twenty days or more so. Joe Malcolm
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  Speaker 1: Black is the CEO of the Graham Dingle Foundation. This
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  Speaker 1: is the charity that's worried about all of this, and
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  Speaker 1: she joins me this morning.
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  Speaker 2: Hello Joe, Good morning Andrew.
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  Speaker 1: This is pretty dire, isn't it. These kids aren't just wagging,
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  Speaker 1: They are choosing not to be educated for a year.
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  Speaker 2: It is pretty worrying.
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  Speaker 1: Why is it happening?
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  Speaker 2: Wow? It's an interesting one obviously, at least this is
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  Speaker 2: a pretty tricky chilt for young people. There are lots
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  Speaker 2: of complex things happening in their lives. What we are
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  Speaker 2: seeing at the Foundation, and we've noticed it since after
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  Speaker 2: the twenty twenty lockdowns, is that a number of young
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  Speaker 2: people are flying under the radar there just becoming less
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  Speaker 2: connected to their friends, they're learning in their communities, and
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  Speaker 2: what that tends to do is that tends to have
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  Speaker 2: a long impact normal things like not just on things
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  Speaker 2: like confidence, anxiety, loss of direction, but it can have
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  Speaker 2: a really negative long term impact on their well being,
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  Speaker 2: their educational outcomes, and of course the future. So what
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  Speaker 2: can start something pretty small can happen massive impact on
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  Speaker 2: their lives.
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  Speaker 1: It's not just the kid's choice here. The parents are complicent,
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  Speaker 1: So why are they letting the kids get away with us?
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  Speaker 2: Young people, if you've got some in your lives, are
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  Speaker 2: complicated animals, and it is really hard to the place
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  Speaker 2: blame entirely on parents or on students. What tends to
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  Speaker 2: happen with young people at the stage is there are
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  Speaker 2: a lot of complex things going a lot around in
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  Speaker 2: their lives that are needing to be managed. They will
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  Speaker 2: be dealing with developmental, social, emotional, and environmental factors. Sometimes
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  Speaker 2: the parents just don't know, sometimes they do. Sometimes there
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  Speaker 2: are complex things happening happening in their families. The best
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  Speaker 2: way that you can turn this around, or the best
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  Speaker 2: way that you can can change this from happening, is
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  Speaker 2: to try and engage early with young people and provide
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  Speaker 2: consistent support about urge and that will reduce the risk
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  Speaker 2: of of disengagement. It's really something you can start at five.
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  Speaker 2: You can actually start it at four things like building
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  Speaker 2: coping skills as preschoolers, but you can start it at
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  Speaker 2: five with creating some fun, interact experiential sessions that help
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  Speaker 2: young people stay connected with Some of the feed that
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  Speaker 2: we got during COVID around some of our promo school
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  Speaker 2: kids is how much their attendance school happened. We know
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  Speaker 2: it attending here, we can classes. It's a habit that
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  Speaker 2: resilience is built. You are born with some inateability, but
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  Speaker 2: you you augment that by help. But they're learning their experience.
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  Speaker 2: This is not a child doesn't wake up at five
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  Speaker 2: and say I've got to disengage from school. Now. There
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  Speaker 2: is a whole lot of commutative factors that cause that
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  Speaker 2: to happen. You can keep them connected by staying alongside
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  Speaker 2: them and helping them learn with their peers about why
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  Speaker 2: being engaged and connected to their colleagues and connected to
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  Speaker 2: their schools, connected to their communities is important.
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  Speaker 1: Now, this was an election issue, So is the work
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  Speaker 1: that the government doing on truancy working and what could
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  Speaker 1: they do more?
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  Speaker 2: It is hard to say at the stage. Obviously we
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  Speaker 2: really support the government getting involved in this in this
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  Speaker 2: because it will change the impact of how our next
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  Speaker 2: duration has grown. So we think it's a really good
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  Speaker 2: thing to do. What we advocate for is working towards
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  Speaker 2: community approaches that really really does take your whole community. Obviously,
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  Speaker 2: supportive families and communities are important engagement of skilled teachers,
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  Speaker 2: but social services and community organizations as well are important
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  Speaker 2: are important to we will all create an environment that
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  Speaker 2: want to stay connected to and parents support and the
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  Speaker 2: government feels as valid. All of those things will create
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  Speaker 2: a social system that can make this happen for us.
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  Speaker 1: Jo American Black. I thank you so much for getting
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  Speaker 1: up early for us and show as the CEO of
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  Speaker 1: the Graham Dingle Foundation. For more from Early Edition with
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  Speaker 1: Ryan Bridge.
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  Speaker 2: Listen live to News Talks it Be from five am weekdays,
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  Speaker 2: or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.