By the Deadly Mob from Concordia Lutheran College, with Claire Scobie and Kristine Ellis.

Going to boarding school can be a difficult transition for many students, but for Indigenous students from remote communities, it can be quite a culture shock. In Two Ways Strong, Indigenous students from Concordia Lutheran College have combined to tell their experience in a story about Jaz a young girl from Palm Island who goes to boarding school at the age of fourteen.

Jaz has many challenges to face, not least having to speak English and make herself understood. Her fellow Indigenous students help to ease the way for her but ultimately it’s up to Jaz to make the most of what boarding school has to offer.

As she becomes accustomed to school life, has fun with her friends and has academic success, Jaz realises just how much she has gained and grown in the time she’s been at school. She’s no longer just one way strong like she was on Palm Island, she’s now two ways strong and ready to take on the world.

About the authors:

The Deadly Mob from Concordia is fourteen Indigenous boarding students from Concordia Lutheran College in Toowoomba, Queensland. They’re all from communities in Queensland—from as far as Dauan Island in the Torres Strait to Hopevale, Mareeba, Lockhart River, Wujal Wujal and Palm Island on the north-east coast to Cherbourg in the central south west. The book was produced by the students during a writing workshop with Claire Scobie, the author of the travel memoir Last Seen in Lhasa and the novel, The Pagoda Tree, and Kristine Ellis, a writer and poet who has links to the Wakka Wakka people and also to Kiriri (Hammond Island) in the Torres Strait. 

The book was launched on Indigenous Literacy Day (6 September 2017) at Brisbane Writers Festival by Hon Quentin Bryce, Patron of ILF.

Community: Concordia Lutheran College, Toowoomba, QLD

Language: English

Age guide: 10+ years old.