Additional Junior Ranger programs announced

Dechlan Brennan Published March 27, 2025 at 12.45pm (AWST)

culture

Senator McCarthy alongside Rangers students on Thursday. (Image: supplied)

Applications will open on Friday for new on-Country learning opportunities as part of the government's Junior Ranger program.

Up to 10 new Junior Ranger projects have been created across the country in every state and territory as part of the $6 million expansion of the program.

Speaking at the announcement in Queanbeyan on the land of the Ngambri people, Minister for Indigenous Australians, Malarndirri McCarthy, said she was hoping programs like the Junior Rangers would allow children to remain in school.

"To keep them at school, to feel good about who they are as young Aboriginal men and women in this country, to correct and reconnect with Country and culture and kin," she told reporters.

"We see this as an important program on many levels. One is about caring for Country, looking after Country, and connecting with culture and Country and kin, but importantly, showing our kids they have a future and that being a ranger could be something that they may wish to be.

"It is so important that we still work on many areas of Closing the Gap to get our kids to school, and the Junior Rangers program is part of that."

Junior Rangers Coordinator Trevor Robinson told reporters the work was "hands on" and allowed the kids to show a maturity level some people may have not thought they had.

"A lot of the kids they struggle through school anyway and a lot of the oral teachings that we do is actually a lot better for them," he said.

"Sometimes I'm delivering stuff to them and I'm worried that they are not actually understanding it, but I'm surprised that weeks later they will say something and I'm going, 'Oh okay, so they were actually listening to what I was saying'. Which is really, really good because it shows that they are actually interested and keen in the actual program."

Eligibility for the expansion of the program is targeted to locations outside the current Junior Rangers footprint in areas where there are a high number of Indigenous youths not engaged in employment, education, or training.

Last year saw the rollout of projects in over 50 locations and comes after the government announced last year more than 1000 Indigenous Ranger positions will be created Australia-wide—up to 770 of them for First Nations women.

The Junior program offers on-Country learning opportunities for Primary and secondary students through place-based and community-driven projects that are aligned with the needs of the community.

"The journey is about trying to increase the kids' knowledge and awareness of the surroundings but also be job ready and be able to actually walk out of school and say, 'Look, I have got these qualifications and I can go for this job here or I can go for that job'," Mr Robinson said.

"They go to school because they know they can get this program in the middle of the week…it's an incentive for them to get up on a Monday because they need to go to school before they can come to us on a Wednesday…it works both ways.

"So, it's a win-win situation where you have actually got the kids out on-Country and they are also in the school learning."

Ngambri Local Aboriginal Land Council chief executive, Trisha Williams, said on Thursday: "Our students, our communities, really need this."

"We need Aboriginal people on land doing land management and being able to do it in a culturally appropriate way, in the old ways," Ms Williams said.

"If we're getting students from school and getting them onto a pathway into land management and then they leave school at year 12 and coming and working in our organisations, that's just wonderful that we have got them from the start."