Taking nursing to remote communities

Nurse Tazarni Clarke is a carer by nature. It’s a large part of what drew her to nursing. That, and her desire to live remotely and work with Indigenous communities.

Now, with a Bachelor of Nursing from ACU under her belt and emergency nursing studies underway, the Guneijumurra woman is close to making her dream a reality.

“The outcomes for Indigenous people are often quite poor, and I’ve always had a part of me that wants to work with Indigenous people to help them achieve better health outcomes,” says Tazarni, who grew up on Yorta Yorta land in Echuca and has lived there all her life.

After completing her nursing degree in 2025, Tazarni enrolled in a 12-month Graduate Certificate in Emergency Nursing to build up her remote nursing toolkit.

“Hopefully I’ll smash that out this year,” she says. “Then I want to go remote and travel around and work with community. You only have really you and maybe a doctor out there – there’s not much support around you. It would be pretty cool.”

It takes determination and hard work. But those are things Tazarni knows all about.

Doing the work

Covid was in full swing when Tazarni did her VCE.

For someone who didn’t love school in the first place, studying online for Year 11 and parts of Year 12 made it even harder to concentrate and put in the effort. So when she received an early offer to study nursing at ACU, it really helped.

“It saved me a bit to be honest,” says Tazarni, who had applied through ACU’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Admission Process. “I found out midway through Year 12 and it took the pressure off for sure.”

To complete her degree, she travelled back and forth between Echuca and ACU’s Ballarat Campus for three years. She’d drive 2.5 hours to Ballarat for classes each week, stay with her grandparents and extended family, then drive back to Echuca for work.

Tazarni worked at a large home improvement store during her first year, then in her second year started at Echuca Regional Health as a RUSON (a registered undergraduate student of nursing) to help registered nurses while gaining clinical experience.

“I received an Indigenous cadetship, which I was very grateful for,” she says. “I worked two days a fortnight, but they were very flexible and allowed me to put my studies first. It was really good experience.”

Embracing every support

Study and work, combined with hours on the road, wasn’t easy. Tazarni says the support she received from her family and ACU really helped.

“My family were always very supportive,” says Tazarni, the third child in her family of five to go to university.

“Pop comes from an era when they didn’t really get much of an education, so I think to him, seeing his grandkids getting an education, going further in life, was good. And I had cousins in Ballarat who really helped me push through.”

Tazarni also received a couple of ACU scholarships – including the St Vincent’s Private Hospital Melbourne Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Nursing Scholarship, valued at $15,000, in her second year – which helped support placement and travel costs.

“I was very fortunate to get those,” she said. “My third placement was in Warrnambool for four weeks, so my St Vincent’s scholarship helped pay for accommodation costs and associated living expenses.

“And there was the fuel expense of travelling back and forth to uni every week, the costs of your textbooks and uniforms … it all adds up.

“I was lucky to have those scholarships, otherwise it would have put a lot of stress on me financially – I’d be working more to be able to study – so it was good to be able to alleviate that stress and concentrate on my studies.”

Landing on her feet

For Tazarni, studying did require considerable effort. And again, it was the support of people around her that made all the difference.

“Studying was always challenging in its own way,” she says.

“They can teach you, but it’s up to you to do the work and get it done. If I didn’t have my family there to push me and support me to get through it, I probably would have wanted to drop out just from the stress of it all. That was really challenging.

“Also, with Ballarat being a smaller campus, I had a lot of support from the lecturers and the Indigenous Higher Education Unit. They were always helping.

“They’d get me tutors and sit down and chat with me and see what was going on. It helped me get through it. If I hadn’t had that support and people willing to help, the outcome would have been a bit different.”

Now on the other side, Tazarni’s thriving. She’s working in the emergency department of Echuca’s hospital, she’s studying her postgraduate course on the side, and she’s on track for a rewarding career on Country.

As to precisely where – that’s excitingly yet to be determined.

“I was looking at working up at Thursday Island last year, but then I don’t mind Western Australia … there are beautiful beaches and good communities there too,” says Tazarni.

“I want to travel around and get agency work, stay somewhere for six months, keep going – something like that.

“I’m taking my time, but you’ve got to be patient with these things.”

Want to go places like Tazarni? Explore nursing at ACU. Then find out what scholarships you may be eligible for and apply.