Dr Lois Peeler doesn't want future leaders of Australia to be oblivious to the history of the country's First Nations Peoples.
The principal of Australia's only Aboriginal girls' boarding school, and a leading voice in the education sector, Dr Peeler has created a resource for the Victorian curriculum called 'Aboriginal Change Makers'.
Working in partnership with the Victorian Parliament, she said she feels blessed to be able to share stories of historic Indigenous figures with Victorian school students.
"It's really about truth telling, saying 'this is what it was like, this is what our people have had to go through,'" Dr Peeler said.
"And these are the achievements that our people have made."
She said very few people know about the struggles and triumphs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, but Australians need to know about the "real history of our country".
"We are going through such a significant social change at the moment," she said.
"We're talking about treaty, we're talking about truth telling.
"We're talking about acknowledgement of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as the First Nations people of Australia.
"That's why it's important to be able to provide resources so that this can be taught in schools."
Dr Peeler said the process of creating the resources for Victorian schools has been an Aboriginal-led process.
She started with stories that she's familiar with — people who are in history books but are still hard to find if you don't know who you're looking for.
"I feel blessed that I have been able to know many of them in my lifetime," she said.
Who are Aboriginal change makers?
One key figure is William Cooper, who founded National Aborigines Day in 1940, a precursor to NAIDOC Week.
"He began with a group for Aboriginal people an organisation called Australian Aborigines' League, and they were advocating for improved conditions for our people," Dr Peeler said.
In 1938, Mr Cooper led a delegation to visit the German consulate on behalf of the Aboriginal community to deliver a letter to say they rejected the persecution of Jewish people by the Nazis in Germany.
"That was one of the amazing things, because our own people were going through this process of being discriminated against," Dr Peeler said.
Another change maker was Hyllus Briggs, who set up the first Aboriginal school in Victoria after the Cummeragunja Walk Off in 1939.
In 1983, her niece, Hyllus Maris, founded the school where Dr Peeler now sits as principal; Worawa Aboriginal College was Australia's first boarding secondary school catering specifically for Aboriginal young people.
Her own past hard to find
Dr Peeler was one of the members of all-female Indigenous group the Sapphires in the 1960s. She understands how important it is to chronicle, and record living history.
"My family comes from the Cummeragunja, Aboriginal reserves. And there was a lot of music, there were a lot of concerts, and a lot of sports on that reserve," Dr Peeler said.
"I think when people left [during the] historic walk off in 1939 … they took with them the legacy of the concerts and the singing and the choirs."
Dr Peeler credits performing for her community at church functions and parties for the creation of The Sapphires.
"That was our life. And it was something that drew us together," she said.
"We formed [The Sapphires] and I had the opportunity to go to Vietnam, and to perform for the troops over there."
There are few recordings of their performances: neither Dr Peeler nor other members Laurel Robinson and Beverley Briggs owned a camera, so it was a consolation to see their journey immortalised on the big screen in The Sapphires.
Big dreams for new resource
"Following colonisation our stories were hidden, in fact, we weren't even considered to be human by many people," Dr Peeler said.
"So it's time to recognise through all of that time, there have been people working hard making changes, not only for a family, but for the entire Aboriginal population."
Dr Peeler said the new resource guide made this once-hidden information more accessible to others in the education sector.
"We started with Victoria, potentially it will spread to other regions, and in fact, possibly across the nation," she said.
"I just think that it's time to tell the world."
