Joel talks about cultural awareness & relationships (3:20)

I’d like to see better the – because, they teach – as part of my work here they – we have to do cultural awareness studies and things like that.  And I think that that cultural awareness stuff and cultural identity stuff needs to be done for not just every staff member, I think it should be something that’s integrated into every course is – is – to get that done.  So that the lecturer teaching the course can on the first day, well if they get this cultural identity and awareness stuff out of the way, they can identify and have questions to do with the culture.  You know, like, because doing these courses a lot of these questions and a lot of these things can and will be answered in, you know, in – in a – in an open forum of that class.  So if it starts there, the students and the lecturers get a rapport with each other by asking the questions and pointing out certain points and then maybe debating something, you know, and it’s very healthy.  And I think, then, you get comfortable with, okay so -

So you’re saying not a cultural awareness lesson, but just almost discussion about where people are from? 

Yeah. 

The different cultural, racial, linguistic backgrounds?

Yep. 

And kind of getting to know each other. 

Yeah, and I totally understand that there’s timelines and everyone’s under the pressure to – to get things done.  But I mean we want – we want to see the numbers of completion increase, because with – yeah, there’s a lot of students that sign up, but because of that non – there’s no communication, there’s no feeling of belonging, there’s no feeling of “I know you, you know me”, it’s easy to step away from.  It’s easy to just go, “Oh well, I’ve done two years but oh” – and they throw their hands in the air and go, “I’ll move on and get a job now, that’s paying me this now.”  It’s so easy to do that.  I’ve done it.  You know, I done it with school, you know, because of certain things.  I’ve done it with past employment where I’ve just – or in past study where I’ve just gone, “No, you know, the – no-one understands me here, like they don’t get it.  What’s the point of me being here?  No-one will miss me anyway.”  And – and that’s the feeling you get.  And as soon as you feel like that you, yeah, you don’t go to class, you don’t want to, you feel – you end up just getting a job and – and not completing.  So to – to have a lecturer sit down in that first – even the first half of the lesson and just take some time out, get them to know – you know, get you to know them, and them to know you, it’s – it’s just a really big step.  You know, it’s – you’ve got to judge personalities of course, so it’s – that’s difficult and I can understand that, but yeah, but just bridging that gap, it’s a big one.