When the School is the Community, and the Community is the School—Connectedness is Everything
A Case study of a Remote School at Yiyili, Central Kimberley, Western Australia
Keywords:
Indigenous education, Kimberley schools, community and relationships, cultural interface, remote schools, engagementAbstract
In 2023, a small team undertook a series of interviews and yarns with staff, students and families at the remote community of Yiyili in the central Kimberley. The case study formed part of a much larger study which sought to understand why attendance rates in remote Aboriginal schools have fallen over recent years, to unpack a whole raft of factors that might explain this, and to also investigate strategies that seem to be encouraging remote kids to attend school. The Yiyili case study demonstrated that heightened connectedness of school and community results in a greater sense of stability and cultural safety for students, school staff and community members. Such a blurring of lines between educational institution and community might not be possible in larger communities, but our study suggests that such institutional openness might prove crucial in cross-cultural circumstances such as remote Indigenous communities.
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Copyright (c) 2024 Kathryn Thorburn, Catherine Ridley
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