Ex-NT education Minister meets with Educators – resigns 5 days later

Hopefully this will be my last few words on the brief tenure of Marion Scrymgour as Northern Territory Education Minister.

A previous post here discusses events up to the date of this meeting. Crikey has published my piece about the current state of the NT Government following Marion’s sudden decision on 9 February 2009, to quit her position as Deputy Chief Minister, Attorney-General, Justice Minister and a swathe of minor ministries.

In one of her last acts as Education Minister – after the first re-shuffle of 4 February 2009, she met with a group of educators composed of Brian Devlin, Associate Professor Bilingual Education & Applied Linguistics at the Faculty of Education, Health and Science of Charles Darwin University at Darwin, Kathy McMahon, a PhD student with experience in bilingual education, Kendall Trudgeon, and apprentice Minister in the Uniting Church who has lived with Yolngu people in n-e Arnhem Land for many years, Leon White, a long-term Principal of the Yirrkala Community Education Centre at Yirrkala.

Also present were Yalmay & Mandawuy Yunupingu, both teachers at Yirrkala and eminent members of their and the Australian community and two members of the Yirrkala CEC Council, Djuwalpi & Rarriwuy Marika.

Marion Scrymgour was assisted by her principal education advisor, Eva Lawler and three staff from the Department of Education (DET).

The Minutes for the meeting are available in full here from the Friends of Bilingual Learning web-group site.

What I want to do here is conduct a brief review of some of the issues discussed in the meeting – particularly in light of the subsequent resignation of Marion Scrymgour from the Cabinet and the announcement that NT Chief Minister Paul Henderson and Malarndirri McCarthy will share responsibility for the administration of the Education portfolio.

What I think these Minutes show, when taken in the context of the recent history of bilingual education, is that there has been a fundamental failure by successive governments to engage with and properly resource bilingual education in the NT. Others will have a better perspective of this than I and I hope that they will make their contribution in due course.

Unfortunately it may also be that there has been a failure, over time, and in the the face of significant challenges and difficulties, of the supporters of bilingual education to firstly properly engage with the NT government and Education Department administrators in order to present them with a unified position on why bilingual education should be supported and developed, and secondly, to properly organise themselves into some form of representative group that could negotiate directly with government and the department.

Not being organised has meant that the government has been able to ‘divide and conquer’ the various language groups/bilingual schools and has also meant that supporters of bilingual education were only able to present a relatively unified face after the fact – through the establishment of the Friends of Bilingual Education web-group.

Another consequence of not having some organised base is that it makes it more difficult to quickly gain a consensus, or a range of views, from those with a common cause; to publicise the work of the bilingual cause or to spread the word to other (in the NT at least) language groups and schools that might want to begin or renew bilingual education programs in their schools.

This point is somewhat reinforced by the attendance at the meeting – while it is creditable that so many Yolngu people were able to attend, it is a shame that no-one from any other language groups or bilingual schools from across the NT were present at the meeting.

Enough of my rant…on the the Minutes of this meeting.

There are 20 points of discussion in the Minutes and I’ll limit my discussion here to those that are of interest or that I think I can competently comment on.

Point 1 – ‘Cabinet reshuffle’ – this refers to Marion’s description of her on-going oversight of several, not inconsequential, aspects of the Education portfolio – notwithstanding that Chief Minister Paul Henderson (Hendo) will be the Minister for Education. Marion would apparently ‘oversee the Transforming Indigenous Education strategy, including the transition to the four hours of English in the morning policy, early Childhood reform, and Local Education Boards.’

Somehow Hendo would apparently be implementing the “four hours of English” decision and other parts of the new strategy.

This point almost beggars belief – there are two issues that arise in my mind – firstly, assuming that Hendo was in agreement with this policy, it shows a disregard for established conventions of Ministerial responsibility.

Under this scheme Hendo would be the Education Minister but Marion would have been operating extra-portfolio in selected areas of the same portfolio – so who will be signing off on decisions and if a parent, or other person concerned by a particular aspect of policy, wishes to make a complaint or representation, to whom would it be made?.

The other issue is related to this two-headed Ministerial beast – to whom would public servants have been reporting or receiving directions from – Hendo or Marion or both?

Point 4 – The DET staffer Kevin Gillan said that:

‘…he was surprised that so little Language & Culture was taught in NT schools.’

This was picked up again in Point 9 where Marion conceded that she was:

“…surprised to find there was no language policy for government schools when she entered parliament.’

It really is difficult to respond to this point other than to express surprise that these comments came from two people charged with the administration of bilingual education policy in the NT – they should be credited for their brutal frankness – but, as they were both in positions where they can, or could, do something about the lack of a language policy, these comments also display a fundamental lack of commitment or inquiry.

Maybe they do have an interest in developing a Languages policy for NT schools – a good place they could go for some resources is this web page created by the linguist David Nash of the ANU.

Another good resource is the New South Wales Aboriginal Languages Policy page of the Department of Aboriginal Affairs in NSW. In a jursidiction where so many Aboriginal languages are threatened, but also where many are strong, lack of an Aboriginal languages policy amounts almost to a betrayal of a large proportion of the NT’s population by successive governments.

As Djuwalpi Marika told the meeting:

“Language is sacred. We don’t want ‘broken language’- our children should be able to read, write and speak in their own language.”

At Point 8 Djuwalpi refers to the lack of influence that many Aboriginal people have in relation to decisions made about their childrens education.

He said that:

“…instead of bureaucrats making decisions for us…we want our childrens education in two languages. The government is telling us what to do and not allowing our leadership to decide.”

Rarriwuy Marika supported Djuwalpi:

“…you talk about partnership here but there is no partnership. You have already made the decision and will not listen to what we are saying.”

At Point 12 there is a discussion about two letters sent to Marion by Cecily Napanangka Granites (published at Crikey here) and Jeannie Egan (I’ve written about this in a previous post) and two petitions from Maningrida and Yuendumu.

Marion responded to these matters by acknowledging the two letters and advising that she will respond to them, and also that she would be visiting Maningrida ‘next week’. In light of her subsequent resignation from all Ministries it will be interesting to see if she does respond to those letters and make that visit – and in what capacity, and with what authority, she would do so.

From the Minutes Marion then went on to say that:

“…all the communities are happy with the move to four hours English a day except Yirrkala and Maningrida.”

This may be a misquote or, if not, a statement relying on limited and flawed information – it is apparent to me and many others that there is widespread dissatisfaction (and confusion) about what will, and has, happened in the bilingual schools.

Marion appears to be confusing community sentiment, which she most likely has no means of effectively gauging, with the fact that 8 of the 10 government bilingual schools had submitted their plans for the introduction of the mandatory four hours of English – a plan that , as I understand it, each principal of the 10 schools was directed to submit.

Further questions arise about the quality, validity and community acceptance (or knowledge) of those plans – we (and indeed the NT DET and the Education Minister of the day) apparently have no independent information about those matters.

At Point 13 there is a discussion by Yalmay Yunupingu, Marion and Djuwalpi that links with Points 14 and 15.

Yalmay raises a concern with the NAPLAN tests, namely that when the test is administered in English the Year 3 students cannot understand it as the English is too complex.

Yalmay says:

“Why can’t our children be assessed in Yolngu Matha at Year 3 because they can read and write in Yolngu Matha?”

Marion’s reply as reported in the Minutes, in my view, failed to address the question:

“The time for excuses is finished. The results are not good enough.”

Djuwalpi responded:

“Look! Our seven-year olds can’t learn everything in English! They will be saying ‘Nha, Nha?’(What, What?), and you can’t learn like that. The teacher will be saying “Blah Blah“and the children will be saying “Nha, Nha?“. That is not good learning.”

Later there was a more constructive discussion on that point.

Kevin Gillan of NT DET responded to Yalmay’s repeated query about NAPLAN testing in Yolngu Matha:

“DET would be willing to commit resources to support Yalmay’s idea to develop tests in Yolngu Matha for Year 3 students but the Year 3 students would have to do English tests as well.”

This time Marion’s response was more positive:

“Yalmay’s idea is a good one, we have to work together on this.”

At Point 14 the Minutes record Marion Scrymgour as saying:

“I’m not saying I don’t value Indigenous staff. But I do ask why there are two teachers in every class? Bilingual should be one [teacher]. I have read all the research on bilingual, both national and international, and it says the teacher should be bilingual. Our indigenous staff don’t have this skill set”.

This has provoked two responses that I think make a very good point.

At Point 16 is a statement from Mandawuy Yunupingu. For those who don’t know of him Mandawuy is the lead singer of Yothu Yindi, a great band that has for the last twenty years and more led the charge for Aboriginal music with songs and albums that are steeped in the traditional language and culture of north-east Arnhem Land and were one of the first bands to sing many of their songs in their own language/s.

Here is a short except from the Yothu Yindi biography:

In 1992, with Yothu Yindi fast emerging as one of the hottest acts in Australia, Mandawuy took leave from the Yirrkala School to concentrate on the band. Yothu Yindi spent much of 1992 touring Australia, north America and eastern and western Europe, winning rave reviews wherever they played.

…

On January 26 1993, Mandawuy Yunupingu was named 1992 Australian of the Year in recognition of his commitment to forge greater understanding between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australians, and because of his burgeoning role as an ambassador for all Australians.

Mandawuy’s short speech (from the Minutes) follows:

“I want to talk about Yolngu strength; either in the English or the Yolngu Matha speaking domain. Yolngu leaders see our language as sacred.

Yolngu kids think in their own language which can then inform them about English and their own form of understanding, about its meanings and its values.

That shouldn’t be underestimated. Ignoring this is the view of seeing Yolngu children as under-privileged.

I consider Yolngu children to be as clever as any one else in the whole world. They should not be asked to leave their cleverness outside the classroom door. Not my kids or my grandkids.

They should have equal rights, the same rights as any kids in the world, whether they are Chinese, or Balanda, the equal right to learn in their own language and to be judged as equal to anyone else.”

According to the Minutes Marion Scrymgour’s response was that:

“DET must revisit the Yirrkala Remote Learning Partnership then and Hendo must re-sign it. Re Numbulwar, I believe you have representations from people there. I have met with elders in the Katherine Region, and we are allocating $1.5 million dollars for revitalisation work so there can be proper structured programs so I’m not all bad! I have listened to elders in the region, and it broke my heart.”

From the Minutes, the rest of the meeting related to issues concerning the data relied upon by then Minister Scrymgour that she presented to the NT Parliament in November 2008.

Particular concerns related to the quality and selective use of what was said to be poorly collated, invalid and unreliable data and it was suggested that a new set of independently verified data be collected and assessed. This met with a positive response from NT DET and there are indications that a new data collection and assesment process will be established in the coming months.

In conclusion, the Minutes record that Minister Scrymgour by:

“…saying it had been a good meeting and that it would be good to have regular meetings. She reiterated that everyone needs to work together to achieve better results for our kids.”