Clarence Valley school funding for 2023 revealed

The Clarence Valley’s richest school has raked in more than $77 million funding in five years, tightly held school statistics reveals. See the income for the region’s schools in 2023 in our interactive.

A NSW school classroom. Pictrue: Angelo Velardo.

An independent analysis of school financial records from the MySchool website has shown the massive amount of money some schools make every year, and how little some schools make do with.

However, a number of the schools with lower gross income actually enjoyed a higher income per student than the large private schools.

The figures reveal Grafton High School had a higher gross income than any other school in the Clarence Valley.

The school made a gross income of $77.6 million, according to financial records from the combined past five years.

Its total gross income per student in 2021 was $18,928 and it saw a 2.3 per cent rise in total income from 2017 to 2021.

Generic image of teacher teaching students inside a classroom.

The second richest school was Maclean High School which made a gross income of $72.7 million over the combined five years and in 2021 its gross income per student was $19,091.

While the third richest Clarence Valley school was South Grafton High School, which saw an incredible 30.4 per cent rise in income in the space of five years.

South Grafton High School’s 2021 gross income per student was just higher than Maclean High School’s — sitting at $19,905.

A NSW Department of Education spokeswoman said money should not be seen as a determining factor in a school’s performance.

“The greatest positive influence on student engagement and education outcomes is quality teaching,” she said.

“That’s why we are looking to support teachers with providing more admin staff to allow them more time to teach, working to increase their pay to reflect the value we place on them and employing more teachers and school counsellors through the Education Future Fund.

“We will be working closely with the Commonwealth Government to bring about a fair funding outcome for public schools.”

Data has been curated to feature schools that have taken the most gross revenue over a five-year period.

In the interactive below there is a breakdown of school revenue by student number.

Old Bonalbo Public School had the lowest gross income of any school in the Clarence. It made $2.5 million over the five year period.

In 2021, its gross income per student was $72,957 – among the highest of any school in the region.

Not far ahead of it was Nymboida Public School – the Clarence school with the second lowest gross income, making $2.6 million from 2017 to 2021.

Nymboida Public School however had a lower gross income per student in 2021 than Old Bonalbo Public School.

Its gross income per student was $48,242.

The Clarence Valley school income figures from the MySchool website include all fees, charges and parental contributions as well as state and federal Government funding and any other private sources over the five years from 2017 to 2021.

It does not include any deductions for capital works or debt servicing. The analysis does not include special schools or schools that did not have complete financial data in MySchool for one or more of the five years.

Generic photo of school students. Picture: Sarah Marshall

A spokeswoman from the NSW Department of Education further clarified how money is doled out to schools.

“All public and private students in NSW receive funding through the School Resourcing Standard (SRS), which provides a combination of federal and state funding for each student,” she said.

“The NSW Department of Education makes sure resources are given out fairly, efficiently and openly to individual NSW government schools through the Resource Allocation Model (RAM).

“This goes beyond the SRS funding model, by supporting the unique NSW context and system characteristics.

RAM provides schools with needs-based funding calculated using three base loadings – location, per capita and professional learning – and four equity loadings – low-level adjustment for disability, Aboriginal background, socio-economic background and English language proficiency.

“Targeted funding is also provided for students with special needs.”

CLARENCE VALLEY SCHOOLS WITH THE HIGHEST FUNDING

Grafton High School – $77.6 million

Maclean High School – $72 million

South Grafton High School – $61.3 million

McAuley Catholic College – $51.5 million

Grafton Public School – $49 million

South Grafton Public School – $43 million

Clarenza Valley Anglican School – $37 million

Westlawn Public School – $31 million

Pacific Valley Christian School – $28 million

Yamba Public School – $22 million

CLARENCE VALLEY SCHOOLS WITH THE LOWEST FUNDING

Old Bonalbo Public School – $2.5 million

Nymboida Public School – $2.6 million

Drake Public School – $2.7 million

Rappville Public School – $2.8 million

Baryulgil Public School – $2.8 million

Mummulgum Public School – $2.9 million

Cowper Public School – $3.4 million

Tucabia Public School – $4 million

Wooli Public School – $4.4 million

Chatsworth Island Public School – $4.6 million