Yarning In Progress: Education Quarterly, Issue 10 2024
Federation has formed a NAIDOC committee, consisting of four staff (including three Aboriginal members) and two Officers (including one Aboriginal officer), chaired by the Aboriginal Education Coordinator.
The new committee organised a morning tea on 24 May for National Sorry Day (Sunday 26 May), to remember and acknowledge the mistreatment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who were forcibly removed from their families and communities, which we now know as the ‘Stolen Generations’.
Sorry Day marks the beginning of National Reconciliation Week. This year’s theme, Now More Than Ever, was a reminder to all of us that no matter what, the fight for justice and the rights of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people will — and must — continue.
As the Reconciliation Australia website states, “There have been many moments in Australia’s reconciliation journey that make us want to turn away. But when things are divisive, the worst thing we can do is disengage or disconnect.” Federation supported the Uluru Statement from the Heart in full in 2018 and the Yes campaign for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice to Parliament referendum in 2023, when more than 78 per cent of teachers and 6.2 million Australians voted “yes”. We need to focus and be determined to tackle and support the unfinished business of reconciliation and reverse injustice for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
Now more than ever, we need to call out racism wherever we encounter it and actively reinforce the voices of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples across this continent.
