‘Children have taught me the most important lessons about advocacy’ says DR CINDY BLACKSTOCK. They are ‘experts in love and fairness’ yet ‘we often view children in ways that reduce their dignity and development’. Dr Blackstock, an international keynote speaker at the 2018 ECA National Conference in Sydney (19–22 September), spoke with ECA about moral courage and […]
In a very personal meditation on identity and race, STAN GRANT—journalist, author and proud Wiradjuri man—talks about his experiences coming to terms with being himself in Australia. Talking to My Country is a challenge and an invitation, written in the wake of the 2015 debate over the treatment of AFL player Adam Goodes. Grant says […]
When a popular children’s picture book came under the spotlight at ECA’s 2018 Reconciliation Symposium in May, it was ‘reconciliation in action’: a chance to express and hear strong, conflicting views, to listen, learn and rethink. For ECA, it triggered reflection and a search for more perspectives. An important and expanding part of ECA’s work […]
National Reconciliation Week (27 May–3 June) is a time for all Australians to learn more about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures and histories, share that knowledge and help us grow as a nation. This year’s theme—‘Don’t keep history a mystery’—makes it personal, inviting each of us to learn more. ECA’s commitment to Reconciliation deepens […]
The role of early childhood education and care in the social and political life of our nation has never been more apparent. As the national conversation about changing the date of Australia Day accelerates—and, at least in some quarters, becomes a topic of lively and respectful debate—early childhood educators are participating and many are pausing […]
Around 20% of Aboriginal births in Western Australia between 1996 and 2012 weren’t registered. The findings from new research published today in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Public Health mean that nearly 5,000 babies started life with no identity. In many respects, these babies were invisible. Low birth registrations are not limited to […]
When the words of Kev Carmody’s and Paul Kelly’s song ‘From little things big things grow’ echoed across the room of 300 people at the conclusion of the ECA’s Reconciliation Symposium, I knew things had changed. Changed for ECA, for the participants and just maybe changed for the early childhood sector. When the ECA Reconciliation Advisory Group first […]
This year’s Closing the Gap report delivers a result that has become all too familiar in comparing outcomes between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians: not enough progress is being made. There is improvement in some areas, but stagnation in others. The government is right to highlight progress reducing infant mortality (which is on track to meet […]
