Rural and Remote Education - NT

Rural

and Remote Education - NT

Lajamanu community meeting,

13 May 1999 - notes

Participants

Teachers, parents,

school council members

Lajamanu

Lajamanu is situated

in the Top End of the Northern Territory in the Katherine region. Approximately

650 - 900 people live in Lajamanu depending on the time of year. Lajamanu

Community Education Centre ('CEC') has 171 students from preschool to

Year 7 or as secondary age students. Walpiri is the first language.

Students with disabilities

Lajamanu CEC has

11 children with some sort of disability. The Special Education Unit assisting

these students is made up of a .5 (half time) special education teacher

and a couple of Inclusion Support Assistants working on a casual basis.

The special ed. teacher presented a written submission about disability

issues to the Inquiry and spoke about the issues facing disabled students

in Lajamanu.

It is very difficult

for the community to get the special equipment needed for the disabled

students. This includes shower chairs, special toilets, safe paths around

school, lifting devices and a standing frame.

"We have had applications

in with the Education Department for a year and a half now, to have our

school modified to meet disability standards ." "But the process is so

slow that nothing happens. Just recently we were told that we would get

the first part of the grant to get the disability toilet but it is still

going to be months before that happens. And there seems to be no special

provisions to get this disability access. You just have to apply like

everyone else does for improvements to the school, and it is just a matter

of luck I suppose, or if the Department considers your thing all right

they approve it. But there is no actual process, which we can go through

to get disability access and to get it quickly."

A general shortage

of student support service staff in the area means that the town schools

are given higher priority and isolated schools do not get the special

education staff they need. "Last year we got no speech pathologist service,

no behavioural management service and we have got children with high needs

in both of these areas. Recently we made a request for a guidance officer

to come to the school and once again we were told that they had to prioritise

the town over us."

"Leston [a disabled

student] just came back from respite care yesterday and they sent him

back without his wheelchair because they could not fit that wheelchair

on the plane they said. And when I asked the doctor, 'How could you possibly

send a young boy without his wheelchair?' her reply was 'Oh he will be

OK for a couple of days.' For me and for our school that is just an absolute

abuse of that boy's human rights. He has a right to be able to move around

the school."

Housing for teachers

The Northern Territory

Government provides houses for teachers who are not locals. The local

Aboriginal teachers are not given houses whereas all the white teachers

in remote schools are given houses. The Aboriginal teachers feel that

this is discriminatory.

Bilingual education

The teachers and

parents of Lajamanu CEC were all very concerned about the Northern Territory

Government's decision of 1 December 1998 to phase out the Bilingual Education

Program. It was expressed very strongly that the people of Lajamanu consider

their Walpiri language to be a very important part of their culture and

that it is crucial that the children are taught in Walpiri as well as

English. The parents and the teachers are afraid that they will lose their

traditional language if it is not taught in the local school. They feel

the Bilingual Education Program has been a success but they want to have

more time to make it work. One very important result of the Program is

that the elders of the community are involved in teaching the students.

The people of Lajamanu

think it is the Northern Territory Government's responsibility to assist

the community in maintaining their language and their culture.

One Aboriginal teacher

from Lajamanu CEC said, "It is really important, I think Walpiri and English

should be together, giving our children pride in themselves."

"And bilingual education

is really important. That we get our elders involved in teaching our children,

our children learn Walpiri, learn about our culture and it makes them

proud of themselves, of who they are. It is really important that bilingual

education is not stopped. It shouldn't be stopped. We've told the government

over and over again not to cut that bilingual program."

A parent and community

member said, "You see, I've travelled all over Australia. And I've been

to places where Aboriginal people don't have a culture and don't have

a language. And when I come back here language is still spoken throughout

the Territory, and that makes me feel very proud. And that must continue,

for that's been a way of life since time began."

Another Aboriginal

teacher from Lajamanu CEC said, "If you can give bilingual education to

Greek, German, Italian why can't you give it to Indigenous people of Australia."

Another staff member

from the school said, "To me language is very important for the kids as

well as for the adults in the community. If we lose our language, what's

going to happen? How are we going to teach our kids? We are now approaching

the 21st Century. Will the kids still keep their language? Language, that's

part of our culture."

Secondary education

There is no secondary

education in Lajamanu. Some students go away to Darwin for boarding school.

The community was not sure what kind of secondary education they wanted

for their children. Several options were discussed: a secondary school

in Lajamanu, regional secondary schools closer to the community probably

based in Katherine, or more boarding facilities in the existing boarding

school in Katherine.

Last

updated 2 December 2001.