OPINION | Better career guidance, financial assistance, and ongoing support can help disadvantaged young people gain educational qualifications.
Poverty has a habit of chiselling a chasm between a young person’s ambitions and their opportunities. Hard work and talent alone aren’t enough to get them to the other side.
Now our national aspirations depend on more of them making it across.
By 2050, the government wants 80% of working-age Australians to have a tertiary qualification, up from 60%. We won’t reach that target unless we remove the barriers that stop young people experiencing disadvantage from earning degrees, diplomas and trade qualifications.