Remote Australia Online

Evidence-based policy making in health is of great importance when addressing issues of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health inequalities. I explore the role of evidence in influencing the decisions of policy makers, and question the relevance and accuracy of current evidence to the life experiences, social and cultural environments, and aspirations of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander persons. I examine the concept of evidence and Lin’s (2003) competing rationalities within the context of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health. Lin describes three competing rationalities: cultural, political and technical. A social rationality can also be included, one that relates to how we see and know the world. Social rationalities may differ according to gender, class, age, ethnicity and place. White middle-class persons and politically marginalised Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples do not think and interpret realities in the same way because of divergent structural positions, histories and cultures. Cultural rationality informs and shapes social, political and technical rationalities because the latter are grounded in and developed by the former.

This article explores a project at the Koori Centre, University of Sydney, funded by the Australian Learning and Teaching Council (ALTC) in 2011, titled 'Indigenous On-Line Cultural Teaching and Sharing'. One of the team members (Kutay) was also a project team member on the ALTC-funded project 'Exploring PBL in Indigenous Australian Studies', which has developed a teaching and learning process (PEARL) for Indigenous Australian studies. In this article, we present the 'Indigenous On-Line Cultural Teaching and Sharing' project as an exemplar of this teaching process. The project turns a highly successful interactive kinship workshop into an interactive online experience for all students and staff of the University of Sydney. The project is developing a sharing portal for Aboriginal people in New South Wales (NSW) to incorporate their stories and experiences of cultural, historical and educational issues within a knowledge-sharing workshop. The site will use voices of Aboriginal participants to express the knowledge of their culture in a comparative and affirmative context. An interface for uploading audio and video has been generated to combine example stories from different perspectives. The interactive kinship workshop and Aboriginal voices will then be used in an online game, embedding Aboriginal knowledge and values within different professional learning contexts, such as law, social policy, health, and education.

While there is considerable interest in Indigenous Cultural Tourism (ICT) in southeastern Australia the extent to which the public is actually exposed to information on ICT products remained unknown. To assess the frequency of information provided, a range of Australian newspapers, magazines and television shows was examined for ICT content. Covering the period 2003--04, the study found that Australian tourism products were well covered with on average one item per issue/ show. On the other hand, ICT products figured only once in every 25 newspaper issues and once in every 13--14 magazine issues/television shows. Compounding that low representation, the study found that ICT products located in the Northern Territory dominate the media coverage at the expense of local and in-state products. The study concludes that current approaches are not working and that the industry should engage in the strategic hosting of visiting journalist programs and media familiarization events

The early years of a child’s life are the most important for learning and development. A child’s teachers in those early years are parents and families. They have a pivotal role in providing the foundation for a child’s ongoing education and life course. The Families as First Teachers program supports families to give their children the best possible start in life. This resource has been developed for professionals to use with remote Indigenous families to increase knowledge of child development, early learning and underlying issues effecting developmental outcomes.

Family violence and sexual assault are reported to be at crisis levels in many Indigenous communites. In response to callls from Indigenous people for change, a number of state and territory governments have established Task Forces, drafted policy documents, and held inquiries in the nature and extent of the violence. This Briefing Paper provides an overview of the key issues and findings from recent reports and research into family violence and sexual assault in Indigenous communites. Four sexual assault workers across the country also spoke to ACSSA about what is happening in their service areas to address sexual assault in Indigenous communities. An overview of the state and federal government's policies and reports into family violence are provided in an annotated bibliography.

A study in an Australian Aboriginal community identified a new way of knowing family violence, locating it in the historical context of colonization, oppression, dispossession, disempowerment, dislocation and poverty. A community development approach to addressing family violence was developed based on this understanding and the strengths of the community.

This report is a formative evaluation of the operations of the DEEWR funded Stronger Smarter Learning Community (SSLC) project from September 2009 to July 2011. It is undertaken by an independent team of researchers from Queensland University of Technology, the University of Newcastle and Harvard University. It reports on findings from: documentary analysis; qualitative case studies of SSLC Hub schools; descriptive, multivariate and multilevel analysis of survey data from school leaders and teachers from SSLC Hub and Affiliate schools and from a control group of non-SSLC schools; and multilevel analysis of school-level data on SSLC Hubs, Affiliates and ACARA like-schools. Key findings from this work are that: • SSLC school leaders and teachers are reporting progress in changing school ethos around issues of: recognition of Indigenous identity, Indigenous leadership, innovative approaches to staffing and school models, Indigenous community engagement and high expectations leadership; • Many Stronger Smarter messages are reportedly having better uptake in schools with high percentages of Indigenous students; • There are no major or consistent patterns of differences between SSLC and non-SSLC schools in teacher and school leader self-reports of curriculum and pedagogy practices; and • There is no evidence to date that SSLC Hubs and Affiliates have increased attendance or increased achievement gains compared to ACARA like-schools. Twenty-one months is relatively early in this school reform project. Hence the major focus of subsequent reports will be on the documentation of comparative longitudinal gains in achievement tests and improved attendance. The 2011 and 2012 research also will model the relationships between change in school ethos/climate, changed Indigenous community relations, improved curriculum/pedagogy, and gains in Indigenous student achievement, attendance and outcomes. The key challenge for SSLC and the Stronger Smarter approach will be whether it can systematically generate change and reform in curriculum and pedagogy practices that can be empirically linked to improved student outcomes.

This report provides an overview of the health and wellbeing of young people in the Northern Territory. It is the second in a series and like the previous report released in 1998, includes both health outcome indicators and information on key determinants of health and wellbeing. The availability of information has improved substantially over the past eight years, which has allowed the inclusion of new and expanded information. In this report there is a continued focus on the difference in outcomes between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Territorians. In addition this second report is able to provide improved trend information so that current data can be compared with information in the first report. The information in the report is provided in seven sections spanning a range from the characteristics of the Northern Territory population through to information on morbidity and mortality. Highlights of each section are: - Population characteristics - Social environment - Mothers and Babies - Nutritional and behavioural determinants - Childcare and Safety - Morbidity and Mortality

Indigenous people are far more likely to be discouraged from looking for work than other Australians. Understanding the microeconomic determinants of what discourages particular workers has important implications for overcoming the labour force disadvantage faced by indigenous Australians. This paper focuses on the interaction between labour supply and demand, and particularly on examining the factors that lead to indigenous people who want to work not looking for work and therefore remaining outside the workforce. A discouraged worker is defined, for the purposes of this paper, as someone that wants to work but is not actively looking for a job. Data from the 1994 National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Survey is used in the analysis. The conventional economic models of labour supply are somewhat unsatisfying in that they only allow a limited role for social environmental factors. The contribution of this paper is two-fold. First it extends the range of factors examined in studies of indigenous labour supply to include cultural and social environmental factors. Second it focuses on what discourages indigenous discouraged workers. Cultural factors are found to be particularly important in determining indigenous labour supply. However, they are by no means the only factors affecting labour supply. Indeed, age, educational attainment and family factors are found to be more important. None-the-less, the clear message is that work which attempts to explain indigenous labour force participation needs to take account of cultural factors.

The Garma Festival 2008 Key Forum marks the 10th anniversary of Garma, now the most enduring platform of cross-cultural understanding, information, and reconciliation of ideas and practices between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people in Australia. The spirit of Garma and its Key Forum has survived changes of government, opposing ideologies, radical policy developments, and institutional change and this is reflected in the unfolding direction of the theme at the Garma Key Forum at Gulkula, north east Arnhem Land 2008. This report outlines the backdrop and the process of the Indigenous cultural framework formed by the theme: Indigenous Knowledge: Caring for Culture and Country. The Key Forum report aims to highlight the significance of the issues, themes, and accomplishments amplified by the participants involved in outlining the proceedings and resetting the agenda in Indigenous cultural affairs for the future.

In remote Indigenous Australia the typical mainstream youth transition from school to employment does not match the reality of community life, where traditional cultural schemas underpin the practice of everyday life and the construction of social identity. Although the developmental trajectory of the current generation of Indigenous youth has diverged from cultural norms, the introduced western trajectory of institutional learning leading to labour market employment does not yet offer a substitute paradigm. I argue that if young people are to become competent, mature adults able to shape their own futures and the economic and social viability of their communities, then attention will need to be paid, not only to institutional education and training pathways, but also to other approaches to learning. Such alternate pathways can contribute to the formation of a positive sense of self, strong cultural identities and the learning and literacy skills needed to shape Indigenous futures. This paper uses research from remote central and northern Australia to explore community-based approaches to youth learning and cultural production.

The performance of Australian Indigenous learners is a national concern. The federal government has recognised that health and education are keys to closing the gap between the achievement of Indigenous and non-Indigenous people and has made health and education a national priority. Through its 'Closing the Gap' initiative, the Rudd government is allocating significant amounts of money to redress the poor health and education among Indigenous Australians. In this paper, we discuss an innovation in education that is being implemented in a cluster of remote communities in Western Australia. The innovation draws on international research that has positively affected mathematics learning, particularly among students who are traditionally excluded from formal schooling. While the research is innovative, the mechanisms that may be the most effectual in bringing about strong mathematical learning for Indigenous Australians are unknown.

Family violence mars the lives of a very large number of Indigenous Australians, helping to effectively disable many communities and deny future generations a basic chance for health, happiness and prosperity. It is important to understand why some programs aimed at changing this situation succeed, and in fact what success means in this field, both in order to advise government spending and to assist Indigenous organisations and groups putting that money into action at the coalface. The core aim of this paper is to consider the current state of good practice with regard to projects or programs aimed at reducing family violence. With the Federal government expending greater amounts on family violence programs in recent years, as well as most State and Territory governments developing relevant strategies and initiatives, this is a useful opportunity to reflect on which programs have been shown to work and in what ways. Also of interest are the approaches that would form part of a sustainable model for dealing with this issue. The awareness among various groups of Australians, including government departments, of disproportionately high and widespread levels of Indigenous family violence was raised by the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody during the late 1980s and early 1990s. Fifteen years later these rates of Indigenous violence and incarceration continue across the country, yet it remains difficult to find good practice guidelines for those wishing to combat Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander family violence. Underlying this problem is the lack of published evaluation studies of anti-violence projects and programs conducted among Indigenous Australians.

The desert context provides unique challenges for the delivery of vocational training and adult and community education programs for Indigenous peoples. Apart from being isolated and remote, Indigenous communities are mostly small and do not have infrastructure capacity that might be expected in other rural communities around Australia. In addition, regional mobility, an industry mix that depends on high skill levels, language and cultural diversity and high population growth rates create challenges for the provision of services generally and post-compulsory education, more specifically. The main employment opportunity for desert Indigenous peoples is the Community Development Employment Program (CDEP). Only one in six working aged desert Indigenous people are in non-CDEP employment. CDEP forms the backbone of essential public and community services on desert communities. Participation rates in VET are high but cluster around Certificate I & II qualifications or in mixed field subject only enrolments. The two main employment areas of desert: mining and retail are noticeably under-represented by Indigenous people. The nature of the engagement of desert Indigenous peoples in VET reflects ACE type courses and learning programs more than vocationally oriented courses. There is a plethora of other educational activity occurring across the desert that are being driven and enacted outside of the formal educational sector. ACE does not exist as a formal sector across most of the desert. The extent of Indigenous engagement with other learning activities facilitated by the vast landscape of programs funded under the umbrella of capacity building or community development alludes to a suite of learning opportunities arguably more situated in and responsive to desert contexts. This suggests, particularly given the absence of a formal ACE sector across the desert, the need for some collaborative agency in shaping an array of learning opportunities more attuned to local aspirations and skill sets and perhaps less aligned to mainstream industry or occupations. The uptake of VET courses across desert Australia is limited to those Indigenous peoples prepared to journey to mine sites or major service centres where most employment opportunities exist and who are less likely to speak an Indigenous language, be employed in CDEP or rely on accessing compulsory education on their communities or homelands. In many ways the bulk of VET offerings across the desert sit uneasily within the reality that the training is aligned with jobs and opportunities available elsewhere and not in the places where Indigenous people live and in all likelihood will continue to choose to live. The available data neither counts nor reflects many of the activities occurring on the ground as desert Indigenous people innovate their own place based forms of engagement across the customary and modern economies as learners and as workers.

The purpose of the Inquiry is to review the child protection system and make recommendations which will substantially strengthen and improve the system to ensure it meets the needs of Northern Territory children. Specifically, the Inquiry is to report and make recommendations on: the functioning of the current child protection system including the roles and responsibilities of Northern Territory Families and Children and other service providers involved in child protection • specific approaches to address the needs of Territory children in the child protection system, including the delivery of child protection services in regional and remote areas as part of the development of A Working Future • support systems and operational procedures for all workers engaged in child protection, in particular staff retention and training • quality, sustainability and strategic directions of out of home care programs including support systems for foster parents, carers and families • the interaction between government departments and agencies involved in child protection, care and safety and non-Government organisations and other groups involved in the protection, care and safety of children. The Inquiry will consider and, where appropriate, incorporate: • findings and recommendations arising from recent coronials and other recent investigations, reviews and inquiries into the functioning of the child protection system, and • child protection issues and developments at the local, national and international level, and its implications for the Northern Territory. In addition to the formal terms, the following two specifications were attached: The Inquiry is • encouraged to draw on the advice and expertise of existing Northern Territory Government advisory councils, as well as other subject matter experts within the broader community • The Inquiry’s consultation processes should be conducted publicly, unless people or organisations contributing to the Inquiry request that their contributions remain confidential.

This report presents the findings of a project commissioned by the National Public Health Partnership (NPHP) to review options and make recommendations for guidelines on the development of national public health strategies in relation to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. The purpose of the project is to enhance the development, implementation and evaluation of national public health strategies, with the intent of improving their effectiveness for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander populations. The project was conceived as an adjunct to existing guidelines for improving the development and coordination of national public health strategies, produced by the NPHP in 2000. These guidelines can be found on the NPHP website (www.nphp.gov.au/natstrat/).

Healing is part of life and continues through death and into life again. It occurs throughout a person’s life journey as well as across generations. It can be experienced in many forms such as mending a wound or recovery from illness. Mostly, however, it is about renewal. Leaving behind those things that have wounded us and caused us pain. Moving forward in our journey with hope for the future, with renewed energy, strength and enthusiasm for life. Healing gives us back to ourselves. Not to hide or fight anymore. But to sit still, calm our minds, listen to the universe and allow our spirits to dance on the wind. It lets us enjoy the sunshine and be bathed by the golden glow of the moon as we drift into our dreamtime. Healing ultimately gives us back to our country. To stand once again in our rightful place, eternal and generational. Healing is not just about recovering what has been lost or repairing what has been broken. It is about embracing our life force to create a new and vibrant fabric that keeps us grounded and connected, wraps us in warmth and love and gives us the joy of seeing what we have created. Healing keeps us strong and gentle at the same time. It gives us balance and harmony, a place of triumph and sanctuary for evermore.

The aim of this project was to collate a broad range of information relating to the health and wellbeing of Northern Territory (NT) women into the one report in order to assist policy makers in the development of policies and programs targeting women in the NT. Health related research includes not just measures of ill health but measures such as health determinants (factors influencing health), self-rated health status and a person’s level of functioning, in order to better measure health and wellbeing. This report recognises the social context of health and wellbeing. The report is comprised of six chapters which cover the broad notion of health as described by the World Health Organisation (WHO) in the declaration of Alma-Ata as “a state of complete physical, mental and social wellbeing and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity”. The report covers the population characteristics of NT women, the social environment in which they live, their pregnancy and childbirth experiences, information on health and health behaviour and available health services.

On 12 March 2010, the Australian Indigenous Doctors’ Association (AIDA) launched a health impact assessment of the Australian Government’s Northern Territory Emergency Response to protect Aboriginal children. The report of the assessment was developed by AIDA in collaboration with the Centre for Health Equity Training, Research and Evaluation at the University of New South Wales, and with support and financial assistance from the Fred Hollows Foundation.

Investment in programs that help Indigenous people undertake work maintaining the environmental health of their country has benefits for the environment as well as the physical, mental and cultural health of the Indigenous people involved. For health these findings have direct implications for some national health policies, service provision to homelands, health promotion and Indigenous health research. There are also direct implications for environmental investment in northern Australia and the design and regulation of markets in resource entitlements. Indirectly the findings should be important for economic, employment and education policies as well as those promoting social harmony. Given the range of benefits there is a strong argument for cross-agency investment in working on country by Indigenous people.

This report provides a five year plan for investment in Indigenous land and sea management across the NT. It provides advice to government agencies on both coordinating current investment and delivering new investment in this area, including the: • Indigenous Land Corporation; • Department of Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs; • Department of the Environment and Water Resources; • Department of Employment and Workplace Relations; • NT Government Department of Natural Resources, Environment and the Arts; and • NT Government Department of the Chief Minister. The Indigenous Land Corporation and Aboriginals Benefit Account have signalled the potential release of approximately $20 million new investment in this area over the next two years. The project used this potential investment as the foundation for building a five year investment package across key Australian and NT Government agencies. It also provides a possible framework for attracting additional business and philanthropic investment in this area. An independent review of the Strategic Framework by a financial consultant has found that it has the potential to deliver more efficient and cost-effective land and sea management on Indigenous lands and, through a multiplier effect, deliver substantial economic, educational and cultural benefits more broadly to Indigenous communities (Appendix One). The Strategic Framework draws its recommendations from research conducted for this project which profiled Indigenous land and sea management, current support arrangements, critical success factors and priority investment needs across the NT. This involved a review of published and unpublished research, interviews, workshops and surveys with approximately 60 organisations including Australian and NT Government agencies, land councils, businesses and Indigenous land and sea management groups. Workshops and meetings were held in Darwin, Alice Springs, Nhulunbuy, Tiwi Islands, Momeka and Djinkarr, Canberra and Adelaide over four months from June to September 2007.

In this article I discuss the way Problem-Based Learning (PBL) and reflexivity is employed in a university environment to address the question of how we can most successfully transfer knowledge about the presumed Other into our own cultural space without reducing, fragmenting, and exoticising complex knowledge systems. My goal is to stimulate in students an awareness of, and empathic engagement with, Indigenous epistemologies and Indigenous perspectives on environment, other species, moral ecology and cultural and commercial activities undertaken on Country. In this article I focus on one particular course in which I use ethnographic scenarios as learning triggers for weekly workshops to provide a multi-sensorial and experiential style of learning. Topics range from the construction of ethnoclassificatory systems to the construction of kinship as an expression of moral ontological frameworks. The process draws on over 30 years experience working with the Yanyuwa families of the southwest Gulf of Carpentaria in the Northern Territory. Central to the success of the course are the li-Yanyuwa li-Wirdiwalangu (Yanyuwa knowledge holders), a core group of senior men and women who play an active daily role in the maintenance and dissemination of Yanyuwa knowledge systems, increasingly a site of their own empowerment. In consultation with Bradley, they have selected and annotated core ethnographic information which I have then developed into PBL triggers for the course.

This article addresses the paradox of the persistence, growth, and increasing circulation of work in indigenous media and acrylic painting in Aboriginal Australia, despite the alarming political turn against gains made by indigenous Australians over the last decade, not only by right-wing politicians but intellectuals as well. Indigenous people in settler nation-states have faced a range of dilemmas in imagining their futures. In Australia, debates about the significance of an indigenous presence and history continue to rage. This article reviews the range of policies extended toward Australia's Aboriginal people (ranging from pastoral care in the face of expected dying out to assimilation to self-determination and beyond), the cultural and political projects through which Aboriginal urban activists and remote communities have attempted to construct their futures, and a consideration of the media through which these futures are imagined.

This is an easily readable book that explores how Indigenous men understand their lives, their health and their culture. Using conversations, stories and art, the author shows how Kimberley desert communities have a cultural value and relationship described as kanyirninpa or holding. The author uses examples from Australian Rules football, petrol sniffing and imprisonment to reveal the possibilities for lasting improvements to men’s health based on kanyirninpa’s expression of deep and enduring cultural values and relationships. While young Indigenous men’s lives remains vulnerable in a rapidly changing world, the author believes that an understanding of kanyirninpa (one of the key values that has sustained Aboriginal desert life for centuries) may provide the hope of change and better health for all. It also offers insights for all who wish to ‘grow up’ their young people.

There were some 22 or more native title claims in Cape York Peninsula at the time of writing. A number were close to determination, whilst many others were in active mediation. Indigenous people may also obtain rights or forms of tenure in land in Queensland under a range of additional processes apart from native title. These include, for example, land trusts set up under the land claim and land transfer provisions of the Queensland Aboriginal Land Act (ALA) 1991, Deed-of- Grant-in-Trust (DOGIT), Indigenous Land Corporation acquisitions, land from Natural Heritage Trust negotiations. The CYLC is concerned about achieving a coordinated approach to these various organisations and processes and wants to ensure that PBCs, as the bodies responsible for the management of native title lands, play an integrated role within broader Cape York land management strategies. A broad project aim is to assist existing or future PBCs to operate effectively in relation to land and sea management, in order to protect and maintain native title rights and interests within a complex pattern of Indigenous interests, types of land tenure, and coexisting stakeholder groups. Cape York is an appropriate example as there is a proliferation of indigenous land titles and rights occurring or imminent in a patchwork pattern across the landscape. There is an emerging problem that the impact of this uncoordinated proliferation on land management might be negative. It has been suggested by some that land trusts and PBCs may be set up to fail due to the unforeseen and unplanned responsibilities which might emanate without the guaranteed resources to fulfil such responsibilities. The current project takes a proactive approach to addressing this issue both in terms of immediate strategies that can be undertaken by Indigenous land interest groups and PBCs, and longer-term goals for the refinement and reform of legislation. Specific aims of the project were to analyse and address the following topics: (a) the relationship between PBCs and ALA land trusts, for example whether ALA land trusts could work as PBCs; (b) the options, practical recommendations and regulatory and statutory changes, state and Federal, required to establish and maintain effective PBCs/RNTBCs; (c) recommendations of practical options for achieving a coordinated approach to land management in the case study areas; (d) draft rules (complying with the relevant legislation but if necessary identifying areas where changes to legislation would be beneficial) for a PBC/RNTBC in relation to at least one of the areas covered by the case studies.