The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted schools significantly over the past 18 months. With students and teachers experiencing this first hand, they have had to adapt quickly to the ever-changing environment transition from learning at school to learning from home. As Coomera Anglican College works hard to deliver real world experiences, the opportunities to expose our students to these opportunities has been limited. However, thanks to our future-focused teachers, our students have access to real work experiences and expertise through the use of virtual excursions.

In Week 5, Ms Pip Macdonald (Head of Humanities) organised for Year Ten students to experience two online web conference meetings with Dr Serena Love.

Dr Love is Principal Research Archaeologist with the Australian heritage consultancy Everick Heritage. Dr Love's work has involved her in several comprehensive long-term studies at archaeological sites worldwide, including Egypt and the Middle East. She has taught anthropology and archaeology at several universities in the US and moved to Brisbane to lecture at the University of Queensland.

Dr Love also currently works as an archaeological consultant giving technical advice to companies, governments and traditional owners concerning Aboriginal heritage and significant development projects. Her work involves in-depth studies of aboriginal architectural sites, culturally significant artifacts and ancient human remains.

Our  Year Ten students are studying a unit called "Digging up bodies: archaeologists at work" and Dr Love's presentation challenged students to think about who owns the ancient artifacts. 

The Year Tens were to consider whether museums worldwide should return objects to their original owners or locations, and the potential long term impact around this decision taking into account that their return can put the artifact at possible risk of being damaged or destroyed. This question helped to apply their learning and studies of ethical issues, cultural continuity and artifact repatriation while taking into consideration Government Policy and Decision Making Processes.

We are grateful to Dr Love for presenting an engaging and enjoyable session for our students. Congratulations to Ms Pip Macdonald, Mrs Roberta Marcellin and Mr Lee Molyneux for facilitating such a valuable learning experience.