Pre-conference keynote speaker Jack Beetson

Building a Foundation for Change

Executive Director of the Literacy for Life Foundation, Professor Jack Beetson, gives a first-hand account of efforts to scale up the organisation’s Aboriginal Adult Literacy Campaign. The approach has attracted international attention and is the subject of the nationally screened documentary, In My Own Words (2017). See Literacy for Life Foundation for more information. Professor Beetson is a Ngemba man with expertise in facilitating dialogues between cultures, post conflict recovery and reconciliation, adult education and training, sustainable community development and indigenous and human rights education.

He is an adjunct Professor at the University of New England and one of only 12 people worldwide to have received a United Nations Unsung Hero Award. Professor Beetson is Chair of the New South Wales Aboriginal Land Council Economic Development Advisory Committee, a Board member of Social Enterprise Finance Australia (SEFA), and regularly undertakes advisory work for government. In the past he has served as the Australian Chair of the Pacific Association of Non-Government Organisations.