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A university student has claimed she was marked down on a key part of her course for not including an acknowledgement of country.
The aspiring police officer received the feedback from her tutor about a speech she gave as part of her Diversity, Crime and Justice course at the University of the Sunshine Coast in Queensland.
She was just two weeks away from graduating from her criminology and justice degree, which cost her $60,000 to complete.
‘An acknowledgement of country would have been appropriate given your chosen topic,’ the assessment read.
The tutor added: ‘Your speech was respectful and mostly clear’.
The student described the incident as ‘pretty annoying’.
‘I just obviously addressed the general feedback with the lecturer of what I could have done better, and marked out all the points of what I did wrong, and one of them, obviously, was the acknowledgement of country,’ she told 4BC Radio’s Peter Fegan.
‘I said ‘What’s with this? Did I lose any marks?’ He said ‘If you did (an acknowledgement of country), you would have essentially got one or two extra marks’.’
A university student has claimed she was marked down on a key part of her course for not including an acknowledgement of country. (stock image)
In an assessment of her speech, the marker wrote (pictured): ‘An acknowledgement of country would have been appropriate given your chosen topic’
‘I (was) quite annoyed, I go off the criteria sheet, and whatever is on there I address, and the fact that it wasn’t on a criteria sheet and I still got marked down for it, that’s pretty annoying,’
The student found some classes which were part of her degree sought to judge people.
‘The social work classes and all the working with Indigenous cultural people, those classes are very judgmental, and they are very opinionated,’ she claimed.
‘I think you can be respectful while still having your own opinions.’
Her mother added: ‘It’s actually bullying. It does feel quite threatening, and it needs to be stamped out.
‘So that’s why I was speaking up about it.’
University of Sunshine Coast has refuted the student’s claims.
‘There is no assessment allocated to inclusion of an acknowledgement of country in this course, a spokesperson told the Courier Mail.
The student was told she would have received extra marks had she included an acknowledgement to country in her speech (stock image)
‘In one of the criminology courses on diversity and criminal justice, students can choose to do a First Nations topic for one of their tasks, and while they are encouraged to do an acknowledgement of country if they elect to do this topic, there are no marks allocated for this.’
Daily Mail Australia has contacted the university for further comment.
The latest acknowledgement of country furore follows what has been called Australia’s ‘wokest’ university scrapping its divisive and mandatory ‘Manawari’ course that labelled non-Indigenous students ‘visitors’ and ‘settlers’.
The controversial module at Sydney’s Macquarie University made headlines last month when a student revealed she was required to take the class which called her a guest in Australia – despite being born and raised here.
The student was weeks away from finishing her degree at University of the Sunshine Coast (pictured
After being reported on radio and by Daily Mail Australia, and questions asked by Liberal MPs in the state parliament, the university has axed the module.
But it also emerged that law students at the same university could fail an exam if they don’t begin it with a heartfelt Welcome to Country.
The requirement is part of Macquarie University’s ‘law reform campaign’ oral exam, which counts for 30 per cent of the final mark in the course ‘age and the law’.
The exam rules said a student would fail if they didn’t present an Acknowledgement or Welcome to Country or ‘did so in a way that was inappropriate or did not comply with the instructions’.
