Supporting Indigenous Strategy

A message from Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Ethics) Professor Hayden Ramsay:

I am pleased to share the news that Universities Australia (UA) has launched its whole-of-sector Indigenous Strategy 2022-25, to support the advancement of Indigenous peoples in and through Australia’s universities. Universities Australia released its first Indigenous Strategy in 2017. The recently announced 2022-2025 strategy builds upon its predecessor and shifts the focus of the university sector from aspiration to implementation.

The strategy underscores the need for the higher education sector to engage and work with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and their communities. It highlights our existing call to work collaboratively towards better outcomes for students, graduates and all staff. For students, this means renewing the sector’s focus on improving completion rates and our overall contribution to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander student success. For staff, the focus is opportunities for career development, including pathways to academic research careers, and organic leadership structures that encourage progression into senior positions. For graduates, we aspire to better knowledge of the history, the present, and the challenges, experienced by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

I’m very pleased to report that thanks to the good work carried out at ACU, led by the First Peoples Directorate together with internal stakeholders from Finance, Human Resources (HR), Office of General Counsel (OGC) and the Office of Planning and Strategic Management (OPSM), we are in an excellent position to meet goals outlined in the 2022-2025 strategy.

ACU currently has an active student engagement and retention mechanism in the Belonging Strategy 2020-2023. Additionally, work already contributed to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples Employment Strategy and the Reconciliation Action Plan will help us implement many of the actions outlined in the UA Indigenous Strategy. All areas of ACU are committed to improving outcomes, evidenced by the support shown to our Cultural Capability Strategy. For those actions and goals still outstanding, discussions are already underway.

The UA Indigenous Strategy 2022-2025 is a clear sign that our sector is taking steps in the right direction to support students, staff, and communities during and after their time at any university. Our university community is strongly committed to working for improved outcomes for our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students, colleagues and friends. The launch of UA’s strategy marks only one step, but an important one, in our journey towards reconciliation.