Rork Projects proudly launched the wa initiative at a special gathering in Brisbane on Friday 31 January.
Around 100 invited guests helped us celebrate the launch of our new initiative that aims to enact positive future change through the education and empowerment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students.
Speaking at the launch, Rork Project Co Owners John Paul Janke and Brian O’Rourke announced a $20,000 donation from the wa initiative to Yalari – a not-for-profit organisation offering secondary education scholarships to Indigenous children at leading Australian boarding schools.
“We’re delighted to announce tonight that Rork – through the WA Initiative and hopefully with the help of our networks – are supporting the Yalari. Yalari a remarkable organisation offering secondary education scholarships at leading Australian boarding schools for Indigenous children,” they said.
Since 2005, Yalari has been providing Indigenous children from regional, rural and remote communities across Australia the opportunity to receive a full boarding school scholarship for their entire secondary education.
All Yalari students are recipients of the Rosemary Bishop Indigenous Education Scholarship. Yalari’s Founding Director, Waverley Stanley AM named the scholarship program in honour of his primary school teacher who supported him in gaining a scholarship to attend Toowoomba Grammar School in Queensland.
Each year, up to 50 Yalari scholarships are offered to Indigenous children who satisfy the selection criteria and are willing to give 100% towards their education. Yalari Scholarships include full boarding and tuition costs at one of Yalari’s partner schools.
Guest were presented with Rork ‘showbags’ that contained special gifts purchased to support other Indigenous businesses. This included:
Purple House – A hessian bag contains lip balm and soap made by patients of The Purple House, using traditional bush medicines. The Purple House is an Indigenous-owned health service in Alice Springs that runs remote dialysis clinics across Central Australian communities. The Bush Balms were first produced by and for the growing number of Indigenous dialysis patients and their families. Forced to leave their country indefinitely for treatment, many longed for traditional bush remedies to remind them of home. And so the Bush Balms were born.
Muesli bars – produced Wambool Dreaming; a 100% Australian Indigenous owned and operated business. The bars have Australian Indigenous ingredients and taste delicious.
Coins – celebrating 2019 as the UN International Year of Indigenous Languages and featuring 14 translations for ‘money’ from some of the many Indigenous languages in Australia.
The launch also proudly celebrated Rork Projects moved into the heart of Brisbane’s CBD on Level 2 at 100 Creek Street and our partnership with the Brisbane Bullets’ as the naming-rights sponsor for the Indigenous Round the following evening.