Community Services students and First Nations Aboriginal students recently attend an overnight camp to participate in a guided tour with Yorta Yorta Traditional Owners.
Students travelled up to Shepparton and met Aunty Sherryl and Uncle Lance who shared their life experiences growing up in ‘Mission times’. Both were born on the outside veranda of the Shepparton Hospital as Aboriginal women were not allowed to give birth or stay inside the hospital. They took students on a walk through the bush which is now signposted explaining this was the place where Aboriginal people set up community after the ‘Great Walk Off’ from the Cummeragunja Mission in Barmah because conditions were so cruel, controlled and devastating.
tudents also visited the Barmah Forest and met Amos Atkinson and Mick Burke who took them into the forest, sharing culture understandings and showing significant cultural heritage sights. They are proud of how many champions rose up from this community despite the generations of hardship endured. Champions like William Cooper, Sir Doug Nicholls, Jack Patten and Margaret Tucker.
Students soaked up the learning and were so grateful for th opportunity to listen and ask questions.
