I see no case for substandard indigenous specific degrees. And given an acknowledgement, we have entered the 21st century, just set aside the endless excuses, prevarication and tolerance for behavior that is mired in the stone age and conflict that was over, over a century ago?

Time to stop with the endless blame shifting of professional victims and the aggressive confrontation of folks still connected to antiquated and no longer appropriate tribalism; and indeed the corruption and nepotism that it appears to give rise to?

And stop being your own worst enemies? Take stock of where and when you are, then crack on taking advantage of what's on the table to improve the common lot and the next generation!
Alan B.

Hi Alan,

If I understand you right, I agree with you that sub-degree courses should never have been the be-all and end-all - and they never were. They were a relatively late initiative. Indigenous people have been graduating from teaching courses (at teachers' colleges) and nurses (from teaching hospitals) since the forties.

Then in the early seventies, some bright spark thought, "Gosh, it seems to be too difficult for Indigenous people to handle standard degrees, let's 'adapt' courses, at lower levels, that they can handle." So the Aboriginal Task Force in Adelaide; a two-year 'adapted' course, specifically for Indigenous students only, down the hall from the standard three-year degree for white fellas. But very soon, this was countered, perhaps unwittingly, by standard three-year teaching courses WITH STUDENT SUPPORT, at James Cook in FNQ and Mt Lawley in Perth. They worked.

But meanwhile, many universities had been enrolling Indigenous students in standard courses, Flinders from 1969 for example. For brevity, let's call these two models, the 'racist' model, or the 'Apartheid' model, and the mainstream model. Let's be clear: students in the mainstream model have ALWAYS out-numbered those in the Apartheid model.

Even in SA, the home of the Task Force, by the early eighties, the mainstream prevailed. But where there was Aboriginal Studies at a university, which type do you think had more clout with senior management ? Yes, indeed, a model which preferred to 'adapt' and write up curriculum rather than ever provide student support.

But for all that, enrolments and graduations favoured mainstream courses, nothing 'adapted' about them. Of course, Ab. Studies took the money for student support, they needed it to write up yet more courses. But even with dumb-dumb senior management support, their cachet dwindled - until they got the bright idea of asking senior management to make it compulsory for ALL students to do a unit of Ab. Studies or Ab. Culture, across the entire university (Of course, I'm writing of a very limited number of universities here). This had the double positive of also being able to get rid of those lower-level courses,

[TBC]

[Continued]

and pissing off Indigenous students altogether. So they thought.

But meanwhile, from around 1999, many more kids were finishing Year 12 and eventually coming on to university study. That didn't start to kick in until about 2003-2004, but it's been up-and-away since then: Indigenous students in degree-level and eventually post-grad courses (about 25 % of Indigenous graduates go on to post-graduate study), enrolling in mainstream courses, away from the influence of Ab. Studies. The horse has now well and truly bolted.

As well, Indigenous people have been living in cities in fair numbers since the fifties, three generations. Grandparents now have been born and raised in cities. Indigenous people are now in the mainstream and are likely to stay there, come Treaty, Sovereignty, dog's breakfast or whatever.

BUT how to re-engage those alienated populations in the outer suburbs, rural and remote areas ? What would be the point of just watching them take the 'road to Aurukun' ? And any alternative road would be to where else but through education and employment ? Who will facilitate that ? The education elites ? Not bloody likely. They're too busy sitting on important committees. So this is a problem that will grow much worse before anything is done about it, I'm afraid.

Cheers,

Joe

Yes Joe and in some cases, an insult to folks who have in their number some of the smartest folk on the planet, with elephantine memories!

I remember back in the seventies, when an indigenous class in a small rural outback community in NSW? Reportedly topped the national averages in one year, due to a lady teacher who refused to accept the label "superior folk" put on first Australians.

I believe anyone who gains entry on merit should get the same (level playing field) opportunity as other folk. And consequently have their credentials recognised as being as good as the next bloke's; and not dismissed as some substandard piece of window dressing that then is virtually worthless out in the real world?
Cheers, Alan B.

Hi Alan,

I wrote up a lovely long reply, then my bastard computer wipe the lot. I don't have the energy to try to do it all again.

But anyway, what do you mean by "same (level-laying field) opportunity" ? That's occurred for Indigenous people only in the last couple of decades. Indigenous student support made a hell of a difference for twenty-odd years, say from the early 1980s until about 2005, but after that it wasn't quite so necessary, at least not for the children of working Indigenous parents. But that seems to be mostly gone now.

Cheers,

Joe

eggzackly Joe. A level-laying field is a place where chickens come home to roost, engage in a little horizontal recreation, or lay a few free range eggs.

This reminds me of an elderly gent, whose horizontal activities had been severely curtailed due to an age related arterial problem and decided to have a full medical. The Doc checked his x rays and tutted away, finally blurting out, look I'm sorry old timer, but you're going to have to give up horizontal recreation! Wadda ya mean doc, replied the old timer, thinking about it or talking about it?

My computer regularly wipes almost completed work also and because I'm not the only one using it?

And in the news recently, identity thieves trying to glean vital information by trolling through your data even as you work at your keyboard. And resulting in some of your work disappearing even as you type!?

In any event they're wasting their time with me given the only financial transactions I conclude or conduct on line are via a load and go debit card, which I load just hours before conducting business and over an agreed or known price, which then taps out the new topped up balance on the card.

I urge anyone reading these lines to do the same where practical? Failing that ensure you run a program like the windows ten I'm currently road testing, which stores most of your data in the cloud?

I believe a degree or diploma should say only a couple of things about the holder, that no free passes were given or expected, and that the recipient is as good as his or her final passing marks indicate and that it was earned on meritorious results! Nothing more nothing less, whether white, black or brindle!
Cheers Alan B.