Premier's Spirit of Democracy Retrospective
From the 10th to the 14th of March I participated in the Premier’s Spirit of Democracy study tour of Melbourne and Canberra, focusing on the study of Democracy, specifically their ancient roots in Classical Greece and their modern implications, with an additional focus on national impacts, social issues and the ways in which democratic participation has and continues to be withheld from Indigenous Australians.
I was informed of the study tour last year by my Year 10 Civil & Human Rights and the Law teacher Mrs Grech. To apply I had to write an essay detail my ‘original take’ on modern Australian democracy and its relation to ancient Greek democracy. As I was writing this, I used what I had learned both in my Civil & Human Rights and the Law class, my Year 9 Citizenship and Democracy and my VCE Classical Studies class, both taught by Ms Palma (all subjects I highly recommend).
The first two days were spent in Melbourne, with visits to the Hellenic Museum, Parliament House, the Greek Consulate, the Melbourne Museum’s Indigenous Peoples exhibition, and the immigration museum. We undertook a tour of Melbourne, learning how Greek architecture and urban city planning inspired the design of Melbourne’s grid layout, and the impacts of Melbourne’s 1956 Summer Olympics on the city’s planning and cultural identity. We also visited the Big Issue, where we had a speech from a guest speaker with firsthand experience of homelessness, who spoke about the ways in which her life has been help by the Big Issue.
On the second day, we woke up at 5am to catch the flight to Canberra, where we spent the last three days of the trip. We were given tours of Old Parliament House, New Parliament House, the High Court of Australia, CSIRO Discover Centre and went to the National Museum’s exhibition on Ancient Greece, with artefacts on loan from the British Museum. We were also lucky enough to attend a lecture at ANU on ancient democracy and it’s relation to modern democracy. On the last night, we flew back to Melbourne (despite a four-times-delayed flight).
This trip was a fantastic experience for me, and I am endlessly grateful that I had the privilege to attend, but it was truly a privilege. This was an opportunity that, for whatever reason, was not afforded to everyone throughout the state, and it would be amiss of me not to acknowledge the opportunity that I had in being accepted and attending. The Tour gave me a political and historical perspective on Australia and its democracy that I did not have before, and that has changed the way in which I view our electoral process and democratic systems. The main message I took away from this tour was participate. Don’t just vote because you have to, listen to (reliable) news sites, write to your local members of parliament, learn who is representing your believes and support them. The only way in which things can get better are if we (the people) change them. This begins with children (the most important people in a democracy) being educated on democratic processes by their elders, and being allowed to express, think about and change their political opinions. The only way for things to improve is to make them improve.
I’d like to once again thank Mrs Grech for informing me of this opportunity and with teaching me the content relating to democracy, our political system and civil rights issues throughout Australia’s history, Ms Palma for teaching me content relating to political systems in Australia and Ancient Greece, and Mr Caldow and the school for allowing me to go.
Henry A, 11K