Non-Indigenous Public Health Educators' Readiness to Engage With Aboriginal Elders and Knowledge-Holders: A Baseline Study Informing Indigenous-Led Consultation.

introductionIncluding Indigenous perspectives in public health curricula supports the development of culturally competent practitioners, using examples of lived experience from Indigenous Australians. Existing literature demonstrates the benefits of Indigenous Elder and knowledge-holder inclusion in tertiary settings. However, there is a need for literature that focuses on the benefits of relational partnerships with Indigenous Elders and knowledge-holders in public health education.

methodsThis study aimed to understand how public health educators in a university setting perceive the benefits, barriers and enablers of collaboration with Elders and knowledge-holders for co-creating public health content that informs curriculum change. Naturalistic qualitative description was the selected methodology. Seventeen health educators were purposively recruited from a Victorian University's Faculty of Health. These participants provided de-identified data through an open-ended Qualtrics survey. This data underwent thematic analysis.

resultsInductive findings suggested that eight of the participants currently draw on Elder knowledge in their teaching. The authentic experience of Elders was perceived as important to culturally safe education for public health students. Participants identified a lack of university-wide support as a barrier to engaging with elders.

conclusionParticipants were ready to engage meaningfully when supported with or enabled by policies and practices that reflect a whole-of-university approach, that is, support and investment from the university rather than a reliance on individual engagement. SO WHAT?: It is now necessary to give voice to Elders and knowledge-holders to understand how they would like to be involved in this context, as this was beyond the scope of this project.