The event began with a beau­ti­ful per­for­mance by the Per­tame School Children’s Choir, singing in their native lan­guage. This immer­sive lan­guage revival school, the first of its kind in Aus­tralia, was cre­at­ed by Batchelor’s Cen­tre for Aus­tralian Lan­guages and Lin­guis­tics. It’s part of the Institute’s work to safe­guard Indige­nous lan­guages and cul­ture across the North­ern Territory. 

In his wel­com­ing address, Batch­e­lor Insti­tute CEO Joe Mar­tin-Jard con­grat­u­lat­ed the grad­u­ates on their achieve­ments. ​“Today, our grad­uands join our alum­ni, becom­ing bea­cons of hope for their fam­i­lies and com­mu­ni­ties,” he said. ​“As a Batch­e­lor grad­u­ate, you are now a role mod­el, with younger peo­ple look­ing up to you for guid­ance and inspiration.” 

Batch­e­lor makes a point of bring­ing togeth­er Euro­pean tra­di­tions with the cul­tures of Abo­rig­i­nal and Tor­res Strait Islanders in these grad­u­a­tions, encour­ag­ing stu­dents to wear tra­di­tion­al dec­o­ra­tions or regalia of their cul­ture along­side aca­d­e­m­ic robes, demon­strat­ing the ​‘both-ways’ phi­los­o­phy of the institute. 

A spe­cial high­light of the day was the pre­sen­ta­tion of an award to Dr. Pat Ander­son for her out­stand­ing work advo­cat­ing for First Nations’ rights. Dr. Ander­son praised Batchelor’s com­mit­ment to First Nations lead­er­ship and its pro­gres­sive vision for the future. 

“We’re already ahead; big­ger and bet­ter things are hap­pen­ing. We are pre­serv­ing lan­guages — one lan­guage had only four speak­ers left, and now it’s on the way to revival.”

Keynote speak­er Vanes­sa Far­rel­ly, a Per­tame South­ern Arrernte woman, spoke pas­sion­ate­ly about her role as the Per­tame Lan­guage Nest Coor­di­na­tor at Batch­e­lor. She over­sees an immer­sion play­group where chil­dren and par­ents leave Eng­lish at the front door, focus­ing entire­ly on nur­tur­ing their lan­guage, cul­ture, and community.

Far­rel­ly, who stud­ied first at ANU, described Batch­e­lor as a refresh­ing change from her ear­li­er expe­ri­ences in acad­e­mia. Over there, Indige­nous peo­ple were referred to as ​‘Abo­rig­inies’ and treat­ed like relics of the past. In Ecol­o­gy class­es, they claimed a king in Eng­land invent­ed the idea of sus­tain­abil­i­ty — even though Indige­nous peo­ples have been keep­ing the Aus­tralian land­scape alive for tens of thou­sands of years.

“Batch­e­lor was such a con­trast,” she said.

Far­rel­ly also shared a per­son­al sto­ry that reflect­ed the suc­cess of lan­guage revi­tal­i­sa­tion. ​“Recent­ly, I saw a child cor­rect their par­ents’ Per­tame pro­nun­ci­a­tion. That’s the future we’re building.”

She fin­ished her speech with these pow­er­ful words:

Bet­ty Vin­cent, a Mardi­gan woman and new­ly grad­u­at­ed Mas­ter of Phi­los­o­phy stu­dent, also addressed the audi­ence. As part of her research, she devel­oped a vision for a new kind of Abo­rig­i­nal cor­po­ra­tion, which led to the cre­ation of an e‑Compliance tool aimed at improv­ing gov­er­nance com­pli­ance for Abo­rig­i­nal organisations. 

“This jour­ney wasn’t easy, but I per­se­vered,” she said. ​“I hope this tool can make a dif­fer­ence for Abo­rig­i­nal corporations.”

The cer­e­mo­ny recog­nised grad­u­ates from a wide range of dis­ci­plines, including:

• Abo­rig­i­nal and Tor­res Strait Islander Pri­ma­ry Health Care Practice

• School-Based Edu­ca­tion Support

• Civ­il Con­struc­tion Plant Operations

• Con­ser­va­tion and Ecosys­tem Management

• Ear­ly Child­hood Education

• Media, Screen, and Visu­al Arts

• Auto­mo­tive Voca­tion­al Preparation

• Work­place Skills

• Com­mu­ni­ty Services