HUMANITIES

BEING CULTURALLY RESPONSIVE

McKinnon Secondary College has benefited enormously from its association with the Council of International Schools. This has occurred chiefly through the process whereby a school needs to meet a raft of standards to be accredited. Happily, we have achieved this milestone twice on our journey of continuous improvement. 

The CIS also offers a range of webinars and workshops which delve deep into the issues confronting schools in the 21st century. The most recent titled ‘Being Culturally Responsive’ looked closely at the underlying assumptions in a country’s national curriculum. Why, for instance, is prominence given to the ‘discovery’ of Australia over the fate of the dispossessed indigenous populations? Just as Britain colonised Australia, so too is the national curriculum dictated by the colonial power’s narrative. 

Still. In the CIS webinar, Dr Conrad Hughes (no relation) spoke of decolonising education. It means we have to deconstruct what we thought we knew. Deconstruction, according to Hughes, requires us to ‘fill in the silent spaces to get to the truth’. To achieve this we need to employ nuance rather than pat answers. Example: The Ancient Greeks invented mathematics. No, they didn’t. The truth is that Ancient Greece existed at the confluence of other cultures – the Thracians, the Phoenicians, the Persians – and were able to capitalise on a long tradition of enquiry and learning. 

How does this stuff apply to McKinnon? If we are truly a multicultural community then we need to tap into the many cultures and source their knowledge and experience. It means the British colonisation of Australia needs to be placed into a wider context. That the establishment of the Australian nation should not be viewed as an end in itself but a stage on a longer journey. 

Simon Hughes

Head of Humanities