Indigenous Education

FIRE Carrier Commissioning Ceremony

FIRE Carrier stands for Friends Igniting Reconciliation through Education. As a school, we have committed ourselves to becoming a FIRE carrier school that will promote reconciliation and develop Indigenous spirituality, cultural heritage and presence and recognition.

Last Thursday, Mr Boyhan, Mrs Vranken, Mrs Beveridge, Izack Timmermans, Evie O'Regan, Spencer Lucas, Ruby Smith and Eli Beddoes attended the commissioning ceremony at the Aboriginal Catholic Ministry in Thornbury. We were greeted by Indigenous Elder Vicki Clark, who led the day by doing a Welcome to Country. Throughout the day, we explored the importance of having Indigenous spirituality, cultural representation and heritage in our school. We created a covenant of what we would like to do at St Joseph's. A few things we would like to do/are in the process of doing is:

Flying the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags
Using Indigenous prayers
Reading Indigenous stories
Listening and playing Indigenous music
In the future, we would like to create an Indigenous Garden and an Indigenous mural.

Being in Vicki's presence was fantastic as she gave us some wonderful ideas! We even showed her the Bunjil art we did last year for NAIDOC week; she loved it!

It then came time to have the Commissioning Ceremony, which involved fire. Vicki heated her hands but the symbolic fire and placed them on our head, cheek, chin, and shoulder. This is significant as we are now carrying a covenant to reconciliation. We also received badges during the ceremony.

We also had Lisa Moloney speak and guide us through the day. Lisa is the FIRE Carrier Program Coordinator and leads the Opening the Doors Foundation. The Opening the Doors Foundation is an Aboriginal-led community organisation supporting educational opportunities for Aboriginal children. The Foundation enables Aboriginal students to participate fully and equally in education, and supports their families to make their own choices about their children’s future. The Foundation believes that consistent support for self-determination is key to raising the dreams and aspirations of the next generation.

The Aboriginal Catholic Ministry had lots of wonderful artwork displayed throughout all of the building. Everything we saw was absolutely beautiful! We were lucky enough to purchase some wonderful Indigenous crosses, rosary beads, and artworks on the Stations of the Cross. Katie Vranken also purchased Indigenous material that she used to make prayer tables and other cloth's around the school.

We look forward to continuing our covenant and learning about indigenous peoples.