Remote Australia Online

Evaluations have traditionally been used by funding bodies and others to justify the acquittal of funds at the conclusion of a project or to assess the project in terms of meeting a program’s objectives. An alternative view is of evaluations as participative processes. Through the participation, the direction of project activities can be influenced, good practices can be supported and promoted and the ongoing development of strategic policy can be informed. This is the approach being used by Charles Darwin University in the Northern Territory to evaluate Domestic and Family Violence policies and strategies. The paper’s authors have been directly involved in the design and implementation of the evaluations, which are in various stages of progress. This paper explores the methodological basis for this approach, drawing on relevant evaluation literature. It briefly reviews the processes used for these projects, which include an evaluation of a ‘whole of government’ strategies and a suite of interventions designed to address family and domestic violence in several remote Indigenous contexts across the Northern Territory. One of the primary concerns of the whole of government evaluation was to consider how government communicates across agencies and how it engages with non-government organisations providing services to clients and vice versa. The focus of the suite of projects is to trial and develop practices that contribute to good outcomes for families and children at risk of family violence. The University’s involvement is both as an objective observer and an engaged participant in the processes. Traditionally the capacity to be both objective and engaged is seen as being impossible, undesirable or somehow unethical, a position this paper discusses and takes issue with. The paper will consider how one university has engaged with community stakeholders at a variety of levels: Commonwealth and Territory government agency representatives; non-government organisations providing services; representatives from communities and clients. The paper will conclude with an assessment of how effective the University has been: a) in engaging meaningfully with these stakeholder groups; b) in influencing the course of strategy and policy according the needs of the various stakeholder groups; and c) in managing the dual role of objective observer/researcher and engaged participant. The paper will provide insights for other research practitioners who may be considering participative approaches to evaluations. It will also be of particular use to organisations and communities that want to build evaluation into their program development.

Closing the Gap is a commitment by all Australian governments to work towards a better future for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. It aims to close the gap of Indigenous disadvantage in areas such as health, housing, education and employment. As the department responsible for Indigenous affairs, FaHCSIA is the lead Australian Government agency on Closing the Gap. The Australian Government, through FaHCSIA, reaches out to Indigenous Australians through a network of offices across the country.

The Northern Territory Emergency Response (NTER) was announced on 21 July 2007 and has been implemented over the last four years. The NTER aims to protect children, to make communities safe and to build a better future for people living in Indigenous communities and town camps in the Northern Territory. It has changed since its initial implementation but its focus and many of the key themes and measures remain the same. The report of the Board of Inquiry into the Protection of Aboriginal Children from Sexual Abuse, Ampe akelyernemane meke mekarle: ‘Little children are sacred’, gave the issue of child sexual abuse in the Northern Territory a high profile and was a direct catalyst for the Northern Territory Emergency Response (NTER). There has been a very large increase in child protection substantiations for Indigenous children in the Northern Territory since 2006–07. Around three-quarters of this increase is accounted for by child neglect, and the increase probably reflects an increase in child protection resources rather than a change in the underlying rate. While child sexual assault is an issue, child neglect is a much larger one. The NTER sought to improve outcomes for Indigenous children and families by targeting communities that had lower than needed service levels for police, child protection, health, housing, education and infrastructure. The current NTER measures in the Closing the Gap in the Northern Territory National Partnership Agreement (NTNPA) are improving the basic services, infrastructure and safety of communities and showing some early signs of positive outcomes for Indigenous people. Outcomes for health, education, employment, housing and safety are still well below those for non-Indigenous people but they have improved since the start of the NTER. In a survey of over 1,300 NTER community members, most people (58.7%) reported that they felt that their lives were better than they had been three years ago. A majority of people surveyed (72.6%) also said that their community was safer now than it had been three years ago. The number of simultaneous activities (many unrelated to the NTER), the long lag time between actions and outcomes, and the short duration of the NTER mean it is rarely possible to attribute outcomes to individual measures. Educational attainment remains a key challenge. Average school attendance rates were low and have not improved since the start of the NTER. There has been some improvement in National Assessment Program—Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) results for Year 3 reading in NTER schools since 2008, but most children in NTER schools do not meet national minimum standards for reading, writing and numeracy. Problems with the implementation of the NTER relate primarily to poor consultation and the blanket imposition of a small number of initiatives. The initial rollout was marked by a sense of crisis that favoured short-term approaches with little consultation. This delivered much needed additional government services, such as police, teachers, night patrols and classrooms. Communities generally welcomed these additional government services despite short consultation periods. However, for initiatives specific to the NTER communities—such as income management and signage outside communities referring to the alcohol and pornography bans—the abrupt, imposition broke trust and made some people feel that they had been unfairly labelled. Many people valued the measures, but the manner in which they were implemented caused problems. Additional engagement mechanisms have been added over the course of the NTER. A survey of 85 government and service providers conducted by the Allen Consulting Group found that 71 per cent of respondents thought that engagement approaches improved over time. Despite this, there are ongoing challenges. Looking forward, new measures to improve enrolment and attendance at school and the extent and sustainability of the economic base are needed if the NTER is to fulfil its objectives. Education and jobs are critical to the wellbeing of communities. Housing also remains an issue of prime importance to communities. Workforce shortfalls, especially shortfalls of suitably skilled Indigenous people, are evident in health, education, policing and governance. Yet there is low employment and low school attendance. There is potential for more Indigenous people to pursue careers that would assist their communities, particularly if they succeed in school. Longevity of both programs and personnel has been demonstrated to work better than rapid change. Long-term commitment and evolution in accordance with community strengths and on timeframes agreed with communities have the greatest chance of bringing about sustained improvement. The capacity of communities to build on government services will be essential to sustained improvement. Dodson and Smith have identified Indigenous governance as the key factor for the sustainable development of Indigenous communities: ‘Without improved governance capacity, there is unlikely to be sustained development, and valuable opportunities will be squandered.’

The Northern Territory Emergency Response (NTER), otherwise known as the ‘Intervention’, was announced on 21 June 2007. The immediate aims of the NTER measures were to protect children and make communities safe. In the longer term they were designed to create a better future for Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory.

Northern Territory Government Domestic Violence Data Collection Report 2006

The AEDI provides a national snapshot of young children’s health and development. In 2009, information was collected on 261,203 children who comprised 97.5% of the estimated Australian five-year-old population in their first year of full-time school. These data included information on 3,230 children who comprised 93.5% of the estimated NT five-year-old population. The AEDI provides information about how local children have developed by the time they start school across five domains of early childhood development: physical health and wellbeing, social competence, emotional maturity, language and cognitive skills (school-based), and communication skills and general knowledge. If a child’s score on a given domain is in the in the lowest 10% of scores nationally they are said to be ‘developmentally vulnerable’ on that domain. This report details the AEDI results for NT at the jurisdictional, regional and AEDI community levels. A further series of reports describing the results for specific local communities is expected to be available early in 2011. The AEDI findings provide a regional and community overview of how children are developing compared to other children in the NT and across Australia. Communities can use AEDI results to develop and evaluate their efforts to improve outcomes for children.

The Indigenous Community Housing Survey (ICHS) assesses remote Indigenous housing maintenance requirements to increase the longevity and safety of houses, and promote conditions that are conducive to improved resident health. The survey was instituted by the Indigenous Housing Authority of the NT (IHANT) in 1998 and redeveloped during 2004 as the result of a review and a subsequent collaborative project between the Department of Health and Community Services Environmental Health Program (DHCS/ EHP); the Indigenous Housing Branch of the Department of Community Development Sport and Cultural Affairs (IHB/DCDSCA) and Menzies School of Health Research (MSHR). The bi-annual survey is now underway throughout the Territory, with over 60% of community surveys completed. This article describes the history and aims of the survey, its implementation, links to health, and a limited analysis of findings to date.

Concerns have been expressed for some time by Indigenous community leaders, analysts, government agencies, and local service providers about the accuracy of census counts for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities in Queensland. Recent reclassification of these communities as Local Government Areas has heightened these concerns in the context of financial distributions and the related need for the ABS to develop small area population estimates. This paper examines the ABS methodology for estimating these populations, and benchmarks these against demographic information available from a range of administrative data. Potential deficiencies in ABS methodology are highlighted and a case is made for the use of administrative data in developing estimates for small populations.

Language work is close to the heart of many Indigenous Australians. The important role that Indigenous languages play in terms of a connection to culture, kinship, land and family was highlighted during the Committee’s inquiry, as was the devastation to communities that results when language is lost. Indigenous languages are the foundation upon which the capacity to learn, interact and to shape identity is built. The dedication and passion of people involved in Indigenous languages projects in urban, regional and remote locations was impressive. The Committee found there is outstanding work being undertaken across the country to maintain and revive Indigenous languages. The Mabo decision of the High Court of Australia in 1992 recognised the occupancy of the Indigenous peoples and their ongoing connection to the land. This report builds on this connection to land and recognises and celebrates the languages of Australia’s Indigenous peoples who have lived in this land for over tens of thousands of years. The Committee has made 30 recommendations in this report in key areas such as: - incorporating an acknowledgement and focus of Indigenous languages into the Closing the Gap framework - expanding the Indigenous Languages Support program and prioritising the development of language nests - establishing a national Indigenous interpreting service and putting in place immediate measures to ensure competent interpreting services in the health and justice sectors - supporting Constitutional change to include the recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander languages - resourcing bilingual school education programs for Indigenous communities where the child’s first language is an Indigenous language - developing strategies for training Indigenous language teachers to ensure improved access to full qualifications, accreditation and career pathways - compulsory English as an Additional Language or Dialect training for all teaching degrees and mandatory EAL/D and cultural awareness training for teacher working in Indigenous communities, and - improving community access to language materials through a dedicated Indigenous languages archive at AIATSIS and the sharing of resources with schools and educational institutions.

Contents: 1. Introduction 2. Legislation and policy: the context of outback ghettos 3. Poonindie, home away from 'country' 4. An established community and its destruction 5. Koonibba, a refuge for west coast people 6. Institutional upheaval and adjustment 7. Dispersal and the end of the mission era 8. Adnyamathanha: survival without institutionalisation 9. Nepabunna mission 10. The ghetto experience and survival

Despite predictions in the 1970s that, with the advent of Western medicine, there would be no Aboriginal healers by the end of the twentieth century, maparn continue to be active within the Kutjungka region of the Kimberley (Western Australia). Using narrative and art from the healers themselves, the author examines their contemporary role and practice. As desert people continue to engage their healers, as also the services of the local health clinic, the author explores how two very different models of health care might better understand each other and work together to improve desert people's health.

A participatory action research project was undertaken with Aboriginal health workerson the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Lands in South Australia. The study examined the factors that affect the empowerment of Aboriginal health workers within the context of an Aboriginal–controlled primary health care service. This project was different from previous research conducted with Aboriginal healdi workers in remote areas for two reasons. First, it enabled them to participate actively as co–researchers in the study, and second, it brought about action and change during the research process. The three main factors preventing Aboriginal health workers from attaining a key role within the health service are the standard of training they receive, their low literacy and numeracy levels, and their lack of participation in decision making within the health service. Each of these factors is interrelated and all affect the Aboriginal healdi workers' ability to have more control and responsibility within the health service.

This paper examines the Australian government's Indigenous policy by interrogating the concept of partnership between governments and Indigenous communities through three examples. Increasingly, the Australian federal government is focusing attention on the poor literacy and numeracy outcomes for Indigenous children in remote and very remote locations. The three examples examined in this paper occurred between 2002 and 2007 during the development of the government?s policies about partnership accountability. A case study methodological approach evolved into a policy ethnography which was adopted to investigate the central question examined in this paper about the strengths and limitations of partnering as a policy concept. The strongest theme to arise from analysis was that parents and caregivers, and indeed their broader families and communities, had a distinctly different expectation of partnership to that of the government policy. Drawing on social exchange theories, the differences identified were concerned with the asymmetry and reciprocity. Indigenous communities are asserting the right to negotiated agreements that are accountable 'both ways' and governments seem to be more focussed on a ?one way? process of making Indigenous people accountable for education failure.

In this article, I take a creative and autoethnographic approach to reflect upon processes of decolonisation in Indigenous Australian studies classrooms. Positioning myself as a non-Indigenous educator, I take the reader on a journey through my search for pedagogy which makes space for the colonial, difficult and messy politics of race, whiteness and knowledge to be actively challenged, deconstructed and reimagined in this context as PEARL.

This article explores the shift in terminology that occurred in a 2-year Australian Learning and Teaching Council (ALTC)-funded curriculum renewal project that set out to broadly explore current teaching and learning practice in Indigenous Australian studies. While we started with the term 'Problem-Based Learning', it became clear as the project progressed that the terminology we were using was not politically or pedagogically appropriate. As the data began to reveal, the research team became increasingly uncomfortable with the colonial underpinnings and associations of the term 'Problem-Based Learning' (PBL), and began to explore the possibility of redefining what we do as something else entirely. A key outcome of the project was that PBL became PEARL, to describe the Political, Embodied, Active, and Reflective aspects of this teaching and learning approach in Indigenous Australian studies. The shift from PBL to PEARL was unexpected, but has resulted in exciting possibilities for migrating and extending theories of teaching and learning in Indigenous Australian studies into critical pedagogy, critical race theory and transformative education. Drawing on critical pedagogy, critical race theory and transformative education theory, this article explores the rationale behind the shift in terminology from PBL to PEARL. We also draw on student data from focus groups, questionnaires and lecturer reflection to examine the ways the results from this project hold great potential for the further implementation of PEARL into primary and secondary classrooms, specifically in relation to pedagogical practice in embedding Indigenous perspectives.

The view, which has prevailed since the time of Plato, is that mathematics represents ‘eternal truths’, and that it is similarly objective in its portrayal of knowledge. The truthfulness and objectivity of mathematics are now being challenged by writers arguing that mathematics is culturally based, represents the views of a particular class and background and is a consequence of humans arguing over proofs (e.g., Bishop, 1988; Lakatos, 1976; Walkerdine, 1990; Wilder, 1982). Ethnomathematics, for example, takes the view that mathematics has developed differently in different cultures and that exploration of how different cultures understand mathematics and mathematical concepts is important, not only for mathematics but also for cultural understanding (Presmeg, 1997). Thus, as the Queensland education system reflects mainstream Eurocentric culture, non-Eurocentric cultures, such as Indigenous, find little relevance within traditional school mathematics. As Matthews, Watego, Cooper and Baturo (2005) argue The education system, as a reflection of the dominant society’s views (Jones et al., 1996; Matthews et al., 2003), has devalued Indigenous cultures as a primitive, simplistic society. This is further reinforced by the notion of ‘technological progress’, which has limited Indigenous peoples’ ability to participate in scientific endeavours and allowed the continual exploration of Indigenous knowledge for scientific purposes. An education based on these principles, only serves to marginalise Indigenous people and undermine the significance of their Indigenous identity.

Perspectives on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Education

For most Indigenous people in central and northern Australia the encounter with the western world has been relatively recent. Yet even in the most remote Indigenous communities, global influences pervade everyday life and new forms of media and communications are reshaping youth culture. This paper draws on ethnographic case study data from research with Indigenous youth who are participating in non-formal community-based media and music production and digital community archiving projects in remote regions. For these young adults the generational shift has been rapid, as many of their elders once lived a pre-contact nomadic existence. Now they are firmly part of global youth culture, taking on the role of mediating between old cultural knowledge and new digital technologies. Such generationally differentiated arenas of social practice are also changing the ways in which youth in remote Indigenous Australia are using oral and written language.

'Engagement' is the second of six top priorities in Australia's most recent Indigenous education strategy to 'close the gap' in schooling outcomes. Drawing on findings from a three-year ethnographic analysis of school engagement issues in the north of Australia, this article situates engagement within the history of Indigenous education policy, followed by considerations of how many of the issues faced by Indigenous families both match and can be distinguished from those experienced among poor and underemployed social groups throughout the western world. We find that Indigenous people are content with the schools' engagement efforts and with their interactions with schools, accepting that how their lives are lived are not within the provenance of the school system to amend. In its homogenisation of Indigenous issues, reification of cultural distinction and foregrounding of disengagement as an issue, Australian education policy is also about non-engagement, in that it excludes key issues from policy consideration while appearing to be inclusive. The education sector does not systematically engage with the grinding issues that Indigenous families face in their everyday worlds; and since Indigenous people do not really expect schools to know how to solve their issues, the call for engagement and its resolution is perfectly irresolvable.

One of the most important programs for Indigenous community and economic development is the Community Development Employment Projects (CDEP) scheme. CDEP employs around 35,000 Indigenous Australians and accounts for over one-quarter of total Indigenous employment. This paper reviews the evidence on the social and economic impacts of the scheme. The available evidence demonstrates that the scheme does have positive economic and community development impacts and that it is cost effective in achieving these outcomes. The paper argues that the CDEP program should continue to be supported and resourced and outlines options for future policy directions in regard to Indigenous economic development and the role of the CDEP scheme.

Objective: There are challenges in delivering maternal and infant health (MIH) care to remote Northern Territory (NT) communities. These include fragmented care with birthing in regional hospitals resulting in cultural and geographical dislocation for Aboriginal women. Many NT initiatives are aimed at improving care. Indicators for evaluating these for remote Aboriginal mothers and infants need to be clearer. We reviewed existing indicators to inform a set of pragmatic indicators for reporting improvement in remote MIH care. Methods: Scientific databases and grey literature (organisational websites and Google Scholar) were searched using the terms 'Aboriginal/maternal/infant/remote health/monitoring performance'. Key stakeholders identified omitted indicators sets. Relevant sets were reviewed and organised by indicator type, stage of patient journey, topic and theme. Results: Forty-two indicators sets were found. Seven focused on Aboriginal health, 23 on reproductive/maternal health, eight on child/infant health and four on other aspects, e.g. remote health. We identified more than 1,000 individual indicators. Of these, 656 were relevant for our purpose and were subsequently organised into 300 topics and 16 themes for antenatal, birth and postpartum, and infant care by indicator type. Conclusion: There are many measures for monitoring health care delivery to mothers and infants. Few are framed around remote MIH services, despite poorer health outcomes of remote mothers and infants and the specific challenges with providing care in this setting. Establishing relevant indicators is vital to support relevant data collection and the development of appropriate policy for remote Aboriginal maternal and infant care.

Background: One third of all Australians live outside of its major cities. Access to health services and health outcomes are generally poorer in rural and remote areas relative to metropolitan areas. In order to improve access to services, many new programs and models of service delivery have been trialled since the first National Rural Health Strategy in 1994. Inadequate evaluation of these initiatives has resulted in failure to garner knowledge, which would facilitate the establishment of evidence-based service models, sustain and systematise them over time and facilitate transfer of successful programs. This is the first study to systematically review the available published literature describing innovative models of comprehensive primary health care (PHC) in rural and remote Australia since the development of the first National Rural Health Strategy (1993–2006). The study aimed to describe what health service models were reported to work, where they worked and why. Methods: A reference group of experts in rural health assisted in the development and implementation of the study. Peer-reviewed publications were identified from the relevant electronic databases. 'Grey' literature was identified pragmatically from works known to the researchers, reference lists and from relevant websites. Data were extracted and synthesised from papers meeting inclusion criteria. Results: A total of 5391 abstracts were reviewed. Data were extracted finally from 76 'rural' and 17 'remote' papers. Synthesis of extracted data resulted in a typology of models with five broad groupings: discrete services, integrated services, comprehensive PHC, outreach models and virtual outreach models. Different model types assume prominence with increasing remoteness and decreasing population density. Whilst different models suit different locations, a number of 'environmental enablers' and 'essential service requirements' are common across all model types. Conclusion: Synthesised data suggest that, moving away from Australian coastal population centres, sustainable models are able to address diseconomies of scale which result from large distances and small dispersed populations. Based on the service requirements and enablers derived from analysis of reported successful PHC service models, we have developed a conceptual framework that is particularly useful in underpinning the development of sustainable PHC models in rural and remote communities.

On 29 October 2002, key representatives from all Australian states and territories who work in Aboriginal health promotion, general health promotion or population health met in Sydney, New South Wales (NSW). Their objective was to further develop a shared vision and understanding of the potential national elements of a Collaborative Centre for Aboriginal Health Promotion, being established in NSW. The workshop was hosted by the NSW Department of Health and supported and attended by representatives of the Commonwealth Department of Health and Ageing and the NSW Aboriginal Health Partnership. These representatives included: • the Office of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health (OATSIH) – Department of Health and Ageing, NSW and Australian Capital Territory (ACT) • National Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisations (NACCHO) • States and Territories Departments of Health and/or Human Services [NSW, ACT, Victoria, South Australia, Queensland, Tasmania, Northern Territory (NT), and Western Australia (WA)] • Macquarie and Far West Area Health Services, NSW • Aboriginal Health and Medical Research Council (AHMRC), NSW • Danila Dilba Health Service, NT • Australian Indigenous HealthInfoNet – Edith Cowan University, WA • Dental Health Services, Victoria. The purpose of the workshop, using an interactive group process, was for participants to reach: • a greater understanding of the structure and purpose of the Collaborative Centre for Aboriginal Health Promotion • consensus on best practice principles for Aboriginal health promotion • a commitment to contribute to the collection of best practice case studies that is time bound and geographically representative • agreement towards the establishment of quality assurance measures that will match case study material with best practice principles • agreement on a set of recommendations on the mechanisms required at state and territory level that will ensure the sustainability of case study contributions to the Collaborative Centre for Aboriginal Health Promotion. The workshop outcomes were intended to build on, and be consistent with, the work of: • the National Public Health Partnership: Guidelines for the development, implementation and evaluation of National Public Health Strategies in relation to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples • the NSW Aboriginal Health Promotion Program: Directions Paper – NSW Aboriginal Health Promotion • the Australian Indigenous HealthInfoNet. This document sets out the Sydney Consensus Statement on Principles for Better Practice in Aboriginal Health Promotion,4 as agreed by the workshop participants. Following the workshop the Principles for Better Practice were prepared by the Centre for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Advancement and endorsed by the Australian Health Minister’s Advisory Council (AHMAC) in February 2003.

This interpretive study explores the relationship between spatial qualities and school-parent engagement in three primary schools which serve low income periurban Indigenous families in north Australia. Drawing from interviews with educators and parents, school-based observations and community fieldwork conducted over the course of two years in two different towns, we found that educators are very concerned that schools, as western institutions, present cultural and physical barriers to effective engagement; but that this view is not shared by Indigenous parents. Rather than seeing this as a simple issue of cultural difference, our analysis seeks to unravel the curious way in which the otherness of school space is acknowledged in educator discourse. Only some place features of school are suggested as a barrier by educators while other aspects – such as the clear identification of insiders and outsiders through school routines and locales – remain unremarked. We conclude by suggesting that schools are inherently exclusionary, a foundational fact which both parents and educators accept and respond to, in ways which both explain the push for engagement within education policy and its irrelevance as a concern for parents.

This publication had its origin in one-day workshop on Indigenous Governance and Management of Protected Areas held during the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS) Conference in Canberra in 2007. All but one of the contributions to this publication began as a presentation at the workshop. The workshop was an opportunity for Indigenous land managers, protected area managers, researchers and graduate students (not mutually exclusive categories) to reflect upon and share their experiences about the current status and direction of Indigenous peoples’ involvements with protected areas (national parks, marine parks, world heritage areas etc.) in Australia. The presentations represented a snapshot of initiatives, innovations, opportunities and challenges faced by all parties involved in the continuing journeys towards the recognition of the rights, interests and opportunities of Indigenous peoples within protected areas established on their traditional Country. With this publication our aim is to make this snapshot available to a wider audience and to provide a permanent record of the status of those journeys in 2008.