Page 3594 - Week 14 - Tuesday, 8 December 1992
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The department includes the spirit of the goals for a multicultural Australia in its education plan for ACT schools, 1991-1993. The draft curriculum policy 1991 sets out the following principles which have relevance to multiculturalism and combating racism: First, the curriculum is accessible to all learners. The curriculum must be designed and implemented so that it is accessible to students regardless of race, colour, cultural background, socioeconomic status, gender, and so on. Secondly, the curriculum is non-racist. It must actively promote cultural identity in our multicultural society by including the contributions of diverse groups. It must uphold and value the languages and cultures of Australian Aboriginal people. It must challenge misconceptions and prejudices.
Specific elements of multicultural and anti-racist policy are outlined for schools to implement in greater detail. They include the following: Identify a multicultural liaison person to collect and disseminate relevant information; ensure that ESL learners have access to specialist ESL programs and mainstream support, to facilitate full participation in all curriculum areas; recognise, accept and value the racial and ethnic identities of all students, to help them achieve their full potential; recognise that languages other than English spoken by students and staff provide a rich resource; attempt, in their languages other than English, to develop an awareness of the language backgrounds of the school community; strive to develop a climate in which the Aboriginal and ethnic origins of all members of the school community are valued; promote racial harmony and refuse to tolerate expression of racial or ethnic prejudice in any form; provide curricula, facilities and practices that cater for the cultural and religious diversity of its community; support and encourage the involvement of all community members of Aboriginal and ethnic origins in school activities; and, finally, encourage all students of Aboriginal and ethnic origins to be aware of the value and importance of participating in a variety of school activities.
As a former teacher, I have taken up many of those issues in specific programs in schools, and they continue in every school in the ACT in varying degrees. Some of our system-wide programs include those to implement the department's policy on Aboriginal education. We provide additional resources in the way of liaison officers and education assistants in our schools to assist Aboriginal students.
Mr Moore raised some questions about those Aboriginal students and, as I noted them, I will give him an answer as well as I can at this stage. Mr Moore said that he had heard of some of these matters and therefore asked the questions. I think that is fair enough, save in one respect. In his second question he suggested that a particular school may have been engaging in inequitable treatment. I think it would have been better if he had not identified a school, since he has only heard these things and had nothing stronger than that. He asked whether students were referred elsewhere. Those were his words.
From time to time, Mr Moore, if students in our government schools have behaviour problems, after very extensive counselling it may be suggested to them that they would be better off having a new start in another school, and another school is always offered to them. That is one of the solutions we have to a fairly intractable problem of behaviour disturbance with some students, and an alternative school is always proposed to them. With that background, it may well be that an Aboriginal student was so counselled, but their treatment would be no different from that of anyone else.
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