Indigenous education has a competition problem. For more than a decade, Indigenous education funding in Australia has been dominated by two organisations: Clontarf Foundation and Australian Indigenous Education Foundation.

Both organisations have delivered important outcomes for Indigenous students and families. Both have built trusted relationships with governments, philanthropy and the corporate sector.

Their contribution to Indigenous education should be acknowledged.

But there is also an important policy conversation Australia has avoided for too long.

How do we create a more diverse Indigenous education ecosystem that allows Indigenous-led organisations to grow alongside established providers?

What must now be questioned, however, is how two large non-Indigenous controlled foundations have effectively captured the Indigenous education market, while Indigenous-led foundations continue to fight for survival, scraps and symbolic partnerships.

This is not healthy policy. It is not self-determination. And it is not what Closing the Gap was supposed to represent.

Over five federal budgets, Clontarf alone has received more than $187 million in Commonwealth funding commitments and $97 million in State and Territory funding commitments, while AIEF has secured at least $85 million in recent Commonwealth funding and $8 million in State and Territory funding allocations and multi-year certainty. Together, they account for the overwhelming majority of named-provider Indigenous education funding in the country.

Every two to three years, the Clontarf Foundation renegotiates its federal funding, turning each renewal into a political moment. Ministers regularly attend events, visit academies and publicly align themselves with the program, meaning Clontarf's long-term security rests not only on outcomes, but also on media visibility and bipartisan political support.

The 2026-27 $55.5 million funding announcement appears significant, but actually represents a reduction in annualised funding, something that will likely resurface at the next renewal.

AIEF's substantial asset base of $161 million reflects the strength of its long-term scholarship model, designed to protect Indigenous students from changing economic and political cycles. However, large reserves can also create challenges in the public funding debate, particularly when governments are under pressure to prioritise programs that demonstrate immediate, visible and measurable annual outcomes.

In practice, operational programs with clear frontline delivery, student engagement and easily understood per-student costs are often politically easier to support than institutions focused on long-term capital preservation and endowment growth.

This is not about criticising successful organisations. It is about asking whether Australia's funding architecture has become too concentrated around a small number of single focussed established providers.

If Closing the Gap is genuinely about empowerment and self-determination, then Indigenous-led institutions must also have pathways to scale, sustainability and long-term investment.

At present, too many Indigenous organisations are expected to compete without access to the same networks, capital or government familiarity enjoyed by larger incumbent organisations. As a result, emerging Indigenous-led models often struggle to gain traction regardless of innovation or community support.

The reality is simple: governments continue to fund what they know, who they know, and who already has power.

Governments frequently speak about community-led solutions and Indigenous leadership, yet major investment decisions still tend to favour large established institutions that governments already know and trust. While understandable from a risk and accountability perspective, the long-term effect can be the narrowing of the sector and healthy competition, opportunity, innovation for new Indigenous-led approaches to emerge.

Meanwhile, Indigenous organisations are too often handed pilot programs, short-term grants or tokenistic partnership opportunities that are impossible to scale into nationally sustainable institutions without the resources.

The message to Indigenous leaders has been clear: You can participate, but you cannot lead.

That contradiction sits at the heart of Australia's Indigenous education policy failure.

Governments speak endlessly about Indigenous empowerment, Indigenous voices and community-led solutions. Yet when serious money is on the table, decision-making overwhelmingly flows back to large established institutions whose foundations are not Indigenous-controlled.

The result is a closed ecosystem where emerging Indigenous-led foundations struggle to enter the market, regardless of innovation, credibility or community trust.

Take the Yadha Muru Foundation, an organisation I co-founded in 2019 and lead, as one example.

Since 2022, Yadha Muru has been the delivery partner for the Federal Department of Education's City-Country Partnership Program, receiving $24.8 million over three years to establish transformational partnerships between high-achieving city schools and remote Indigenous schools.

In just a short period of time, Yadha Muru has established 22 partnerships involving 47 schools across the country. These relationships connect communities including the Barkly, Tiwi Islands, Cape York, Arnhem Land, Torres Strait and the Kimberley with leading schools such as Shore, Barker, Scotch, Kings, Meriden, Trinity, Roseville, Pymble, Immanuel, Woodleigh, Scotts and Caulfield.

The model is fundamentally different from traditional scholarship or engagement programs. It focuses on long-term institutional relationships, capability and capacity building, cultural and educational exchange and shared responsibility between schools and communities.

Importantly, it also mobilises significant non-government investment and institutional capacity that governments themselves could never replicate alone.

An independent evaluation of the program commissioned by the Department of Education is due to be released at the end of May.

Yet despite the success in establishing these partnerships, and despite the government awaiting the outcome of its own independent review, Yadha Muru has not received ongoing investment in the budget for an extension of the program. Without ongoing investment, partnerships that are on the early stages of development are now at risk.

At the same time, larger incumbent providers continue receiving expanded multi-year certainty.

That should concern anyone serious about Indigenous education advancement.

This debate is bigger than one organisation.

It raises a deeper national question: Why does Australia continue to trust Indigenous people to participate in programs, but hesitate to trust Indigenous people to build and lead institutions at scale?

If Closing the Gap means anything, it must include the transfer of power, investment and institutional ownership. Not symbolic inclusion. Not advisory roles. Not token partnerships. Real investment in Indigenous-led infrastructure.

The uncomfortable truth is that many Indigenous organisations are expected to compete in a system where the winners were decided long ago. Large incumbent providers enjoy entrenched political relationships, philanthropic networks, corporate sponsors, government familiarity and administrative scale that emerging Indigenous-led organisations simply cannot access without comparable investment.

A genuinely diverse Indigenous education ecosystem would not weaken outcomes. It would strengthen them.

Competition drives innovation. Diversity drives better responses. Local leadership drives legitimacy.

And Indigenous children deserve more than a one-size-fits-all model occupied by a small number of dominant providers.

This is not an argument against Clontarf or AIEF existing.

It is an argument against a funding architecture that leaves little room for innovative Indigenous-led organisations to emerge beside them.

Australia cannot continue talking about self-determination while maintaining a system that concentrates power, funding and influence into the hands of a select few organisations year after year.

If governments are serious about Indigenous empowerment, then Indigenous-led foundations must be funded not as peripheral participants, but as equal nation-building partners.

Until that happens, the rhetoric of self-determination will continue to ring hollow.

Mr Sean Gordon AM, a proud Wangkumarra and Barkindji man, is the CEO of Yadha Muru Foundation.