Indigenous Leadership Conference

On 18 May 2017, we held a Leadership Day at the Campbelltown Art Gallery with twenty Aboriginal students and teachers.

Getting to know you and being used to saying and doing activities in front of others, with Ms Bee
Getting to know you and being used to saying and doing activities in front of others, with Ms Bee

The day began with the Aboriginal Community Liaison Officer with the Acknowledgment of Country. We then played a connection game before Kristy Bell and Jackie Cornforth from WSU gave a talk and ran some activities on leadership. It was interesting to hear of the twists and turns someone’s life can take, and how to turn events into learning experiences. For the rest of the morning we played ‘fruit stop’ and some more games, then we listened to the next session with Amelia Corr from Macquarie University talking about pride and self-confidence.

Learning of Culture, Individuality and Pride with Ms Corr
Learning about culture, individuality and ride with Ms Corr

They enjoyed hearing about their culture and as the day progressed they lost a lot of their reservations and joined in. The students enjoyed meeting other students from different schools. They particularly loved the sharing of stories throughout the day, but overall it was an amazing event. After lunch we then heard from the president of the Campbelltown Local AECG, Jodie Bell, about what the organisation has contributed to Indigenous Educational Rights; her speech was fascinating as always.

Learning about the AECG with Jodie Bell
Learning about the AECG with Jodie Bell

Our next step here at Thomas Reddall High School is to create a Junior AECG and feed into the school’s Student Council committee so there is a specific Indigenous input into the student side of the running of the school, raising the profile of the Aboriginal students at our school.

Story contributed by Diana Boot from Thomas Reddall High School. Published in 2017.