Kinne Ring: Country University Centre manager to ‘empower’ students
Kempsey’s Kinne Ring has returned to her hometown to help champion better opportunities for university students as she heads up a new centre designed to help empower rural communities.
Mid-North Coast
Don't miss out on the headlines from Mid-North Coast. Followed categories will be added to My News.
- Is this Port’s most mischievous marsupial?
- ‘We just need some help’: The cost of COVID travel industry
Nelson Mandela said it best when he opined that it was not beyond our power to create a world in which all children have access to good education.
And that is the type of mentality that resonates with Kempsey professional Kinne Ring.
Ms Ring, 25, has returned home from Wollongong to head-up one of nine national university centres that are being rolled out to support and empower local students to have quality access to higher-education opportunities.
She will oversee the day-to-day operations of the new Country University Centre (CUC) at Kempsey, and help mentor students who are studying online through an established tertiary education provider.
The CUC, a joint federal and state government project, will be in operation from semester one, 2021.
It will offer access to high-speed internet, online technology and helpful resources to assist students with studies.
After some years away studying and working in Newcastle and Wollongong, Ms Ring said she was thrilled to be back making a difference in her home town.
“Growing up in the area, I knew so many students who didn’t want to move away from their family, they didn’t want to make a big change,” she said.
“For many people it was going away to Newcastle, Sydney or Coffs Harbour, but ultimately they do need to travel away for further study.
“Kempsey is a small town, and university can be an abstract concept or a daunting prospect. “If you are first in family to go to university, even going to a place like the CSU campus in Port Macquarie can be quite daunting.
“I think having the centre locally, being able to walk past it, or know someone who goes there, will be able to make a huge difference.”
Ms Ring attended Kempsey High School and was the 2012 school captain. She has worked in higher education for around six years, having completed a Bachelor of Business, major in Marketing at the University of Newcastle (UON).
She then moved to Woollongong to work in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) at the University of Wollongong (UOW).
“There was a large focus on building the aspirations of students from equity and diversity backgrounds to pursue higher education,” she said.
“In particular, increasing the amount of female and indigenous Australian students into STEM degrees.
“This work was truly rewarding, and I have been fortunate to be able to work with students from primary school to postgraduate university in a broad range from programs.”
A champion for helping marginalised communities, Ms Ring said the CUC would be instrumental in breaking down barriers for students to access higher-education support.
Broadly, around 49 per cent of students at the CUC are ‘First in Family’ (the first member to study at university) and almost all are from a low- or medium-socio economic background.
The biggest cohort is undergraduate, followed by post graduate and then a small amount of sub-bachelor students (diplomas etc).
Kempsey Shire Council and the CUC Macleay Valley Board were one of nine successful grant applicants for the Federal Government’s $53.2 million Regional University Centres program.
Kempsey Shire Mayor and CUC Macleay Valley Board Chairperson Liz Campbell said: “Both council and the CUC Board have long recognised that local education is fundamental to our community,” she said.
“The parents of Kempsey have for too many generations seen children leave the shire to go to university.
“We have worked towards creating a university presence for Kempsey since 2012 and now, with the support of the State and Federal Governments working with the council, the community board and the CUC model, we will have one in the heart of Kempsey’s CBD.”
Cowper federal Nationals MP Pat Conaghan said the CUC would provide improved education and employment opportunities for young people in the Macleay Valley.
“I want young people living in Kempsey and the Macleay Valley to have the same study options as their city counterparts, so that young people don’t have to move to Newcastle or Sydney to gain higher education,” he said.
“Equally, I want businesses on the Mid North Coast to have access to skilled local individuals to employ.
The CUC proudly partners with three cornerstone university partners, CQUniveristy, Charles Sturt University and the University of New England.