QTU launches Innovate Reconciliation Action Plan
Queensland Teachers' Journal, Vol 127 No 8, 2 November 2022, page no. 12
The QTU’s Innovate Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP) was launched at the QTU Land Language and Culture – Carry the Flame Conference in September. Here General Secretary Kate Ruttiman looks at the issues the plan will help address.
I write this article from the perspective of someone who is still learning. Someone who wants to support our First Nations members to find their voice and speak their truth so that we can truly walk the Path to Treaty.
There was no “First Nations Education 101” for my generation. We were raised in a country in which the curriculum was whitewashed, and my default setting from learning Australian history at school was that it was pretty uneventful and the biggest insult you could give someone was to call them a convict. We were not taught that we were treading on stolen land. We were not taught of the pain inflicted by our ancestors.
It wasn’t until I started teaching and had a First Nations boy in my classes that I started to explore the story of the First Nations people of that part of Queensland. In 1993, I travelled to the Rockhampton School Support Centre for a two-day course on embedding Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander perspectives into the curriculum. Just two days!
Since then, I have continued to learn – I have listened to my colleagues, read opinion pieces, visited members in community, and helped my children research the history of our First Nations people.
But I feel that more needs to be done.
I believe that a necessary path to reconciliation is understanding the truth. This means that we need to put down our shields – whether they be shields of privilege or shields that we place around our hearts because we don’t want to question our own identities. We need to put them down and have uncomfortable conversations.
Recently, the QTU has been including the four “Ps” of leadership – people, process, perception, and projection – in our training. When considering “process” as part of your leadership, you should consider who your processes privilege. That is why when I started to think about our Union’s path to reconciliation, I homed in on process.
Who do the QTU processes privilege? I know that they do not privilege our First Nations members.
How do we put processes in place that address privilege? And how do we help members understand why we need to do this, especially now, as we head toward the referendum on securing a Voice to Parliament? It’s not lost on me that the referendum may prompt a rise in racism and cultural violence, and that First Nations people will again be reminded of the violence, the pain, and the hurt that was and is inflicted time and time again.
How do we, as a Union, as their colleagues, do what Unions do? How do we help First Nations people raise their voice with the support of the collective? How do we use our privilege positively?
That’s where the QTU’s new Innovate Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP) comes in.
The Innovate RAP runs for two years, and outlines actions for achieving the QTU’s vision for reconciliation, allowing us to gain a deeper understanding of our sphere of influence, and establish the best approach to advance reconciliation.
The plan focuses on developing and strengthening relationships with First Nations peoples, engaging staff and stakeholders in reconciliation, and developing and piloting innovative strategies to empower First Nations peoples.
I see our RAP as a path which we can walk together.
Together we can learn and understand what else we, as a Union and as people, can do to bring love and relationship into our policies, our rules, our laws, and our community.
You can find the QTU Innovate RAP at https://www.qtu.asn.au/rap