We are grateful that LINI has taken part in the New Colombo Plan scholarships during the last three years. Since 2017, we hosted ten Australian students from Murdoch University and the University of Australia. The students came to our Centre to help us with various programs, in order to apply their university knowledge. They assisted us in aquaculture, teaching English to local communities, environmental education in local primary schools, and setting up a permaculture garden. This year, we had three students from Murdoch University. They were Saskia, who was helping us to re-design our LINI website, Nikki who was teaching the local children to swim, and Holy, who was creating some LATC program videos. Thanks to them, we now have an updated website, swimming goggles for the inventory of the swimming classes, and videos for marketing materials about our Centre.
Collaborations like this are very important to the success of our work because they benefit not only our organization but also the fisher community, whose children have learned to swim for the first time! It is important to note that, in Les village, many people do not know how to swim, even though they live close to the beach, and they/their families are fishers.
By Gayatri Reksodihardjo-Lilley and Eveline Kurniati