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really important, when you go to these
places, to be open to learning about that
history and to hear it and understand it.
The second thing I think people need
to understand, or have some reflection
about for themselves, is racism. I think
we’ve reached a point in our country
where racism is becoming a bigger
and bigger issue. We saw through the
Adam Goodes saga the impact that
this is having on society. You can’t go
to a barbeque and have a conversation
about things like Aboriginal people
without there being comments made.
It’s really important when
you go to places to be
open to learning about that
history and to hear it and
understand it.
Where do you stand on those comments
when they come up? A good place to start
would be to have a look at Stan Grant’s
recent speech and racism IQ seminar
series that was held at Sydney University
at the end of 2015. He makes some really
useful points about how we as Australian’s
all embrace our history together.
And I guess the last thing is that
people do need to be willing to ask
for help when they get stuck. When
they’re feeling lost or isolated. In rural
communities there’s a lot of connection
and connectedness, if you feel you’re
What advice would you
give to students going on a
rural or remote placement?
The fist thing I would advise is that they
need to really understand the history of
the community that they’re going to.
Students need to understand what
has happened to the Aboriginal
Torres Strait Islander people in this
country as a whole since settlement.
Policies and government processes,
the acts of genocide that happened
and impacted on people in the
communities.
Things
that
have
happened at a global or national level.
There’s also been things that have
happened in communities they’re
going to be working in that people
have a memory of, people still have
connections to, and I think that it’s
they’ll make up the large proportion
of people that you’ll see and care for.
‘I think we’ve reached
a point in our country
where racism is
becoming a bigger
and bigger issue. We
saw through the Adam
Goodes saga the impact
that this is having on
society.’