WITHIN the mix of students of the first class of Vietnamese refugees in Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Catholic School, Darra, who arrived in Australia in 1975, has sprung careers in education, health, banking, and law enforcement.
Members of the class came together to remember their beginnings within the now, Darra-Jindalee parish, on July 3, honouring all their educational steps and one teacher of three in particular – Lorraine Hennessy.
The 82-year-old was overcome with emotion – before, during and after the Thanksgiving Mass – talking with The Leader of her “surprise” to be remembered with such fondness.
“It was a real experience to teach this first group of kids,” she said, recalling the students’ arrival in 1975, having departed Vietnam in April and taking up Brisbane residence in the August of the same year.
“They had no English, and we had no Vietnamese.
“We simply ‘met in the middle’… you just ‘do’ because you want to communicate.”
With no official ESL (Languages Other than English) curriculum available at the time, the federal government provided “the best they could” including writing and reading books, the first official school day being August 25, 1975.
“The students ranged in ages from about five to Year Seven age,” the ESL pioneer said.
“Fr Dan Carroll (the then parish priest) went to the Wacol Migrant Centre because he knew that a fair batch of Catholic people had arrived from Vietnam. That’s how forty-five children were first enrolled.
“We had them in three classes, and they were fully withdrawn from normal schooling as they had intensive language studies.”
Mrs Hennessey said the first day was spent learning and identifying names, the children having been given Anglo-Saxon titles for which they didn’t identify with or respond to.
“Fortunately, the kids were enrolled in their Vietnamese name because when we called ‘Frank’, ‘John’ or ‘Peter’, they didn’t understand or respond,” she remembered.
“We identified the older children who could help us match the names with the student and that was very helpful.
“Pretty much the whole first lesson was simply to identify who was who.”
While a group of Timorese refugees joined for a time, the Vietnamese cohort continued to grow each year although never again as many as forty plus beginning.
Mrs Hennessey taught the youngest of the students, having been a teacher since the early 60s, excluding the decade or so spent bringing three daughters into the world, saying the ESL teaching was “very interesting and a privilege.”
Teaching ESL until the end of 1980, husband Frank Hennessy took up a Principal appointment at Our Lady of the Sacred Heart, Darra, from 1989, while his wife had become an ESL advisor to the Brisbane Catholic Education Office.
She was very much still connected to the school, religiously visiting every week.
“I kept up my involvement with the Darra school because every Friday after going to Wacol (Migrant Centre), I would come back to the school to let them know what new arrivals they would be getting on the Monday,” Mrs Hennessy said.
Vietnamese language support was given through interpreters and the learning, for everyone, continued, as did the Hennessey’s commitment to active parish and faith involvement.
They speak very highly of former parish priest, Fr Dan Carroll, who has since passed away, although now identify as parishioners in Jubilee Catholic Parish, worshipping at St Joan of Arc, Herston.
High regard for all her students was evident as she spoke and while Mrs Hennessy “didn’t have a favourite”, it was Nga Vu, within the first group of students, who had made a certain impact.
“Over the years, Frank and I have been Godparents to some of those we met in the Vietnamese community,” the former teacher said.
“We’ve gone to weddings and funerals, but I’ve often wondered where some of them are … some continued to stay in touch… like one boy who calls Frank and I his ‘Australian Mum and Dad’.”
It was the memorial service for Fr Carroll where the ladies reconnected, Mrs Hennessy saying, “I didn’t recognise Nga, but she recognised me … (and) as soon as she spoke, I knew it was Nga. She has a sparkly personality.”
At the July 3 Mass, the young woman honoured her former educator as a representative of all those who welcomed Vietnamese refugees into the Catholic education system, assisted with settlement and offered acceptance and friendship.
“Thank you to Australia for accepting and taking us in,” Ms Vu said.
“My first vivid memory of coming to the ESL class are the beautiful eyes that belonging to our very first teacher in Australia, Mrs Lorraine Hennessy.
“We can never say thank you to everyone in person, but we can start with one and we, the Vietnamese refugee children of August 1975 and students of the following years … would like to thank and honour Mrs Hennessy for her love, dedication and support.”
Feeling “shocked” for the honour, the long serving educator said it was the affection of the students that will live longest in her heart.
“They made me part of their lives and not just their school lives,” Mrs Hennessy said.
“There was special acceptance for me, and they had stolen my heart.”
There’s a feeling that no matter what career path the students had of taken, this long-serving Catholic educator would love them regardless.
