Key details about the proposed $12m Yipirinya boarding facility remain unclear while the Federal Opposition has further assured its support for the project in a meeting with the school’s board of Aboriginal elders.

Shadow Minister for Indigenous Australians, Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price, and Shadow Minister for Education, Senator Sarah Henderson, said the school is “like a family” when they visited the campus yesterday.

Senator Price said it is “for the most vulnerable children within our community.

“A lot of very serious issues they are confronted with in our streets. Those kids need a better start in life.”

But in a statement on Saturday Lingiari Federal Member Marion Scrymgour said she had not been able to get clear answers about the project and she favoured a facility accessible to all schools in town.

However, Principal Gavin Morris said the school council opposed sharing with other schools, open to “a range of different students that are coming from different backgrounds and schools, cultures and language groups. Won’t work.

“That’s not the model that’s being proposed here. A boarding school model at Yipirinya is what we are asking for.”

Ironically, despite this statement’s rejection of a what could be a multi-group or multi-cultural facility, Dr Morris touts Yipirinya as Australia’s only school teaching in four Aboriginal languages: “We are the only school, of type, in Australia. This has come from our elders.”

Senator Henderson referred to aid for dysfunctional families as well as some children “who travel up to 280 km a day, about three hours on a bus.” This is not tenable for proper learning.

She said more than 300 students are “attending” this community school.

However, Principal Gavin Morris said yesterday the attendance is only 50 per cent of enrolment.

“You need to be very careful how you analyse enrolment and attendance in Aboriginal context,” he said.

“Active enrolment is a student who has been to school one day in the last 20. And that’s true in any school around the country. At this point we have more than 300 active enrolments.”

According to its website the school employs 90 staff of whom 65 per cent are Aboriginal, a staff to student enrolment ratio of 3.3 to 1 or 1.7 children to 1 staff attendance ratio.

By how much the staff numbers will rise at Yipirinya if a boarding facility is created remains unclear.

Morris: We need to staff the accommodation, naturally. A lot of the staff members who will get those positions are likely to be family members of those children. Which is why the model will work. The students will feel safe. They will feel they belong.

[Alice Springs] News: Does the $12m cost include accommodation for the parents who are also staff members?

Morris: The project has a “focus on the kids” but there will be accommodation for the staff.

Henderson: Every boarding school in the country makes provision for adults [who] are required to stay in the boarding school to supervise the children.

Morris: All the logistics we need to work out in the next little bit. The logistics around numbers and staff ratios and parent ratios is detail that will come out as it comes to hand.

[Alice Springs] News: How many dwellings will there be for parents and how much will they cost?

Morris: All the detail is coming to hand now as this project comes to life.

Henderson: It is an integrated facility. The adults who are here supervising the children are here, in the school. That’s what every boarding school requires – adult supervision. And the school makes the determination about the best adults that should be working at the school as well.

[Alice Springs] News: Would the parents acting as supervisors be staff and would paid be paid?

Morris: I’ve got parents and staff in emergency accommodation all around Alice Springs. [This reply does not answer the question.]

The number of students in the facility also remain equally unclear.

In a question from the Alice Springs News Dr Morris said there would be between 40 and 50.

Journalist at a doorstop yesterday says previously it was stated there would be accommodation for 24 students and now you are saying there would be 40 or 50 students.

Morris: Certainly the first concept plan was for around sort of the 15 to 30 sort of numbers but there is flexibility in that number.

Senator Price responded to a question from the [Alice Springs] News on Saturday whether she had declared an interest as her mother, Bess, was an assistant principal at the school.

Price: I made that very clear from the outset when my mother was first involved as part time employed here that the focus has been about the children in the community.

She pointed out that in any project in the Northern Territory “there is probably a family member involved. Because that’s just the nature of being an Indigenous person in the Territory [who has] family and kin right across the Northern Territory”.

Senator Price said Ms Scrimgour, MLA Chansey Paech and ALP Senator Malarndirri McCarthy are likely to be “in the same boat”.

Morris: Bess is not a deputy principal of the school. She is a cultural leader. Bess does not have a teacher registration so she can’t be an assistant principal.

The school newsletter for Term 1 this year states there are three assistant principals, Bess Price being one.

Senator Henderson said: “We’ve not seen any expenditure for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in the education portfolio since the Albanese Government was elected.”

Asked whether the boarding project funding should come out of the recent $250m special Federal grant for Alice Springs, both Senators said no, it should not come out of that amount but should be funded separately.

This article appeared on the Alice Springs News on 1 May 2023.