Plain sailing for Jilkminggan school students

The mighty Roper River flows past the remote community of Jilkminggan, southeast of Katherine, but local kids had never had the chance to sail down it, until now.

This remote NT community is one of 69 across the country participating in the Remote School Attendance Strategy (RSAS) where local people work together to get kids to school each and every day.

To encourage and reward kids who have a 100% attendance record the Jilkminggan school have developed a range of programs to help increase attendance figures, and according to the principal Des Barritt they have had a big impact on school attendance in Jilkminggan.

We caught up with the teachers, kids and local rangers from Jilkminggan as they were about to go on a boat trip on the Roper River.

“Today we will get about 11 students who over the last 11 weeks have had a 100% attendance and their reward for that attendance will be to go on a boat trip.

“Obviously they live on the river but no one in the community actually owns a boat, so for them to go out on a boat is a really big thing,” Des said.

“So we use this as a reward for the kids that are attending and that’s done with the local Indigenous ranger group.”

Lee Doctor is one of those Mangarrayi rangers and he encouraged the kids to go to school every day before they set off on the trip.

"So you all should go to school all day from Monday to Friday, all the way. Then you can go to college and learn more and come back and get a job like me,” Lee said.

Adrian Doctor, the attendance supervisor for Jilkminggan School, is proud of the kids who are making the effort to go to school regularly.

“It shows that you can get a good education but still keep your culture,” Adrian said.

“When I was younger I went to school and learnt the white fella way but when I came back here from college I had an education but I still had my culture.”

Des Barritt has seen the many positive changes that have taken place in Jilkminggan through increased school attendance not only in the school but in the community as well

“It’s had a pretty big impact at Jilkminggan, primarily it’s increased our attendance which is one of the goals. But secondly it’s helped the school develop a lot better connections with the community.

“I’ve definitely got passion and we can make a change, a determined consistent approach to attendance strategies in communities that is what I would like to see. It’s all about trying to make things consistent so everyone knows the rules and knows what to expect and just keep plodding on, and we are making headway,” Des said.