News from the ILF ILD National Digital Event, 2022 Yamandhu marang Friend, On 7 September, our Foundation celebrated its biggest and most exciting day of advocacy; Indigenous Literacy Day (ILD). The day celebrates Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples stories, cultures and languages. We thank the estimated 200,000 supporters for watching the National Digital Event, and for your generous donations on this special day. The National Digital Event featuring Jessica Mauboy, Gregg Dreise and a lively group of children from remote Milikapiti and Jilkminggan is still available to watch on our Youtube channel here. We are pleased to welcome our new Publishing Manager, Nicola Robinson, who joined the ILF team early this month. Nicola brings an abundance of knowledge with a master's degree in Children's Literature
and has worked in publishing, journalism and community arts. Nicola recently commissioned fiction at HQ, a division of HarperCollins Publishers Australia. She is excited to begin a new learning journey at ILF. It is exciting times for ILF as we continue to grow and expand our reach and impact in remote Communities. As always, a heartfelt thanks to you, for being a valuable supporter on our journey. Mandaang guwu, Ben Bowen To celebrate UNESCO's first year of the Decade of Indigenous Languages, each month we encourage readers to learn a new word in either an Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander language. This month's word is turtle in Tiwi language! Illustration from No Way Yirrikipayi. Dean & Derek Meet Jessica Mauboy! Superstars of the ILD National Digital Event, Dean and Derek, had their first ever trip to Sydney to join the ILD Sydney Live Event. Dean and Derek were thrilled with the opportunity to meet Jessica Mauboy and Gregg Dreise, the other stars of the ILD National Digital Event, as well as other special guests at the event. Our Indigenous Literacy Day celebrations were captured by Channel 10, check out the interview here featuring Jessica Mauboy, June Oscar, Gregg Dreise, Dean and Derek! Busking for Change - Learn a Song, Change the World Busking for Change is a new fundraising activity developed by ILF ambassador Josh Pyke to engage primary students in a multi-literacy activity incorporating song, music, movement and language. A big thank you to the following schools that piloted the activity in 2022 and collectively raised over $16,000 - IGSS, Balmain Primary School, Summer Hill Primary School, Abbotsleigh, and SCEGGS. Register your interest now for 2023 here. Fish Creek Children's Literature Event ILF enjoyed attending the Fish Creek Children's Literature Event this month. ILF Ambassador Gregg Dreise hosted several free workshops for children. A big thank you to our volunteers on the day and also for the wonderful support we received in book sales at the event. World Indigenous Peoples Conference on Education Event (WIPCE) For the first time ever, ILF attended the WIPCE event in Adelaide this month. It was a great opportunity to meet Indigenous groups from all over the world and to share successes and strategies for culturally grounded education. The Very Hungry Caterpillar Translations This month, as part of our Translation Rights project, our publishing team received advance copies of six versions of The Very Hungry Caterpillar, translated into Murrinhpatha, Karwar, Kriol, Pitjantjatjara, Dhuwaya and Aboriginal English. 90 Playgroups Reached in 2022! We are pleased to announce that we have reached 90 playgroups from remote Communities through our Book Buzz program this year! This means that we have exceeded our goal for targeting playgroups for this year. Printing Two New Commercial Books Our publishing team is also excited to have sent two new books off to print this month. Stori bla brutbrut en bujigat (Story about Cat and Mouse) is a bilingual Kriol and English story from the Northern Territory, and We Look, We Find, which features Thaynakwith language words from far North Queensland. We can't wait to share these beautiful books with you! We would like to give a big thank you to Black Rock Band who gave us permission to use their beautiful song, 'Modjarrkki' as the theme song for this year's Indigenous Literacy Day National Digital Event. We would like to acknowledge our friends over at Better Reading and Better Reading Kids for their continued support and promotion of ILF campaigns and programs throughout the year. We extend our thanks to our Indigenous Literacy Day Major Supporter Lendlease, not only for their financial support but also for their support in promoting the event and the work of the ILF to their extensive networks. Thank you Lendlease for committing to share and celebrate the diversity and richness of Stories, Cultures and Languages. Read more about Lendlease's contribution to ILD here. Thank you to Pantera Press who have donated $10,000 to the ILF as part of their release of So Far So Good, a debut memoir of Torres Strait Islander actor, director and producer Aaron Fa’Aoso, co-written with acclaimed biographer Michelle Scott Tucker. We are indebted to our partner Australia Post for their support with the delivery of Book Supply packs to remote Communities and their ongoing fundraising. Learn more about how they supported ILF in 2021 here. A big thank you to KingGee who have designed a range of Blaze work boots in collaboration with Indigenous author and artist, Sally Morgan. KingGee has donated a percentage of their sales to ILF and have been a great supporter for the last couple of years. For the past three years during the whole month of NAIDOC week, Top Teacher has donated 10% of subscription sales to the ILF which has raised over $20,000! A big thank you to Top Teacher for their continued support. Thank you to Mapien who fundraised for the ILF with their 4for40 challenge, a four week team challenge of health, mindfulness, and fun activities as part of their '40 Years of Mapien' celebrations. |