A State of Writing community

By Paula Grunseit

‘Literacy is like breathing; that’s how important it is,’ community leader and NCIE Director Sol Bellear said as he spoke at Friday’s Book Week event which highlighted the value of books, reading and education.

According to figures published by the National Year of Reading 2012 initiative: ‘There are 46 per cent of Australians who can’t read newspapers, follow a recipe, make sense of timetables, or understand the instructions on a medicine bottle.’ National Literacy and Numeracy Week and Indigenous Literacy Day are other upcoming initiatives aimed at changing these alarming statistics.

The event, which brought together 400 school children from the Waterloo/Redfern and Alexandria areas under the banner ‘Connecting Communities’, was organised by Sarah Garnett and her team at The Benjamin Andrew Footpath Library and Capt. Stefan King, Commanding Officer of the HMAS Albatross, Nowra.

The Footpath Library delivers books to homeless and disadvantaged people living in hostels and on the streets.

Dr Naomi Mayers, CEO of the Aboriginal Medical Service said: ‘Education is one of the top priorities in our community and our children are eager to learn. They just need a chance and free access to books is a great help.’

When King met Garnett earlier this year, he offered to run a book drive with the HMAS Albatross community. Over 3000 books were donated to The Footpath Library during National Homeless Persons’ Week. ‘Everyone was very excited to support this great initiative,’ King said.

‘Because National Homeless Persons’ Week and Book Week both fall within August, it was decided to hold an event that would focus on encouraging literacy and making books accessible to everyone,’ said Garnett. Guests included NCIE Director Evonne Goolagong-Cawley, community leaders, and the Hon. Tanya Plibersek, Minister for Housing, Minister for the Status of Women.

Excitement was building for the main highlight of the day: the spectacular landing of a flash Augusta 109 helicopter from 723 Squadron, which some people may have seen at football Grand Finals delivering the trophy, right on NCIE Oval. Now that’s something you don’t see every day! As a special treat, children (and grown-ups) were allowed to inspect the chopper—a first for many.

Before the big moment, the QANTAS AFL Kickstart boys played football with the navy team and, after breakfast, a puppet show, and a welcome to country by Chicka Madden came a stageshow MC’d by the next host o Playschool, Luke Carroll.

National Break Dance champion B-Boy 2 Ezy had even the tiniest Harry Potter look-alike utterly spellbound with his amazing moves; artist/storyteller and didj player Adam Hill proved that if you know what you’re doing, you can play anything, including vacuum-cleaner tubes! Book parade stars were inspired by Angelina Ballerina, Frankenstein, and The Cat in the Hat.

Garnett said that the Book Week ‘Connecting Communities’ morning was a huge success. ‘The feedback from teachers, children, and the community has been overwhelmingly positive, and we have been asked if we can do it again next year! The look on the kids’ faces when they saw the helicopter overhead and the smiles when they were presented with their library bags made us all feel like we had achieved our goal—to give kids a morning they would not forget and to encourage them to read,’ she said.

Photos from top:

Commander King arrives

Kaiawa and Miriama Welsh and Warinda Treweek inspect the helicopter

Luke Carroll, Evonne Goolagong-Cawley (Director NCIE), Sol Bellear (Director NCIE), Tamara Bellear-Mayers (Director, The Footpath Library), Sarah Garnett (Founder/Director, The Footpath Library)

Photo credit: Banjo

This is an amended version of an article first published in the National Indigenous Times (2 September 2010).