Success Stories from an Indigenous Immersion Primary Teaching Experience in New South Wales Schools
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1375/ajie.40.23Keywords:
Aboriginal education, teacher professional development, pre-service teacher training, teacher retentionAbstract
A federal report released by the Department of Families and Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs (FaHCSIA, 2009), entitled Closing the Gap on Indigenous Disadvantage: The Challenge for Australia, highlighted the inequality that exists between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students based on a restricted access to resources, issues of isolation, staff and student retention, and cultural differences and challenges. In New South Wales (NSW), the Department of Education and Training (DET) and the Aboriginal Education Consultative Group (AECG) in 2003/2004 undertook their own review of Aboriginal education in NSW Government schools that revealed significant concerns about the outcomes being achieved by Aboriginal students in NSW DET schools, confirming the more recent FaHCSIA (2009) findings. In 2006 the NSW DET implemented the Enhanced Teacher Training Scholarship Program (ETTSP) to empower 20 final-year education students to successfully engage with Indigenous students in schools and their wider community during their internship period. Using themes, this article explores the experiences of 10 University of New England scholarship holders at the end of their final year of teacher training and immersion/internship experience in 2010. The article puts forward useful recommendations for both teacher universities and students intending to teach in schools with high Indigenous student populations.
Downloads
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2011 The Author(s)
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
The Australian Journal of Indigenous Education is in the process of transitioning to fully Open Access. Most articles are available as Open Access but some are currently Free Access whereby copyright still applies and if you wish to re-use the article permission will need to be sought from the copyright holder. This article's license terms are outlined at the URL above.