This report was commissioned by the Northern Land Council (NLC) in 2019 and suffered severe delays due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The report was originally commissioned with Fogarty and Associates Pty Ltd, and later in partnership with the Centre for Aboriginal Economic Policy Research (CAEPR), now renamed the Centre for Indigenous Policy Research (CIPR).

The research team worked closely with the NLC and in particular the Learning on Country team. As this evaluation was designed to be both formative and summative, findings were continually provided for program improvement throughout the evaluation cycle. The report was fully funded by the NLC and any factual errors are the responsibility of the authors. 

In many ways, the notion of Learning on Country (LoC) recreates elements of the original Indigenous classroom, where young people spend time on traditional lands, in the company of Indigenous adults with responsibility for those lands, learning about country, culture and the responsibilities they as adults will take on. In today’s version, those adults typically include Indigenous rangers, knowledgeable senior Traditional Owners and other Indigenous adults with responsibilities for those children and that country.

Overall, the LoCP is meeting or exceeding its intended outcomes. The key areas demonstrating success are: increased participation of students, intergenerational transfer of knowledge and engaging the wider community in schooling. There is also demonstrable success in growth of VET training and completions, Year 12 retention and completion of NTCET. Similarly, there are strong outcomes for Indigenous employment and the growth of female participation in the program.