Remote Aboriginal culture(s) and Western culture(s) are two of the most diverse culture groups on earth. In the context of these two fundamentally different world views, Aboriginal formal schooling is facing a major dilemma. Simply put this dilemma is that while most Aboriginal parents have a deep desire for their children to ‘grow up Aboriginal’, they also want their children to succeed in Western schooling and to perform successfully in some aspects of white culture, thereby reducing dependency on white expertise in their communities.

There is growing interest and respect in the world regarding the knowledge and experience of Indigenous peoples. This is particularly so in industrialised ‘post-colonial’ societies such as Australia, which see themselves as committed to principles of equity and social justice.

There is a new political, economic and social context in which Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultural knowledge is widely recognised and valued, even if not properly understood. In the search for a more precisely articulated national identity, Indigenous identity is claimed by many as integral to Australian identity. Coupled with this is a revised sense of coming to terms with the past, a recognition of what has been left out of histories taught from non-Indigenous perspectives. The cold war of invasion and resistance goes on but there are signs of an end in view.

Since first coming to the Northern Territory in 1982 I have spent much time in Aboriginal Education in many different roles. Remote school Principal. Batchelor College lecturer and Centre of Aboriginal and Islander Studies Maths lecturer to name a few. I would like to share with you some of my findings over this time.

In the bi-cultural context of Aotearoa (New Zealand), engagement with stakeholders that is transparent and culturally responsive is a priority for educational research. More common research approaches in New Zealand have followed a Western euro-centric model of engagement with research participants resulting in interventions and initiatives that have not necessarily served the needs of the education sector. The authors critically analyse the researcher relationship with research participants to provide a Māori perspective to guide the engagement process as researchers enter educational communities to conduct research. Embedded with Māori ideology and knowledge, the Hei Korowai ethical research framework is a platform for insider positionality that acknowledges partnership between the researcher and the researched for the benefit of knowledge development and the educational sector.

Health research remains a vital activity of Indigenous health workforces. This paper reports on the main findings of yarning interviews with 14 Indigenous researchers, that was central to a project analysing the role of research training infrastructures in strengthening the Indigenous health research workforce in Australia. The findings highlighted Indigenous researcher peers as core sources of inspiration, moral support and sustenance in academia and in life. Peer generative power arising from peer groups provide a unique enriching to the educational and research experience. Indigenous researcher peers have a strong shared aspiration to champion change to health research and higher education as a key pathway to widespread positive impacting on health and well-being. We suggest the (revived) development at a collective level of a strategic and planned approach to capitalising on the positive outcomes of peer generated leadership and support.

As a child I lived at a place called Angatja. My father, mother, grandmother, older brothers, aunts, and uncles taught me there and I learned from them. My mother taught me about her bush foods. She collected the plant foods and prepared them and I learned by watching her. I learned also from my father. He taught about meat foods, cooking the meat, making spears, joining parts of the spears tightly with sinew and going out hunting for meat. My mother would take me out with her. We two went out together to collect small animals and plant foods, hitting sand goannas, and sometimes collecting bush honey. I watched her and gathered some foods and when we all came together in camp we ate the meat and plant foods. My mother gathered various plant foods, native millet seeds, pigweed, roots which grew in the rocks and other seeds. These foods were available in autumn. Other foods were found on trees in spring. These fruits included mistletoe berries, mulga apples, native plums and quandongs. Also the native fig trees grew on small rocky hills.

All children, black or white, learn a lot more outside the classroom than inside it. All normal children, by the time they go to school for the first time, have already learnt to speak their mother tongue, have learnt who they are and where they fit into their family or community, and have learnt a vast range of behaviours which are appropriate (and inappropriate) for members of their culture. They have learnt all these through the informal process of socialization which affects all members of every culture throughout their lives. In traditional Aboriginal society, for example, hunting and food preparation skills, the traditional law, patterns of land ownership and important stories from the past, were all learnt informally in the daily life of the family. Only some sacred knowledge would be transmitted formally in a ceremonial context.

This project involved the collection of stories about the aspirations, goals and strategies from a sample of mothers of Indigenous children living in Perth, Western Australia. Analysis of the semi-structured interviews indicated that the education of their children was important for many of the mothers. Whilst some of the mothers preferred their children to learn about their Indigenous history, culture and identity, others valued the type of education that emanates from a mainstream-style school system. A major theme was a need for schools to partner with Indigenous parents in the decision-making process to engage the families in a positive education experience.

‘Sounds, Words, Aboriginal Language and Yarning’ (SWAY) is a school-based oral language and early literacy programme based on Australian Aboriginal stories, knowledge and culture. It was developed by a multidisciplinary team in collaboration with Australian Aboriginal community members. SWAY aims to strengthen and support the communication skills of educators to facilitate language and literacy development of children in the early school years, particularly Australian Aboriginal children, within rural communities in New South Wales. Key features of SWAY include capacity building of educators and small group speech-language pathology intervention sessions, delivered remotely via telehealth. This study explored educator perceptions of SWAY training, mentoring and implementation, using a mixed methods approach. Findings revealed: use of culturally responsive strategies; positive educator perceptions of the SWAY programme, training and mentoring and positive changes to the confidence and behaviours of educators both supporting language and early literacy development, and embedding Australian Aboriginal perspectives in the classroom. Positive findings support and encourage the ongoing provision of SWAY. Findings also have implications for the future collaborative development and implementation of culturally responsive language and literacy programmes.

Despite recent developments in Aboriginal education very few Aboriginal high school students in Queensland are in academic courses that will enable them to matriculate with the possibility of entering into tertiary institutions. Instead, the majority of Aboriginal students are in lower level industrial and commercial courses and consequently leave school ill-equipped to enter into a competitive job market. Of those students who do find employment, few are in jobs commensurate with their ability.

Educationalists such as McConnochie (1973) have pointed out that the failure of Aboriginals to succeed at school is primarily a result of factors associated with our social institutions, particularly the schools, rather than with the Aboriginal child himself. McConnochie suggests that our institutions tend to debase the black child’s concept of himself and the group with whom he identifies, and it is the child’s consequent lack of self-esteem that contributes significantly to his low vocational aspirations and academic achievement. However, low vocational aspirations and achievement themselves interact, reinforcing the child’s negative self-concept and he becomes caught up in a self-sustaining cycle of increasing school failure and worthlessness.

In a large urban centre in North Queensland, a young five year old Aboriginal boy enters the classroom, wide-eyed and silent. Behind him come his mother and grandmother, seemingly reluctant to enter the classroom. The school year commenced two weeks earlier, so the other children have developed some routine. Having not been to pre-school, Joseph takes his place at the desk assigned by the teacher and silently watches the other children talk, laugh and skilfully use the available equipment.

When we talk about Aboriginalizing education, we have to find ways of describing or analyzing what happens in education, which will help us to understand what needs to be done. For me, one of the most useful ways of thinking about education is to make a clear distinction between what is taught (the content, or message of education), and how it is taught (the methods, or processes or the medium of education). In traditional white education, both the content and the process of education reflect the white ways of looking at the world. In traditional Aboriginal education, the process and content of education are both Aboriginal.

Indigenous knowledge is multidimensional encompassing the beliefs, practices, arts, spirituality and other forms of traditional and cultural experiences that belong to Indigenous communities globally. In order to protect, preserve and recognize the knowledge of the Indigenous people of Fiji, known as the iTaukei, the University of Fiji has established a Centre for iTaukei Studies. The Centre apart from its cultural dimension has adopted the western system of disseminating knowledge through publications, text books and teacher education programmes. While maintaining the importance of preserving the originality of the Indigenous cultural identity and practices, the paper highlights how the infusion of the cultures of the Indigenous people and that of the Indo-Fijians, who have co-existed together for over 100 years, has shaped the unique multicultural landscape in Fiji.

This paper is a meditation on the idea of South-South dialogue, beginning with the South-South Dialogues: Situated Perspectives in Decolonial Epistemologies symposium held at the University of Queensland in 2015. I interrogate the concept of South-South dialogue, apposing it to the Cartesian ‘I think’, and then question the plausibility of the concept. On the basis of a Gadamerian conception of understanding, I suggest that what passes for South-South dialogue is in fact more likely to be North-South or even North-North dialogue. This is buttressed by an examination of Valentin Mudimbe's Parables and Fables. I go on to suggest, however, that by staying within the realm of the concept, in what could be called a Cartesian paradigm, Mudimbe misses the important role that South-South dialogue can play. Drawing on the work of Sara Motta, Tsitsi Dangarembga's Nervous Conditions and the concept of hunhu, I claim that the promise of South-South dialogue is the creation of spaces in which humanity is fostered.

Since leaving ‘the bush’ I have been continually surprised at the ignorance that still exists about Aboriginal people and their languages. When people chat to me, and it is revealed that I used to work in Aboriginal schools in the Northern Territory, they say things like “Do you speak Aboriginal then?… Maybe you could make a sign for us saying ‘Welcome to our Kindergarten’ in Aboriginal?” I then have to explain that there are many, many different Aboriginal languages, not just one, and to say or write such things in any one of these languages requires a lot more than a mere literal translation. When I began doing research on the topic of writing in Aboriginal languages. I was again surprised at the sorts of comments people made to me. Comments like “How can you do research on writing in Aboriginal languages; I thought the Aborigines didn't even have an alphabet!”

Minimbah is an Aboriginal word whichmeans ‘place of learning’. Since self-management in 1987 by the local Aboriginal Management Committee, the school Director, Dianne Roberts has promoted parent, staff and community input at this place of learning. Improved parental involvement in this Aboriginal preschool was essential following the policy change from outside control to self-management.

The following extracts are taken from Professor Watts’ evaluation of the Aboriginal Secondary Grants Scheme, which was tabled in Federal Parliament on 3rd June, 1976.

There is little doubt that the most effective teacher of Aboriginal and Islander children would be a person from the community in which the children live, or at least one who shares many of their life-ways. However, until Aboriginal and Islander children have access to teachers from their own cultural groups, it is important that what has been learned about how best to provoke a learning environment for them is readily available.

Since 2001 there has been an increase in migration patterns by Indigenous families from remote communities to urban and semi-rural locations. Indigenous student emigration from remote Indigenous schools to urban and semi-rural schools is an emerging crisis as there are routinely inadequate service providers for Indigenous émigrés. Migration away from a particular location from which a person's ancestors, kin and Dreamings come (henceforward named as Country) to semi-rural and urban locations raises many complex issues. This article outlines Aboriginal Community Education Officers’ (ACEOs) role as support workers for Indigenous students who utilise an Indigenous ethics of care framework as a support mechanism to aid the transition of Indigenous students into new schools. The article draws on research undertaken between 2000–2008 (MacGill, 2008) in conjunction with current literature in the field (Pearce, 2012) to highlight ACEOs’ border work and ethics of care practices necessary for successful Indigenous student transitions as émigrés.