I co-supervised an honours student, Susannah Emery, who was funded by the NINTI One project. She used the Sims as machinima to show how local indigenous communities could develop their own cultural heritage-influenced games. She received a first class honours and was a Winnovation finalist.

I am very proud to announce that I have received the award of First Class Honours from Curtin University for my honours thesis entitled ‘We are Stronger Together/Nganana Tjungurringkula Nintirrintjakunana: a collaborative approach to telling Anangu stories through video games.’

Well done Susannah! As part of her research helped form an article on indigenous cultural heritage games. The article, for playwright, is called

You’re never alone in Never Alone: game mechanics as cultural metaphor

Then about a month ago i was invited to the final report/findings of the Remote Education Systems/NINTI ONE Project.

The Remote Education Systems project aims to find out how remote Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities can get the best benefit from the teaching and learning happening in and out of schools. It is doing this by engaging with members of communities, schools, government agencies and other end users who want to find ways of improving outcomes for students in remote Australia.

My takeaway on the most important element for children’s’ learning to be successful was parental buy in- not surprising but good to see it researched. Also, local staff are an important factor, class attendance is related to income, qualifications do not necessarily reveal the best teacher, successful projects incorporate the assets of students, families and communities, and the presenter said “ownership will be a priority.”

I am looking forward to the report going on the website.