Socio-Economic Status

Students' family backgrounds (parents’ education and occupation) have an influence on students’ educational outcomes. In addition to these, a school’s geographical location and the proportion of Indigenous students a school caters for need to be considered when summarising educational advantage or disadvantage at the school level. 

The myschool.edu.au web site displays an index of Community Socio-Educational Advantage (ICSEA) which provides a scale that numerically represents the relative magnitude of this influence. Most Schools lie between an index of 900-1100. A School with an index less than 900 would be considered to be disadvantaged.

In a sense, this measure is another characteristic of the School Culture.

The Gonski recommendations were basically about providing more assistance to Schools with low index values. Many Educationalists, e.g. Prof Richard Teese, argue very strongly for this - click HERE to see Prof Tees interviewed on the 7.30 Report.

Click HERE for a fact sheet about the index, click HERE for a guide to understand the index.

Watch the myschool introductory video on the HOME page to find this index.