Each program helps to foster continuing relationships with fellow members, and indigenous and non-indigenous organisations. These strategies are based on the continuing relationships that greatly influence the possibility of graduates contributing back into the programs, which in turn form the self-preserving and circular foundations that underpin our approach in providing support, and ultimately addressing the structural disadvantages faced by many of our members.
The ancestors of the First Inhabitants of this land fashioned each generation into kinship systems and family patterns which ensured the self-preservation of these people, and their culture. This understanding of kinship and family ways created and became a source of strength and unity and illustrated that by constructing enduring relationships as building blocks in a holistic manner, the outcomes will become the natural order of things as the relationships are fostered and built upon.
Using these powerful ideas as the basis and drawing upon them creatively, the Indigenous Law Students and Lawyers Association of Victoria (ILSLAV) has established and designed a number of programs to create pathways and connections in Indigenous legal education.