Peace, Justice, and Strong Institutions

Building Community: How unity & inclusivity increases First Nations student support

Kacie Fahey (Learning Advisor, First Nations); Carlie Waters (Learning Advisor, First Nations)

A common barrier experienced by some First Nations university students is the lack of a sense of belonging or community, particularly for first-in-family students, students studying away from home, and students whose family may not fully support a student’s decision to study or understand the benefits higher education can provide the student, their family, and their community in closing educational, employment, and financial gaps. In a concerted effort to minimise these barriers, it is vital that UniSQ creates safe, supportive, and culturally appropriate environments for First Nations students during their study journey.

Building engaging environments, spaces and places for students creates a sense of connection and decreases the culture shock that can become overwhelming throughout a student’s university experience. The building of community is, therefore, integral to the attraction, retention, and overall success of First Nations students. One way to build this community is through ensuring that there is an accessible First Nations presence virtually, as well as physically on all main campuses.

Semester 2, 2022’s Student Life Expo occurred within the first three months of employment of the two new First Nations Learning Advisor positions. With a new strategic direction, marketing material, and academic support resources finalised, the final piece of the puzzle was creating a physical space to reintroduce the First Nations Learning Advisor roles to students. Due to the rapid transition of the positions, it was vital that these roles leveraged relationships with the College for First Nations (formerly the College for Indigenous Research and Education) to create this ‘space’.

This collaborative approach enabled a holistic approach to First Nations student services and academic supports. By incorporating group-based activities (including earring making, weaving, collaborative artworks, and mindfulness activities), as well as informational elements pertaining to culturally competent supports available to First Nations students, each event experienced significant student engagement. This engagement in turn increased the profile of the Student Learning Advising team (formerly the Student Learning and Development team), wider Library Services team, and College for First Nations. Providing these activity-based, creative spaces sparked genuine conversation, enabling natural relationship building, which lead into discussions regarding the suite of student supports available, and of individual student needs and goals.

Based on the success of the collaboration between the First Nations Learning Advisors and the College for First Nations at the Student Life Expo, it is evidenced that having culturally competent spaces on campus results in building stronger culturally safe communities, and increases student engagement with support services, including Library services. To build on this concept of unity and inclusivity improving access to support, additional activities such as Yarning Circles and increased presence at other events is a potentially beneficial approach.