I was the only Aboriginal student in my entire high school. Having few common experiences with my fellow students, I spent the majority of my high school education dreaming of the day I would leave school and escape to the outback where my Aboriginal relatives lived. I was not concerned with higher studies, nor do I remember having the idea implanted in my head by either parents or teachers. I guess at the time I was not the best or brightest of students. I never made the choice to drop out of high school; it was effectively forced on me by the closure of my high school at the end of year 11. The following two years taught me a really valuable lesson: nobody will hire a person with only a year 11 qualification for any but the most mundane of tasks. I even made that escape to the outback a few times, but the same problem kept driving me back. I realised that my freedom in life would depend on having the right education, and more importantly, the right attitude towards that education.
By this time, my mother had begun working at the University of Melbourne in what was known as the Koorie Education Unit, now the Centre for Indigenous Education. It is through my mother that I began to hear about the great work being done by the University via the Koorie Education Unit to attract Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander people into university courses. Unfortunately for me, I did not yet qualify for mature age placement, nor had I finished VCE, so the Unit encouraged me to gain a VCE equivalent which could act as a bridge towards an Indigenous entry into a University of Melbourne arts degree. The bridge I chose was an Associate Diploma in Aboriginal Health and Community Welfare at Preston TAFE, which provided me with the basics of tertiary study and the confidence necessary to go to university. After graduating with only average marks, I applied for, and received, Indigenous entry into a Bachelor of Arts degree at the University of Melbourne.
My first year of Arts was tough. I was not nearly as prepared as I had thought. Fortunately, the Koorie Education Unit provided me with a number of really great tutors. As well as providing the usual advice on essay writing and sitting exams, they provided me with practical information, like how to take notes and how to work smart, not hard. While applying to university had become the best decision I had ever made, a close second was accepting a position at Ormond College, a residential college on the Uni campus. Midway through my first year I was told that a college position had become vacant, and the Dean- a lovely lady called Phillippa Connelly- wanted to welcome an Indigenous student into residence. I was looking for a place to live, and was thankful to accept this invitation. Living on campus made the world of difference. It gave me the chance to study to my full potential and make some of the most rewarding friendships I have ever had.
University can teach you so much about yourself. Before university, I did not feel confident about my academic abilities, and only ever expected to achieve average marks. Now I get disappointed when I do not get the highest mark in any class. The way I feel about myself has changed completely. I realise that I can do anything I dedicate my mind to. My most recent achievement is finishing near the top of my honours class in anthropology. I was even encouraged by both the Director of Anthropology at the University of Melbourne and the director of the same department at Harvard University to apply for a PhD at Harvard. I am not sure if I will apply, but it inspired me about my passion. For some years now I have been quietly working away on developing a radically new theoretical paradigm to explain the logic of Traditional Aboriginal knowledge and, importantly, to resolve that logic with Western theoretical paradigms. By having a passion, I got more out of uni.