Blog post 4: HSC Belonging question theme for 2013 – cultural diversity

Blog post 4: HSC Belonging question theme for 2013 – cultural diversity

URL: http://www.smh.com.au/national/education/rich-themes-of-cultural-diversity-in-belonging-hsc-question-20131014-2vixi.html

The HSC Paper 1 for 2013 Advanced English was based on Cultural diversity as identified by the article titled “Rich themes of cultural diversity in belonging HSC question” by Josephine Tovey. The article pointed out that in Australia’s diverse classroom there has been a push for writing “what you know” and almost 70, 000 students in NSW sat Paper 1 with underlying themes of cultural diversity.

The article provides the example of Birrong Girls’ High School in south-west Sydney where girls come from more than 45 language backgrounds and as a result of the HSC questions students were able to draw on their “Experiences with asylum seekers and conflicting cultural values as inspiration for creative writing pieces centred on the theme of belonging”.

The HSC area of study section of the Advanced English syllabus frequently points to occurring themes of that year, taking into consideration political happenings and Australian themes. This topic was not only very much relevant to our Australian society, however also a fantastic way of incorporating issues of multiculturalism, race and culture into student writing.

Prinita Thevarajah says that she wrote “about a little asylum-seeker boy who comes here and gets rejected”. Prinita drew inspiration from her parents who work with asylum seekers and visited other boys in detention centres. Similarly, Najwa Halwani wrote about a “conflict experienced by a Muslim woman working in an Australian corporation”. Here we are able to understand an almost positive aspect of the HSC exams and the most recent English examination – It’s ability to incorporate issues of race, culture and identity into education allowing students of different cultural backgrounds to draw on their subsequent experiences.

While this is only a small inclusion of culture in the HSC testing, it is arguably an effective step towards greater testing belonging and inclusion. Students of cultural backgrounds for once had the advantage, being able to draw on personal experiences and background to write their work, and likewise students who aren’t from cultural backgrounds were able to touch on and identify with these ideas for their own responses.