The rates of higher education access, participation and completion for Indigenous students are much lower than those for non-Indigenous students in Australia. This paper argues for a research-led focus on what works in terms of Indigenous student equity in higher education. Undertaking independent evaluation of existing initiatives and leveraging the experience of hundreds of successful Indigenous graduates, it may be possible to articulate some of the ways in which success has been, and can be, achieved, despite the challenges that face Indigenous students. In other words, it may be possible to articulate some aspects of what works for some Indigenous people in relation to higher education. A focus on articulating strategies that Indigenous individuals and communities might adopt in relation to higher education should be developed alongside the management of systemic problems through a range of means. The “success-focused” approach would provide one of a suite of approaches that may be helpful in addressing Indigenous student equity.

In the language of the Tebrikunna (Cape Portland) clan, Carne Neemerranner is “telling ground”. It is also what we call the research methodology designed for Meeting at Bark Hut, a recent community-engaged Aboriginal history project conducted in northeast Tasmania. The project examined, retraced and explored one brief, but poignant, episode in Tasmania's colonial contact history – a meeting between the parties of George Augustus Robinson, colonial agent charged with the “conciliation” and removal of Trouwunnan (Tasmanian) clanspeople from the Tasmanian mainland, and that most likely included Mannalargenna, one of the last Trouwunnan leaders still living in his own clancountry at the time (1830). While this episode and encounter has profound connotations for presentday Tasmanian Aborigines, its significance has largely been overlooked by academic historians. Meeting at Bark Hut was conceived as an opportunity to redress this deficit, to allow the story of this event to be told and to come alive in a dynamic and culturally relevant way. This article offers some insight into the meaning and method of the project from both theoretical and practical perspectives.

Indigenous participation rates in higher education are significantly lower than the rates reported for non-Indigenous people in Australia – with the greatest disparity evident in the area of postgraduate studies. This problem needs to be addressed by providing culturally appropriate support mechanisms to Indigenous postgraduate students. This article draws on the findings of a doctoral thesis in which the support provided to Indigenous postgraduate students in Australia was investigated (Trudgett, 2008). Several issues and problems emerged from the data surrounding the support, or lack thereof, provided to this cohort by the Indigenous Units or centres in universities today. Nine recommendations for consideration and implementation by the Indigenous Units within Australian universities are provided. These recommendations have the potential to reduce this disparity by helping to close the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous participation and, most importantly, completion rates in postgraduate studies.

This paper demonstrates how Indigenous studies is controlled in some Australian universities in ways that continue the marginalisation, denigration and exploitation of Indigenous peoples. Moreover, it shows how the engagement of white notions of “inclusion” can result in the maintenance of racism, systemic marginalisation, white race privilege and radicalised subjectivity. A case study will be utilised which draws from the experience of two Indigenous scholars who were invited to be part of a panel to review one Australian university's plan and courses in Indigenous studies. The case study offers the opportunity to destabilise the relationships between oppression and privilege and the epistemology that maintains them. The paper argues for the need to examine exactly what is being offered when universities provide opportunities for “inclusion”.

The numbers of Indigenous students studying in health career courses at the tertiary level is low. This paper describes a forum conducted as part of a project of national significance which examines the solutions and barriers for Indigenous student entry to medical and other health science education. Small group discussions and observations were used to determine how a group of Indigenous students, school age and mature, became interested in a health career, what influenced them, their expectations and where they sourced information. The initial design of the forum, based on other successful non-Indigenous health career events, was deemed inappropriate. When an Indigenous educator intervened, and used a more culturally appropriate approach, the engagement of the Indigenous students increased. The importance of culturally relevant health career promotion is a vital part of a complex series of actions needed to increase the recruitment and retention of Indigenous students into health science careers.

The theory that the rapid depopulation of Indigenous people post-colonisation was largely caused by European introduced or exotic disease to which Indigenous people had no immunity resonates through most narratives of the early years of colonisation. The question of whether this narrative is based on sound medical evidence or is better placed in the realm of myth is the subject of this paper. Here I contend, that introduced disease is little more than a convenient explanation of the rapid depopulation of Indigenous people in south eastern New South Wales during the nineteenth century, and one that allows the illusion of colonial ethnography to perpetuate a widespread belief that introduced diseases and immunity were the unfortunate, but unavoidable cause of most Indigenous population decline. But what is the evidence that these disease theories found in Australian history are anything more than Eurocentric constructions? An Indigenous approach to the topic, as undertaken in this paper, raises questions that are as yet without answers and which challenge conventional theoretical explanations.

Teaching Aboriginal studies to a diverse student cohort presents challenges in the pursuit of developing a critical pedagogy. In this paper, we present Children of the Sun (2006), a local film made by Indigenous youth in the Illawarra region south of Sydney, New South Wales. We outline the film's genesis and its utilisation in our praxis. The film is a useful resource in the teaching of urban Aboriginal identity to primarily non-Indigenous students in the discipline of Aboriginal studies. It contributes to the development of critical thinking, and our own critical practice as educators and offers a starting point to address pre-conceived and stereotypical notions about race and colour. We situate this paper within a theoretical framework of identity and whiteness studies to explore the issue of light skin in relation to the constraints of identity surrounding urban Aboriginal youth, as represented in Children of the Sun. We discuss the usefulness of this film as a self-representational text that subverts and challenges pre-conceived notions of Aboriginal identity.

The nature and status of Indigenous knowledge is often debated, but the idea that Indigenous people's knowledge is local knowledge seems widely accepted: knowledge is place-based and may reference a range of places, from traditional land to other places known from social and cultural connections. Through collaboration with Koori people from the south coast of New South Wales to develop a web-based science resource, other distinctive characteristics of their knowledge emerged. This paper explores some transformations in contemporary Indigenous knowledge, while acknowledging the history of colonisation in south eastern Australia. A focus on two examples of Koori art demonstrates that Indigenous knowledge is contingent, contested and changing in culturally denned ways. These aspects are often overlooked in educational practice that essentialises Indigeneity and Indigenous people's knowledge.

This is a reflective paper that explores Martin Nakata's work as a basis for understanding the possibilities and restrictions of non-Indigenous academics working in Indigenous studies. The paper engages with Nakata's work at the level of praxis. It contends that Nakata's work provides non-Indigenous teachers of Indigenous studies a framework for understanding their role, their potential, and limitations within the power relations that comprise the “cultural interface”. The paper also engages with Nakata's approach to Indigenous research through his “Indigenous standpoint theory”. This work emerges from the experiential and conceptual, and from a commitment to teaching and learning in Indigenous studies. It is a reflection of how non-Indigenous academics working in Indigenous studies can contribute to the development and application of the discipline.

In this paper we report the findings of research that has examined, from first-hand accounts, the career pathways of Indigenous Australians who have studied to become teachers. We focus on one key aspect of the larger study: the nature and experience of initial teacher education for Indigenous student teachers. Elsewhere we have reported on aspects of their subsequent working lives in teaching or related fields. We focus here on participants' talk about teacher education, particularly with reference to the factors that have impacted positively and negatively on their identity formation as “Indigenous” students and teachers. As a research collective that comprises Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal teacher educators, and in the context of increased emphasis on university access following the Federal Review of Higher Education, we argue that it is time for government, universities and schools to listen and learn from this talk. In particular, we highlight in our participants' accounts the persistence of three longstanding and interrelated factors that continue to impact on the success or inadequacy of teacher education for Aboriginal people i.e., the presence and nature of financial, emotional and academic support in university and school settings.

This paper will discuss “both-ways” as the philosophy which underpins course programs and operations at Batchelor Institute of Indigenous Tertiary Education, the only tertiary institution in Australia that caters exclusively to Indigenous students. This paper draws on recent research undertaken by the author focusing on the following questions: What is bothways philosophy? How is it being implemented as a teaching methodology at an Indigenous tertiary institution? What innovative practices, processes and activities can be celebrated as exemplary teaching practice? The notion of both-ways will be explored to ascertain how it is being translated into an effective teaching methodology that incorporates and embraces Indigenous knowledge into course curriculum, planning, delivery and evaluation.

Indigenous conversation and voice are increasingly heard in the research literature but there needs to be more dialogue in order for it to be a two-way conversation. This paper contributes to research that attempts to redress this situation by reporting on conversations with Aboriginal parents and caregivers of students enrolled in a public secondary school in a large New South Wales country town. The conversations were conducted over a three-year period (2005-7) by a team non-Indigenous researchers working in collaboration with Indigenous researchers. In this paper, we describe the various approaches we developed to establish conversations with Aboriginal parents and caregivers, and the various themes that emerged over the course of the study. We also assess how this type of research is located within and contributes to, the existing research literature. Finally, we discuss the importance of ongoing conversations with Aboriginal parents and caregivers, and how schools and systems can better respond to well-established policy goals of productive parent-school relationships.

There are numerous aspects to becoming an effective, culturally competent health practitioner, among these is the need to “become knowledgeable about the historical and sociopolitical backgrounds of clients” (Bemak et al., 2003, p. 26). It has been established that culturally sensitive empathy has the potential to contribute greatly to the healing process when working across cultures. It is therefore essential for an effective and productive client-healer relationship. Indeed it is said that “empathy bridges the gap” between practitioner and client (David & Erickson, 1990). This paper explores a model to develop cultural competence within health related courses.

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.

In Australia, Indigenising the curriculum is increasingly acknowledged as a possible avenue for addressing Indigenous under-representation in tertiary science education in a culturally appropriate and relevant manner. While no Australian university has implemented such a program, there is much to be learnt about the inherent complexities of Indigenising curriculum before it is pursued. In Canada, however, innovative university programs have been implemented that imbed Indigenous knowledge into the curriculum. This paper details key findings from research that sought to learn from Canadian practices in Indigenising tertiary science curriculum, by exploring the practices and experiences of two Canadian programs: Trent University's Indigenous Environmental Studies program, and Cape Breton University's Integrative Science program.

The paper will present findings from a Social Science and Humanities Research (SSHRC) funded participatory evaluation conducted over the past four years in the Cree nation of Wemindji in Quebec, Canada. COOL (Challenging Our Own Limits) or “Nigawchiisuun” in Cree, was launched in 2003 as part of a broader program of governance initiatives within Wemindji. As a key component of this new governance program, COOL was to address the need for after-school care within the community for parents, as well as to engage with the recurring problem of low retention rates in school. In consultation with the Band Council of the Cree Nation of Wemindji (James Bay), the Deputy Chief at the time (Rodney Mark) – who was elected Chief in 2006 – established a COOL committee to oversee the design, organisation, implementation and running of the program. Unlike the other eight Cree communities of the James Bay, Wemindji decided to fund and run its own program based on values, customs, and traditions that have been established through consultations with elders, parents, and other interested groups within the community. This has made COOL a distinctly homegrown, autonomous, self-determined Cree program. The paper will not only report on principal themes and issues connected with the establishment and administration of COOL, but will also discuss why a participatory evaluation has been used to assess its effectiveness as a social/educational program.