Rural and Remote Education - Qld
Rural
and Remote Education - Qld
Community meeting in Doomadgee,
6 October 1999 - notes
The meeting was attended
by 17 members of the community including four elders who were members
of the Stolen Generations. From HREOC: Chris Sidoti, Human Rights Commissioner;
Lady Pearl Logan, Queensland Co-Commissioner; and two Commission staff.
School attendance
"School attendance
is usually around 60%. It generally starts off well at the beginning of
the year but declines as the year progresses."
"We tried doing a
bus run for a while to encourage children to attend school. It didn't
work very well though. A lot of children used to hide when they heard
the bus coming."
"Sometimes there
are problems in school that keep children away. Some stay away because
of bullying and conflict in the schoolyard. Children sometimes bring community
problems into the school."
"There is a pre-school
but not many children attend. They are excluded because of community grudges.
Some of these feuds between families go back 20 or 30 years. My young
kids have never been to pre-school because of old grudges. You'd think
we could work together for the kids. They don't know about the grudges."
"There are no role
models for these kids. I teach grade 6 kids and yet I go down to the river
and see 12 year old kids who I've never seen before."
"At the beginning
of the year the police put up a sign saying that children have to attend
school and that if they do not their parents will be fined. Imposing fines
on parents when their children don't attend school is not a good idea.
It will only result in people being dragged into the criminal justice
system if they can't pay the fine."
"Maybe financial
penalties [for non-attendance at school] could be imposed on parents pursuant
to a council by-law rather than through the criminal justice system."
Literacy
"Many parents in
the community are concerned that their children cannot read or write."
"My son is 19. He
has been attending pre-school and school in Doomadgee for the past 17
years. He still cannot read or write."
"Children drop out
of school because they are told they are nobody. They need encouragement.
When I was a child someone told me I was clever and that they believed
in me. That gave me the encouragement I needed to learn how to read and
write." [Aboriginal elder, a woman]
Teaching approach
"The kids want more
sport and manual arts. They want to go out bush. They need practical training
as part of their schooling too. They don't want to spend all of their
time in the classroom."
"Indigenous languages
are not taught here. They should bring the old people down to the school
so that they can teach the children about language and culture. The school
is not really serious about culture. They might employ people to teach
it but they are not really committed."
Role of parents
"We have problems
when mothers don't care for their children. There is neglect and then
the child gets no schooling. Parents should give their children more encouragement
to go to school."
"Some kids stay up
late waiting for their parents to come home at night, then they can't
wake up for school the next morning."
Relations between
the school and the community
"There needs to be
more communication between the school and the community. The school should
go out to the community more."
"There is a lack
of communication between the school and the community. The teachers need
to talk to the parents more. They need to come into the parents' homes
and show them respect. If children see the parents and the school working
together, attendance will improve and they will respond better to their
teachers."
"A community school
run by Indigenous people for Indigenous people may be the answer. It should
be a bilingual school and it should teach Indigenous culture."
Alcohol and other
community problems
"There are big problems
in Doomadgee with drugs and alcohol and gambling. There are people selling
'sly' grog so that they can gamble. The children are the silent victims
of this. These things have been introduced into the community on the basis
that people have the right to do so. Yet these people are denying children
their right to a decent quality of life."
"Some kids go away
to do Years 11 and 12. They come back to Doomadgee and find that there
are no jobs, so they just start drinking and having babies. Other kids
coming up through the system see this happening so they don't see any
point going up to Year 12."
"When we [the elders]
were going to school there was no drinking and no gambling."
"When we make decisions
they must be made communally and collectively in the Aboriginal way. When
people say they have the right to drink, they should consider the communal
well-being."
"White society has
imposed its values on us and this has created mental trauma for Aboriginal
people. They introduced many of the problems that are destroying our society.
White people take the view that they know what is best for us. They are
making all the decisions but still things are getting worse and not better.
Blacks and whites need to work together in partnership to solve these
problems."
"We went before the
local council to discuss these issues but they refused to talk to us.
They just left us sitting there."
Health issues
"The school offers
free lunches for students three days a week."
"Some children have
hearing problems which affect their education. They can't get the special
support they need to deal with this problem."
"The Government is
putting millions into Aboriginal health and education but it is still
getting worse. It hasn't occurred to the Government that they are going
about it the wrong way. They still have the mentality that they know what's
best for us."
Indigenous culture
and identity
"Principals and teachers
must be educated in Aboriginal ways."
"Teachers who work
in Indigenous communities should be carefully screened for their knowledge
and understanding of Indigenous cultural issues."
"Government cuts
to bilingual education for Indigenous people is another form of assimilation."
"Indigenous people
have been taught the wrong history. When I was a boy we were taught that
Captain Cook discovered Australia. This gave Indigenous people an inferiority
complex. It made us want to be white and not black."
"The system was created
by Europeans for Europeans and not for Indigenous people. We go into the
system 2 or 3 years behind non-Indigenous people because we are taught
to hunt and to gather, not to play scrabble and add and subtract. We are
set up to fail. It is culturally inappropriate for white people to be
teaching Indigenous children."
"We acknowledge the
good things about white Australia but they must also respect the good
things about us and our culture. It's a two way process."
"White people don't
have the answers for black people. The Indigenous culture is a spiritual
culture and you are a material culture. Your culture does not care about
the identity of the child, only the child's academic achievement. The
child has to be able to answer the question 'Who am I?'. We should have
Reconciliation but we should also understand that we are different. We
have to teach our children the spiritual values of our culture."
"Once the children
know who they are, once they are accepted as equals, we will see Aboriginal
doctors and lawyers working with the white community but also keeping
their own culture intact."
Children from outlying
communities
"Some of the children
from the outstations don't want to come into Doomadgee because there is
too much drinking and fighting and conflict. They want to stay in their
own communities. We should look at ways of enabling them to do this. They
should set up a School of the Air for the outstations. Or maybe they could
send teachers and health teams out there. That way the children can get
their education but can also learn hunting and fishing and traditional
practices."
"One outstation has
been taking Japanese students who pay to stay there and learn about our
traditional medicines and our way of life. This pays for the outstation's
upkeep. It gets no government funding. We would like to expand the scheme
so that more people can go there and learn from us."
Last
updated 2 December 2001.