Mr Evans says that he is pleased with the support in the Baird Report for the Australian immigration changes announced on 8 February 2010. He goes on to say that the immigration changes mean the removal of incentives for students to apply for course in the hope of later gaining Australian permanent residence. However, the report also said that there should be tougher national accreditation and that there should be greater protection for foreign students.

The Immigration Minister went on to refer again to the changes such as the ending of the Migration occupations in demand list which is to be replaced mid-year by a new targeted skilled occupation list to be developed by an independent body Skills Australia. He went on to say that the new skilled occupations list will be focused on “high value skills” such as the professions and trades in areas such as healthcare, engineering and mining which it is hoped will deal with Australia’s future skills needs. Forecasting future skills needs is not easily done. It remains to be seen how accurate the forecasts will be.

In a number of cases sponsorship may be the way forward. Students currently on a course not on the new skilled occupation list will have until the end of 2012 to apply for a temporary skilled graduate visa for up to 18 months to gain Australian work experience and find an Australian employer to sponsor them. It may also be possible to come under an Australian State sponsorship scheme.

International students in Australia on a vocational, higher education or postgraduate student visa will still be able to apply for permanent residence if their occupation is on the new skilled occupations list.

The Immigration Minister then stresses that the student visa is to study in Australia. It does not give someone the right to permanent residence. He also said that Australia still welcomes international students who would then have an opportunity to find an Australian employer to sponsor them. Therefore, in practice studying in Australia may lead to greater immigration opportunities in Australia.

The Baird Report by Bruce Baird a former Australian Member of Parliament raised concerns about the treatment of overseas students in Australia. It was felt that some schools were taking advantage of international students. Mr Baird also had the following comments to make about attacks on Indian students in Australia:

“The recent attacks, predominantly on young Indian students, have saddened me as an Australian. I have a strong interest in Australia’s successful multicultural ethos through my involvement in refugee issues, and it is extremely disappointment to see Australia’s reputation as a safe and tolerant country damaged. I condemn these acts of violence.”

Mr Baird felt that international students should have somewhere safe to go if they were facing problems, and also felt that new legislation should be introduced to protect international students.

Food, food and more food. Is it even possible to live in Melbourne and never hear about the diverse, quality restaurants that circle you? A group of us young Melbournians put the best Greek restaurants to the test.

Greek restaurants and cake shops have boomed with plenty of competition to keep each other vying for a spot on our taste buds. On High Street Northcote alone, consumers are spoiled for Greek choice with over 10 restaurants and coffee shops. Fairfield, Coburg, Fitzroy, Northcote, Thornbury, Brunswick and surrounding suburbs possess a heavy Greek base and hence also possess some of Melbourne’s best Greek cuisine.

Medallion Cafe, located right in the heart of the city’s Glendi on Lonsdale Street won the approval to be named the restaurant who serves the best souvlaki in the city. For under $10 you can’t go wrong.

For the average sweet-tooth we found some not-so average cake shops. Delphi, on High Street Northcote came second best to Oakleigh Quality Cakes, on Portman Street Oakleigh.  Given the distance between the two, it seems impossible to go wrong if you are looking for quality.

On the more formal side of things, those restaurants who serve the best quality of traditional Greek cuisine came in close to each other – each of these in close vicinity to the heart of the CBD. Alpha Ouzeri on Brunswick Street Fitzroy and Trapezi on Station Street Fairfield, both prepared food to the highest quality standards as opposed to competing restaurants in the area.

Koutsantonis with Mike Rann

A record number of Greek Australians are candidates in the upcoming state elections in South Australia, which will be held on March 20.
The largest number of the Greek candidates are running on a ticket with a newly formed party called Fair Land Tax (FLT) under the leadership of George Kargiotis.
The FLT is campaigning against high taxation and wasteful government spending.
A total of 20 Greek Australians are candidates in the South Australia elections with eight of them running on the FLT ticket alone.
As for incumbent candidates, Tom Koutsantonis is running in the ALP safe seat of West Torrens. Mr Koutsantonis is also the first SA MP of Greek descent to become a Minister.
Three Greek Australians are candidates for the Liberal Party, three for the Family First Party (FFP), two are standing as Independents and two candidates for the Save the Royal Adelaide Hospital Party (SRAH).

The polls are suggesting that the race is very tight between the Labor Party and the Liberal Opposition.
The detailed list of candidates in an alphabetical order is as follows: Apostolou Nick, FLT, Adelaide; Bouras Rita, LIB, Legislative Council; Christopoulos Adriana, ALP, Fisher; Coleman-Mastrosavas Dylan, IND, Legislative Council; Desyllas John, FLT, Mount Gambier; Haralampopoulos Andrew, FLT, Legislative Council; Kalogiannis Nick, FLT, Bright; Kargiotis George, FLT, Legislative Council; Katsaros Jim, SRAH Legislative Council; Kourtesis Maria, LIB, Bright; Koutsantonis Tom (Incumbent), ALP, West Torrens; Marantos Denes, SRAH, Florey; Morichovitis Peter, LIB, Colton; Panagaris Peter, IND, Legislative Council; Papageorgiou Jack, FFP, Chaffey; Stamos Yiannis, FLT, Colton; Theofanous Paul, FFP, Norwood; Tsekouras Harry, FLT, Mawson; Zafiriou Helen, FFP, Morphett; Zavos Jim, FLT, Newland.
(source: neos kosmos)

The following article has been published on the online edition of “Neos Kosmos” on March 11th written by Federal Member for the Victorian electorate of Calwell and a former Modern Greek secondary teacher, Maria Vamvakinou.
Now is the time to lobby for modern Greek Modern Greek has a formidable infrastructure and policy-makers must recognise this.
Maria Vamvakinou, MP

The release of the Federal Government’s National Curriculum proposal and the review of which priority languages to include in the National Curriculum presents a historic window of opportunity to lobby for the teaching of the Modern Greek Language in Australia.
It’s incumbent on us all to make our voices heard. How many times have you heard the statement, ‘you have to hand it to the Greeks, they push hard to maintain their Greek language skills, more so than any other community’?
I often refer to the Greek Communities remarkable efforts in relation to preserving Greek language and culture when addressing parliament.

I feel fortunate to be one of those Australians who are bilingual. This has been an asset to me and I want to see other young Australians, no matter what their background, have the same opportunity.
I hope my children feel the same, if they don’t just yet, they will in time, just like me.
My generation studied the Greek language in afternoon schools. I attended primary and middle school classes at St John’s Greek Orthodox Church, and in my senior years I attended classes at University High and Princes Hill High Schools.
By the mid to late ‘70s, Greek language was being taught at a large number of venues run by the Orthodox Church, the Greek Community, Saturday School of Modern Languages and private providers. The first Greek bilingual day school was established in the late ‘70s.

The Greek language was not only spoken extensively at home, but it was taught at Primary, Secondary and Tertiary Levels with Post Graduate courses available.
Modern Greek language was also available as a Method in the Melbourne University’s Post Graduate Diploma of Education Course.
Where we had once relied on people with some training in Greece to teach in our afternoon schools, we were now training our own Australian Greek Graduates to teach the next generations.
Over the years of course we have benefited, and continue to benefit, from teachers who are seconded to Australian Greek language Schools from the Greek Education Department.
My experiences of formal Greek language learning began in 1964 and ended in 1980. In 1982 I took up my teaching post at Thornbury High School, as a Modern Greek language teacher. Of course, the teaching of Modern Greek relied heavily on material and textbooks initially supplied by the Greek Government.
Eventually as we built our own local capacity, we began to produce Greek language books and teaching materials.

The Greek Australian community was very much in the business of maintaining its language capacity as well as its culture. Over the past 60 years, we have adjusted our teaching approach in order to suit the learning capacity and the realities of each generation. My experience, as a first generation Greek Australian in learning the Greek language is different to that of my children.
The overall aim for teaching Modern Greek remains the same however, and is twofold. One, retention of the Greek language for the purpose of maintaining an active Greek cultural and linguistic inheritance for those Australians of Greek descent and two, teaching Greek language and culture to Australians who are of non-Greek descent.

I want my children to learn Greek because it will help retain active links to their Greek inheritance. I also believe in the immense educational advantage of speaking a second, or third or fourth language.
The effects of multiple language learning on the brain’s learning capacity are well documented, but so too is the importance of multilingual education on a generation of people who will work and live in a global community.
Our education system needs to be better prepared for the challenges ahead. Modern Greek has a formidable infrastructure and policy makers must recognise this.
There are over a hundred languages spoken in Australia and Modern Greek is one of the top five. In over 60 years we have established thousands of afternoon schools, many bilingual day schools and tertiary courses.

We have a Greek speaking capacity of hundreds of thousands of people in this country alone.
The significance of the Greek Language to science, medicine, classics and philosophy cannot be underestimated. Nor can the historical support of the Orthodox Church, the Greek Communities, generations of Greek Australians and the Greek Government.
This infrastructure makes for a compelling case about the relevance and viability of Modern Greek in the National Languages Curriculum.
We have a unique opportunity, in framing the National Languages Policy, to build on and to strengthen this country’s approach to language learning.
We must establish a viable and comprehensive national languages policy that will give Australia the best chance yet to grow and develop a serious and competent multilingual capability.
We need to harness the language capability we already have by striking the right balance between the so called economic languages and the community languages.
Success will be measured on the ability of our education system to produce genuinely multilingual Australians, fluent and conversant in languages other than English.
(Sources: ana, Neos Kosmos)

Young children proudly present their true colours

The internationally regarded Greek community in Melbourne proves to be one of the largest and fastest growing communities in the world. With a new and extensive range of social and cultural groups emerging with the younger generation, the Greek community in Melbourne is now arguably stronger than it has ever been. With many community gatherings including the upcoming annual Antipodes Festival, it almost appears hard not to be a proud member of this close knit community. Greeks began migrating over 60 years ago and still today, our Greek heritage has not been lost at all – three generations have passed and we shine as the biggest and best cultural group throughout the diverse city of Melbourne. And here’s why:

“Our Greek community feels like it is small because of its sense of togetherness, but it really is a large and spread-out group” says Victoria Kouloumantas, student of Alphington Grammar School (one of the Greek Community based and run schools here in Melbourne). This is easy to see, especially with the younger generation. With the accessibility of the internet, the Greek community and its groups have made their way even deeper into the Aussie way of life. Groups on Facebook such as ‘fraps stop wars and bring people together’ and ‘half Greek, half awesome’ allow Greek Australians to stay connected with the rest of the Western world and to share common beliefs and values.

Also, many functions have taken place with the intention of keeping our community close together. La Trobe University has the largest Greek student base. Last Tuesday they had their annual LUGS (LaTrobe University Greek Society) night. First Year Student Isaac Konstantinidis commented on how gatherings like this are possible due to the fact that Greeks of this generation “still thrive on enthusiasm.” After being prompted as to why this enthusiasm was still present after 3 generations, he replied that it is because of “the principle of ‘customs and traditions’ that are passed down [from generation to generation].”

The annual Antipodes festival is also just around the corner, so all Melbournians be sure to head down to Lonsdale Street as of March 27th!

The event is the result of the cooperation between the Education Office of the Consulate General of Greece in Melbourne with the “Antipodes Festival” that will take place in mid October in the context of the Greek Film Festival.

Participants may choose any topic covered in the above theme , for instance customs and traditions that survived in Victoria,or, Greek flavors in our daily diet, Celebrating the Greek way, Greek dancing and playing, Greek History through the eyes of third generation immigrants, etc.

Films may vary in form , such as short films, animation or documentary but all are limited to 4 minutes running time and the dialogue of the film must be in Greek.

There will be 3 categories of contestants: students of 3rd to 6th year of Elementary school, students of 7th to 9th year of Junior High and students of 10th to 12th year of High School.

Each category will be awarded 3 prizes (1st prize $400 AUD, 2nd $300 AUD, 3rd $200 AUD). The award criteria will be based upon creativity and imagination, amount of appropriateness of the Greek language and quality of picture and sound.

All contestants will be awarded with a certification of participation.