NAIDOC Week Food, basketball, dancing, art, a smoking ceremony and a moving guest speaker filled the College during NAIDOC Week this year.
Sean Bonney, Year 10, raising the Aboriginal Flag for the NAIDOC Week Marching and Assembly, photograph: Pixel Poetry
In MacKellar Hall Junior School boys danced to the didgeridoo and outside on the grass Early Learning students helped produce a sand mandala. Middle and Senior School boys ate kangaroo-based dishes whilst our Scotch College Indigenous Network (SCIN) scored two wins in staff versus students basketball games at Scotch and PLC. On the final day, with local Noongar elder Neville Collard standing by, Senior School boys marched through the smoking ceremony and sat spellbound at Assembly as West Coast Eagles Women’s player Alicia Janz told her story as a young talented Indigenous sports woman. As applause filled the Dickinson Centre, we were left with a question: would we, as a group of young men and as a school community, stand with Alicia and recognise and protect Indigenous culture in Australia? Therein lies our annual challenge following NAIDOC Week: how do we sustain the engagement and deepen the knowledge with regard to Indigenous culture, history and our connection to Indigenous people and not leave this connection to a one week, once a year moment?
Middle School barbeque lunch
Year 12 students (left to right) Kevin Laidlaw, Jonus Williams, Sam Wolf, Daniel O’Meara and Tyrelle Manado with West Coast Eagles’ Alicia Janz and Noongar elder Neville Collard, photograph: Pixel Poetry
The colours, tastes and stories of NAIDOC Week are always fascinating, but they need to be seen as a reminder, as an invitation to explore, understand, support and respect Indigenous culture. As this year’s NAIDOC theme underscored, Australia always was and always will be the home of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island people. Mr Richard Ledger Indigenous Programme Coordinator 20 | whole school
Year 7, Year 8 and Early Learning students with their sand mandala
