Freeman, Leonard A., and Staley, Bea (2018) The positioning of Aboriginal students and their languages within Australia’s education system: A human rights perspective. International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 20 (1). pp. 174-181.

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Abstract

This paper is a critical review of past and present languages policies in Australian schooling. We highlight the One Literacy movement that contravenes the human rights of Australia’s Aboriginal students. This in turn impacts students’ right to freedom of opinion and expression as stated in Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The One Literacy movement operates by equating Standard Australian English literacy acquisition with Australia’s global competitiveness and economic success. There is only one pathway through the Australian English curriculum with common assessments and standards. However, the Australian Curriculum provides three distinctive pathways when students from an English-speaking background learn languages other than English. We reveal this double standard, where current educational policies prioritise the languages of trade (e.g. Chinese) and accommodate speakers of these languages. Meanwhile Aboriginal-language-speaking students are not provided with the same accommodations. For educational equity, there should be a distinctive English language learner pathway that recognises that the majority of remote Aboriginal students from the Northern Territory are learning English as an additional language. We advocate for these changes because all children have a right to an appropriate education that will enable them to flourish as learners and citizens.

Item ID:	86498
Item Type:	Article (Research - C1)
ISSN:	1754-9515
Keywords:	Australia; English language learner; multilingual; Aboriginal languages; Standard Australian English; Universal Declaration of Human Rights; Article 19
Copyright Information:	© 2017 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the originalwork is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.
Date Deposited:	05 Aug 2025 21:29
FoR Codes:	39 EDUCATION > 3904 Specialist studies in education > 390402 Education assessment and evaluation @ 50% 39 EDUCATION > 3902 Education policy, sociology and philosophy > 390201 Education policy @ 50%
SEO Codes:	16 EDUCATION AND TRAINING > 1603 Teaching and curriculum > 160301 Assessment, development and evaluation of curriculum @ 50% 16 EDUCATION AND TRAINING > 1602 Schools and learning environments > 160201 Equity and access to education @ 50%
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