Over 80 people attended the graduation of the first students to complete the Advanced Education Entry Certificate course at the Derby Civic Centre on Sunday, August 12.

The Director of Mount Lawley College, in presenting the awards to the successful students, expressed the college’s delight in being able to conduct the ceremony in the Kimberleys and that the college was hopeful that it could continue to provide a service to people in remote areas of the state.

The first five graduates – Agnes Albert, Verna Lockyer, Rosita Lovell, Christopher Bin Kali and Selina King, had completed the course in minimum time, which was a very commendable feat, considering the course only commenced in 1978 and the program was entirely by correspondence.

All the first five graduates had completed the course and been granted their award with credit. This entitled them to unconditional entrance into teacher training at Mount Lawley College.

Speakers at the ceremony included Mr Steven Albert, Chairman of the National Aboriginal Education Committee, Mr Jim Biendurry of the National Aboriginal Committee and Mrs Ester Bevan of the National Aboriginal Education Committee.

Mr Albert, while congratulating the graduates, stated that this was only the first step and he hoped it would not be very long before these students would graduate as qualified teachers and return to work in their own communities.

The first graduates had done a magnificent job, according to Mr Biendurry, and shown all other people what they could do by studying and hard work. He wished all other students in the course every success with their studies and hoped to see many more graduates from the course in the near future.

A mobile education unit was commissioned in 1976 as a completely new concept in the education and advancement programme for Aborigines in South Australia. Previous attempts of institutionalised educational programmes had proved generally unsuccessful as adult Aborigines living in their own lands had not responded well to conventional approaches.

The Department of Further Education accepted the need to preserve and develop Aboriginal society and to provide effective training within that society. As a result, opportunities were offered to adult Aborigines in the north west of the state to acquire domestic and mechanical skills in locations of their own choosing and in a way appropriate and in harmony with, traditional life styles.

On many occasions in recent times, at conferences and in reports, it has been said that it is of considerable importance to produce curriculum materials which are relevant to the lives of Australian children. In particular, it has been asserted that language teaching programs for Australian Aboriginal children and for the children of recently arrived community groups would be facilitated, if there were materials available to which these children could relate. Many materials presently available in schools are criticized, because they have been designed for child audiences in the United Kingdom and the United States, or that minor ‘cosmetic’ adaptations have been made to suit them to an Australian market. One argument put forward for the use of these ‘imported’ materials is that the Australian market is too small to support the development and production of materials designed specifically for Australian conditions. Contributing factors to this cost element are the use of four-colour printing, high quality glossy paper and expensive binding techniques. It is asserted also, that the use of these materials may be necessary*as they form part of integrated language teaching programs. In many instances, however, the classroom practitioner may develop an ideosyncratic language teaching regime which incorporates facets of several ‘recognized’ schemes. The problem arises therefore of how to capitalize upon the techniques and skills of the teacher with ‘established’ methods and yet provide materials with which the children can achieve a degree of empathy and self-identity and thereby, through the materials, experience stimulus motivation.

Because of the need to establish clearly the Department’s co-ordinating responsibilities in relation to both Commonwealth functional departments and State governments, the Department’s functional statement in the Administrative Arrangements Order was revised and now reads:

A functional statement for Regional Offices was approved. This gives priority to field officers being the means of effective consultation with Aboriginal communities, keeping the Government informed of the state of affairs in Aboriginal communities, and stimulating, co-ordinating and monitoring the activities of all agencies providing services to communities.

The Department will require officers, both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal, of rare commitment and versatility to carry out these functions.

The Department, with the advice and assistance of the Commonwealth Department of Education, is concerned to ensure that, at all levels of education, opportunities and programs are available to Aboriginals which are appropriate to their needs and in no way inferior to those available to the general community.

This course design is such that it will enable twelve Aboriginal school leavers to compete, within nine months, on an equitable basis with other generally more qualified students who seek apprenticeships in the automotive and building trades.

Some interest has been shown by schools in the guidance camps currently conducted jointly by members of the Queensland and Commonwealth Departments of Education for Year 11 Aboriginal students. This article outlines the philosophy and content of these programs, and emphasizes that their effectiveness is, in part, determined by follow-up activities and support from the participants* schools.

The twelve years from 1966 to 1978 were very exciting ones for early childhood education in the Caribbean. During this period early childhood education was acknowledged as the foundation upon which to build the fundamental principle of “equality of quality educational opportunities for all” – a principle which each island government supports and is prepared to accept as an obligation and make real for its children - rich and poor.

An Aboriginal Oral History Conference was held at the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies on June 16, 17 and 18.

Aborigines and non-Aborigines active in recording and documenting oral history discussed the importance of carrying out this work. In some cases there is special urgency to record the histories of older people while they are still alive. It was also noted that history and its study are ongoing processes and that the opinions and memories of young Aborigines today are important to Aboriginal history and identity. The conference also discussed the importance of Aboriginal history to general Australian social history.

The social relevance of oral history in Aboriginal land claims, for the cultural education of Aboriginal children and in rectifying the ethnocentric slant of Australian history was discussed.

Mr Michael Mace, the Chairman of the Aboriginal and Islander Advisory Committee to the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies said:

We thought readers would be interested in the following account of the activities and aims of the Aboriginal Arts Board of the Australia Council