Success for Aboriginal students requires action

PETER WILSON outlines the changes needed to be made to the draft recommendations from DET's Review of Aboriginal Education.

There are two overwhelming findings that should come from the Review of Aboriginal Education. The first is that the system and all levels of government have to work in partnership with Aboriginal parents, caregivers and communities to strengthen and build the self esteem, health and well being of Aboriginal children and students. This can only be done if Aboriginal culture, both at the general and the local community level is understood, acknowledged and respected by our schools and the other institutions of the broader society. Acknowledgement by our schools and TAFE institutions that Aboriginal identity is an intrinsic part of the being of Aboriginal students is fundamental for the development of these students' self esteem. A strong self esteem is essential for young Aboriginal people to achieve and progress in the education system.

The second finding that must come from the Review is that our system is overwhelmingly failing to provide functional literacy levels for the majority of Aboriginal students. Success in our education system is dependent on a person's literacy and numeracy levels. Lack of literacy and numeracy undermines a student's ability to achieve in all curriculum areas. Lack of literacy and numeracy undermines self esteem and the lack of development in both of these areas causes higher rates of absenteeism and eventually early dropping out from school.

There could be no greater condemnation on a system of education than that a great proportion of its students continue in that system, year after year, but remain functionally illiterate and innumerate.

For the great majority of Aboriginal students this is the case.

At the year 3 Basic Skills Test, Aboriginal students are about 18 months behind non-Aboriginal students in literacy. At the year 7 ELLA assessments, this gap has increased to approximately 35 months. In other words, the average Aboriginal student at the commencement of year 7 is at a 4th class literacy level.

To express this failure of the system in another way, in 2003 45 per cent of Aboriginal students in ELLA reading assessments were in the lowest two skill bands and thus below the National Benchmark in comparison to 17 per cent of the non Aboriginal students. In regard to the SNAP assessment in numeracy, 62 per cent of Aboriginal students in year 7 were in the lowest two skill bands as against 34 per cent of non Aboriginal students.

The Minister has said that the performance of Aboriginal students is to equal the performance of non Aboriginal students within 10 years. There are nine years to go. To deliver those equal outcomes in the ELLA reading assessment would require our system to improve the outcomes of approximately 70 per cent of Aboriginal year 7 students to at least one higher performance band in the 2003 test.

It means every school with Aboriginal students will have to be assisted to take the necessary actions to bring about this improvement. Aboriginal students are enrolled in 1300 primary and central schools and in 437 high and central schools and college sites.

The DET Literacy Strategy is not working for Aboriginal students. Schools indicated that programs such as Reading Recovery often were not suitable for Aboriginal students. At present, there is very little additional support for any children that are not achieving acceptable literacy and numeracy levels after Reading Recovery and schools reported that many children who need assistance are not able to access Reading Recovery. The assumption in the system is that the classroom teacher will address the literacy issue.

It is clear from the Review that the goal to achieve equality of student education outcomes requires an approach involving the whole of government and non government agencies working in partnership with all Aboriginal communities. Education and schools must take responsibility and act, but our level of future success in education is dependent upon the extent that all government and non-government services can jointly implement programs developed in partnership and implemented with the engagement of Aboriginal communities.

We will continue to fail Aboriginal students and Aboriginal communities if future approaches do not attempt to intervene in at least all of the following areas:

1. Significantly increase Aboriginal student literacy and numeracy performance, assisting Aboriginal people from birth to adulthood.

2. Implement long term programs that build Aboriginal student self esteem and acknowledge Aboriginal identity as the key to building self esteem. On going and system-supported student mentoring and leadership programs, and programs that connect Aboriginal students with positive role models are essential. Too often in the Review, schools complained that funded programs were too short, required excessive levels of paper work and too much written evaluation for pathetically small amounts of money which was then discontinued. We need long term funding commitments to support schools to build self esteem and to counter the negative influence of some student peer groups that model disengagement from school. Aboriginal communities want their children to come into contact with Aboriginal adults that have succeeded in education and have gained meaningful employment. These role models can include sporting people but must go beyond these athletes to Aboriginal adults that are teachers, nurses, doctors and lawyers...Aboriginal adults that can lift the aspirations of Aboriginal students.

3. Implement community determined inter-agency programs to assist Aboriginal parents and caregivers with children in the 0 to 5 years age range. DET has to become involved in the 0 to 5 years. This has to occur to lift the pre-literacy levels of Aboriginal children at entry to kindergarten. Concern was expressed that it was extremely difficult for schools to make up the large gap that existed for many Aboriginal children at entry to kindergarten. We need more pre school places for Aboriginal children across the state, and these pre schools must be assisted to run quality social and educational programs.

4. Increase the number of Aboriginal people employed in schools and TAFE, and in the DET hierarchy. Aboriginal children have to see members of their own community working in, and valuing education. Non Aboriginal people have to see more Aboriginal people working in schools.

5. Increase the level of community involvement of Aboriginal people in both schools and TAFE. For example, there is a Commonwealth Department of Education, Science and Training program called "in class tuition" that brings Aboriginal adults into some schools to work in classrooms with teachers and children. In all places that I visited that had this program it was highly praised for many reasons, and not just because it provided additional assistance to children in class rooms. The program brought Aboriginal adults inside the school gate; it broke down the barrier between the school and the community; it gave Aboriginal people the dignity of being paid an income for valuable work; Aboriginal adults were role models for both Aboriginal and non Aboriginal children and adults; it assisted teachers to know Aboriginal people and to reduce stereotyping that some teachers have in regards to Aboriginal people and communities; it gives confidence to the Aboriginal adults, some of whom have now started further study themselves; in some places it has brought Aboriginal fathers into the schools who then have taken on other commitments such as volunteering to train school sporting teams. The success of Aboriginal students today is dependent upon the degree that the Aboriginal community becomes part of and respected by our schools.

6. Work with Aboriginal communities to build the capacity and confidence of Aboriginal people and at the same time extend the capacity of schools and TAFE to work together with Aboriginal people.

7. Increase the cooperation between all government and non government agencies to develop programs with Aboriginal communities to address the community identified needs. This should progressively mean that some other community services will be located within the geographical confines of the local school so that the school becomes the centre of the community's service provision. There is too much blame between government departments accusing other departments as being the prime cause as to why success in their own area is not being achieved. Bringing services together to work as a team is argued to be potentially more efficient.

The success of Aboriginal students in education requires action to occur on all of these fronts. To not sufficiently support one of these will undermine the capacity of all of them to deliver improved outcomes for Aboriginal students.

Some of these strategies will require more resources and staffing to be provided to schools. If the resources and staffing don't come, any initiative will be undermined.

In conclusion, the Review process of community consultation at 375 different locations across the state and the submissions has provided the knowledge as to what needs to be done to go forward. Most recently, the process DET has used to determine the recommendations to come from the Review has been a farce.

The task is enormous. The approach to grapple with this task is complex and varied. The question is whether we now have a state government that is prepared to genuinely turn around the undermining of Aboriginal culture that has been occurring for more than 215 years.

Peter Wilson is a Country Organiser. This is an edited version of his speech to Annual Conference.

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Last Modified: 15 Nov 2005