Boarding and Australia's First Peoples

Dr. Marnie O’Bryan works in Indigenous education research in Australia, with a special interest in the lived experience of First Nations students in boarding schools. She is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Aboriginal Economic Policy Research [CAEPR] at the Australian National University; an Honorary Research Fellow at the Melbourne Graduate School of Education, University of Melbourne; and co-Chair of the Indigenous Literacy Foundation, a national not-for-profit charity focussed on supporting the literacy development of children in very remote Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. This book was was inspired by O’Bryan's own lived experience teaching First Nations students in an elite boarding school in Melbourne, Australia and is written in collaboration with young people from across Australia. It should inform best practice in Indigenous program delivery in dominant culture boarding schools.

• Understanding the Historical Context.- Boarding Schools.- The Purpose and Presumed Benefits of Boarding; Parents and Alumni.- The Purpose and Presumed Benefits of Indigenous Programs: Education Participants.- Transition to Boarding.- Homesickness .- Trauma.- Encountering Cultural Dissonance, Racial Stereotypes and Racism at School.- Family Support and Finding a Voice.- Resilience and Developing a Resistant Mind-set.- Education Policy, Choice and Remote Education. Lest we Forget.- Understanding the Cost/benefit of Boarding by Reference to Football.- First Person: Accountability.- Truth Telling and Transformations.- Conclusion.