Are Queensland power-brokers to learn from the FREE VCE History Roadshow?

Hi Stephen,

Just a friendly reminder that I am serious about a former answer to my question and the email to you on 3 August (attached); from the Royal Historical Society of Queensland, the equivalent of the Royal Historical Society of Victoria, and also the National Trust of Australia Queensland, History Queensland Inc., and the Queensland Heritage Council, all of which are organisations who greatly influence history education, but I fear that most members lack the education and the experience in history education.

As you will find from the link, history educators in Queensland who passed, specifically the Queensland History Teachers Association (QHTA) Patron, Dr H.R. Cowie (Russ) and a former (QHTA) President, Ian Gray, had the early beginnings of reform for their day, but the UQ and QUT schools have failed miserably in following up on the educational reform in the last two decades. Griffith at least has multidisciplinary educational education, but the educationalist is able to make nuanced criticism with the institution of Mount Gravatt; soon to disappear in that location, and locations are very important in urban sociology. The reasons for the failure in the Queensland history curriculum, in, say, the last decade (but with linkages further back), is complex, but it is much more politically complex than “too complex” in education. In fact, it is compatibilism in the philosophy of education, and most Queensland academics miss it.  And I remind you, and others in the conversation, that I research, write, and publish as an active member of the Australian and New Zealand History of Education Society (ANZHES) and the Australia and Aotearoa NZ Public History Network (AAPHN). I am not troubled in the least about who I offend; as they say, “I am on the side of history”. There is a historical shift in Australia, now, from those who had enough of the business-as-usual politics and too tired of the culture-history war. The fact that I am a public historian who cc. the relevant parties, and openly publishing in social media, means I am not engaged in the closed-door conniving, personal and institutional, politics.

I am confident that future historians will judge the Queensland history curriculum was lacking in the extreme, but now is the opportunity to change history, to rewrite the narrative. I have on several occasions written to the Education Minister pointing out several failures of history education in policies over recent years, and now the Minister, the Royal Historical Society of Queensland, the National Trust of Australia Queensland, History Queensland Inc., the Queensland Heritage Council, and the Queensland History Teachers Association, have the opportunity to take ‘a learning leaf’ from the History Council of Victoria’s History Roadshow, a special showcase of Victorian history and heritage organisations (notice below). That would be a start in the major reform that the Queensland history curriculum requires.

Remember silences in history research usually means deafness. My call requires a timely response from everyone. Let me remind folks, as an applied community philosopher of education, to think but do not necessarily speak, the thoughts, “It has nothing to do with me” or “I do not care” is the position of contrarian, not an educated person.

Kind regards,

Featured Image: Notice History Roadshow – Bookings open! 1 August 2023