What program are you studying at UQ?
Bachelor of Laws(Hons)/ Bachelor of Arts
What are you majoring in?
Public Policy & Economics
Why did you choose to study at UQ?
I got the OP, reputation, best humanities department in the state.
What was the best thing about your study?
I chose to study Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander electives in my final semester of my prolonged dual Arts (public policy & economics) /Law program. Seven and a half years of study in these disciplines left me largely uninspired and intellectually frustrated. It was a breath of fresh air to come to study Gendered Business under Associate Professor Chelsea Bond and Indigenous Contemporary Philosophy under Dr Carlos Rivera-Santana and Graham Akhurst.
It's not an overstatement to say that these subjects were the best taught, most intellectually rigorous and challenging subjects I did in my entire undergraduate program. I learned the most in these courses, and I grew the most during the 6 months I took these courses. It gave me the space to reckon with and examine my settler positionality and responsibility to Indigenous led decolonisation in creative and constructive ways. The ways of thinking that I was encouraged to develop in these subjects have stayed with me after graduation and I continue to utilise them as I embark upon my legal career. I'm deeply indebted to the world class educators and Indigenous scholars at the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Unit who I had the privilege to learn from.
I would highly recommend Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander studies to all students. I think it carries a special significance for many Indigenous students. But I think it also offers us non-Indigenous students a unique space to learn how to listen to Indigenous voices, seriously consider and grapple with Indigenous thinking and consequently have the rare opportunity to gain an honest and truthful education of who we really are in this place.