Eastern and Central Arrernte People and Western Education

The first western education that this group of Eastern and Central Arrernte people were involved in, was provided by the Catholic Church. It began at the back of the presbytery in Hartley Street and was soon after relocated to the new Little Flower Mission established at Charles Creek. A group of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart nuns arrived in 1938 and provided classes on a daily basis for students. When the Mission moved to Arltunga the nuns eventually relocated the school there.

In 1953, the Mission moved again to Santa Teresa. Santa Teresa School is now known as Ltyentye Apurte School. This school was run by the OLSH nuns until 1988, when the Marist Brothers took over. Up until 1988 when the school became bilingual, the school program was predominantly run in English with Western knowledge being the focus for learning.

A mainstream secondary education program was not run at Ltyentye Apurte School. Students who acquired good literacy skills and wanted to further their education at a mainstream level had to attend mainstream school interstate, Darwin or in Alice Springs.

A number of students from Santa Teresa were sent away to boarding schools interstate to Redbend in Forbes, St Augustine’s in Cairns, St Patrick’s in Townsville or to St John’s in Darwin.

Some people attended school at OLSH in Bath Street, Alice Springs. Special Units for Eastern and Central Arrernte students who were academically not at a mainstream level were established there the 1970’s. A few students accessed mainstream education but the majority of students attended the unit programs. These units provided supportive environments including specialist ESL programs and welfare support to those in need. that enabled students largely from Charles Creek, Whitegate and Hidden Valley to access education.

The Ntyarlke Unit at Catholic High School, was established as a special secondary education unit for Eastern and Central Arrernte students at the Catholic High School in 1987. It was established at the request of the Ngkarte Mikwekenhe Community. Many of the eastern and central Arrernte teenagers were not attending education programs after primary school and parents’ concern about this initiated the unit. This unit was coordinated by Michael Bowden, until 1993. It provided specialist ESL programs and supported students in mainstream educational programs. It was successful in retaining a large group of teenagers aged up to 18 years, for 2-5 years. Students who accessed this program had a range of literacy skills. In a thesis about Eastern Arrernte students in relation to the Ntyarlke Unit, Bowden (1994, p.25) states that six students were more than five years below their mainstream peers and thirteen students more than four years behind in their spelling and reading ages.

The majority of students left the program with a basic ability to read and write ranging from a Year 1 – Year 6 level. Students that accessed this program were mostly from Hidden Valley, Charles Creek, Whitegate and Amoonguna. After 1993, changes in staff and policy at both OLSH and Catholic High School saw most of the Eastern and Central Arrernte kids gradually drop out of the program. These changes included a push to dissolve the unit support and mainstream all the students.