In many ways, schooling represents a double bind for Aboriginal people. [It] is a means by which specific types of knowledge and . . . values are reproduced. For the most part, these are derived from non-Aboriginal society. Schooling is therefore almost inevitably assimilationist in
the sense of providing Aboriginal people with ideas, attitudes and values which are not derived from their own culture. If however, they do not participate in schooling they are denied access to many of the skills and resources which are required for building the type of future which many Aboriginal people say they want − a future in which they have much greater control over the circumstances of their lives. (1991b: 300)