A group of Year 12 VCAL literacy students have been selected to be involved in the Stories Across Generations and Cultures Program organised by Meg Rosse. During the program, the students will work for five weeks at the Preston Intercultural Centre, doing intergenerational interviews with new Australian citizens from a range of backgrounds and ages.
The students will support these people to write up their stories. The work in these sessions will carry on as classwork as our students learn to tread the fine line between editing the work and preserving each writer’s authentic voice.
The students – Abudin Awo, Daniel D’Urso, Isabella Geralda, Elias Khairallah, Joel Taylor and James Tsapkounis – will be guided by Arnold Zable, pictured above, an Australian author who has extensive experience in storytelling workshops with participants of all ages and backgrounds. Arnold helped the WRSC students to prepare for their role and gave them an indication of the challenges and rewards facing them.
Finally, the students got to meet their subjects; Alejandra from Colombia, Pari from Syria, Xue from China, Au from Vietnam, Wendy from Malaysia, Anusgaran from Sri Lanka and finally, Sharmila from Kashmir. There was such an excited buzz in the room as each person met their randomly allocated partner and began to get acquainted.
– Report by Lillian Leptos, VCAL literacy teacher