Gawura School, a unique kindergarten to Year 6 initiative, has been operating out of St Andrew's Cathedral School in Sydney since 2007.
Its approach combines academic support with embedding experiences that strengthen First Nations students' identity, such as inclusion of Aboriginal languages, incorporating truth-telling across subjects, and creating On Country excursions.
Now First Nations students at the school have had an audience with a very special visitor - Governor-General Sam Mostyn.
The Governor-General's visit opened in one of the school's dance studios, where students took to the floor to show off a series of cultural dances.
Older students took on the role of spokespeople: naming the dances, the story being told and who taught them.
The students and teachers explained that these are dances taught from when they were in kindergarten, stories that all the jarjum at Gawura School can tell together.
While it's a formal way to welcome the Governor-General to campus, this wasn't the first time Mostyn has step foot in to this independent Aboriginal school.
'The very best of education'
The Governor-General said she had been an appreciator of the Indigenous-led initiative for years.
"Gawura was a school I knew about through friends, who had children who came through here and have now graduated," she told NITV.
"More recently, it was a school that was working with the Go Foundation, the Goodes O'Loughlin Foundation where I was involved on the board. We came to see the school and see the students as the very best of education."
"I feel very attached to the school now as Governor-General," she said.
For Gawura co-founder Pastor Ray Minniecon, the Governor-General's visit has been a fitting precursor to the upcoming 20th anniversary next year.
He says the significant milestone shows First Nations communities that "it can be done".
"The model, I think we need to replicate it around the place and other schools taking up the the initiative of doing it in their own areas," he told NITV.
"We were just trying to offer the model first, so that people can see ... that through persistence we can get to where we want to go."
Looking to the future
Proponents say the result of embedding First Nations history, culture and knowledge across curricula is shown in students' academic records.
In 2025, the school announced that the Gawura cohort had experienced their best NAPLAN results, with both Year 3 and 5 students registering results across all subjects above the state average.
While they look forward to celebrating 20 years of operation, the school's community wants the sector to be "open to new models" like Gawura.
"Support them and extend them, and make sure that other schools ... learn from things that have been tested here over two decades," the Governor-General said.
"This is a model that has been patiently created. It's deeply respectful of culture and of ways of learning, and and paying respect to First Nations community and history."
Minniecon wants to see greater investment in Aboriginal teachers and embedding First Nations knowledge in education.
"The most important people, as far as I'm concerned, is not the [Governor-General], but the teachers in the classroom," he said.
"They're at the coal face, trying to make sure that our children get the best quality education they can.
"To make sure that [First Nations children] have the confidence that they can stand up in any place, not only in our country but in our world, and say, 'I know what to do because I've got the knowledge, I've got the wisdom, and I've got the teachings.'"
