This week, the Rork Projects Canberra leadership team took part in an official Smoking Ceremony to kick off their partnership with the ACT Government and Gold Creek Senior School, for a new school extension.
This $6M project sees an expansion of the school facilities to house a further 200 students, increasing the capacity of the Gold Creek Senior School to 1000 students for the Gungahlin community.
Local Ngunnawal man Richie Allen performed the traditional ceremony with the students providing a guard of honour as the fire was carried through the school, cleansing the site of any bad spirits.
A smoking ceremony is a traditional indigenous ceremony, where the smoke from a mixture of native plants is used to promote the protection and wellbeing of visitors to the area, whilst releases cleansing properties to the surrounding area, and warding off bad energies and spirits.
Co-Owner John Janke spoke to the media on the day informing them of our goals for this project.
“For us it’s an opportunity to really help grow the community spirit here and obviously the facilities but build the next generation of Canberrans.” He said.
“We want to engage as many other Indigenous businesses on the projects as possible, because that helps with capacity employment opportunities for Canberrans, but importantly indigenous Canberrans”.
You can read more about the ceremony at Gold Creek Senior School below:
Smoking ceremony marks start of Gold Creek School expansion | The Canberra Times | Canberra, ACT
