NSW public school audit reveals growing number of schools with 40+ demountable classrooms
More than 90 NSW schools have squeezed more demountables onto their playgrounds in the past year alone. FIND OUT how many “temporary” classrooms, canteens and toilets your school has.
Education
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Students at a school decimated in the Northern Rivers flood disaster are still learning in temporary classrooms more than three years later, while more than 90 schools statewide squeezed more demountables onto their playgrounds in the past year alone.
The NSW Department of Education’s latest audit of school demountables – portable temporary structures used as classrooms, toilet blocks and other facilities – has revealed the total number in use across the public education system has fallen from 6,414 in 2024 to 6,136 this year.
However, The Daily Telegraph’s analysis shows there are now more schools with 40 or more demountable structures on site than at any other time in the past four years, rising from five in 2022 to 11 in 2025.
Carlingford West Public School remains by far the worst-affected school in the state with 72 temporary classrooms and 15 other demountable facilities, due to be removed at the end of the year when new buildings are completed.
Teachers and students at both Northbourne Public School in Marsden Park and The Rivers Secondary College Richmond River High Campus in Lismore are working and learning in 61 demountables, while the neighbouring Riverbank Public School and The Ponds High School have 57 demountables apiece.
Richmond River High School P&C president Megan Bennett was not surprised to learn the school, which has operating entirely out of demountables beside Southern Cross University since its original site was inundated in the 2022 Lismore floods, had the second-highest number in the state.
“It’s not a record that we want to hold for much longer,” she said.
Planning for a new build is underway and a flood-resilient site has been purchased but the P&C is “increasingly concerned at the pace of the project”, which is not expected to be completed until 2027.
“If we are not careful, an entire cohort of students will have attended a temporary school of demountables for all of their high school years,” Ms Bennett said.
“Keeping the school together, on one site post-flood was an essential part of its recovery, to maintain some stability and structure for students who in other parts of their lives were in turmoil.
“However, the very real consequence has been movement from our school to others, within the public sector and to the independent system quite simply by families in search of more immediate certainty and wider subject choice and facilities.”
In Sydney, Castle Hill High School P&C president Katherine Kirk fears the school’s 51 demountable classrooms present a safety risk to children and students dashing between buildings during wet weather.
“Modern day demountables automatically have walkways built with them but our school somehow missed out,” she said.
“There have been no permanent buildings promised or planned so this is an issue that needs to be addressed, especially when you have long periods of rain like we have recently had.”
The NSW government has prioritised removing the oldest demountables on school sites first, an approach which has seen the number of demountables at 24 different schools reduced to zero in the last year.
Eastwood Public School in Ryde has this year swapped nine temporary classrooms for a new multistorey building including additional administrative facilities, to the delight of parents and principal Michael Kammerer.
Acting Education Minister Courtney Houssos said under the Minns government more than 800 new classrooms have been added across NSW.
“When we came to government, we inherited a significant public schools infrastructure backlog,” she said.
“We know there’s more work to do, but rebuilding the state’s public education system won’t happen overnight.”
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