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Aurora Education Foundation is an Indigenous education organisation that provides opportunities and resources, such as scholarships and tutoring, to First Nations students.
The foundation's goal is to encourage all Indigenous school students to realise their educational potential, and become aware of careers available to them.
It's chief executive, Wiradjuri woman Leila Smith, has experienced firsthand the support that it offers.
After she left school, Ms Smith applied to Australian National University (ANU) through an alternative pathway for Indigenous students.
She said she first heard of Aurora in her undergraduate years, when a colleague recommended she apply for one of its scholarships to Cambridge.
"I had a casual job as a research assistant, and [my colleague] came into the office where I was working one day a week, waving this piece of paper," she said.
"When he left, I put the piece of paper in the bin, I thought, 'it's not for people like me."
She graduated from ANU with First Class Honours, and started working with the Australian Indigenous Doctor's Association, when an opportunity to attend the award's ceremony of that same scholarship program came up.
"I sat in the audience and I saw these three scholars and I realised that they were just like me," she said.
"They weren't these mythical superheroes, they were nervous, they wanted to make their families proud, one of them said, "I hope I don't fail."
"I was so inspired that I drove back to the office, and I said to my boss, I'm going to apply."
She was accepted for an Aurora study tour, where 20 Indigenous students travel to universities in the US and the UK to meet academics and expose them to overseas study opportunities.
Ms Smith went on to do a post-graduate degree at Cambridge, and successfully applied for an executive education scholarship to Harvard through Aurora a few years later.
"The other person on that Harvard course with me was the CEO of Aurora," she said.
"He'd been CEO for over 10 years at the time, and his dream was to hand it over to an Indigenous person, particularly one of his alumni.
"He asked me if I'd come on board as his deputy [CEO], with the goal of eventually transitioning into the CEO role."
Aurora's work
Ms Smith said a lack of confidence at school is a key issue for Indigenous kids, as it was for her.
Aurora data shows confidence in First Nations high school students is at its lowest in years 7 and 8.
If they can make it through that period, maintaining a positive outlook on their schooling and career aspirations, their confidence often shoots up.
But, many Indigenous school students feel left behind, and like they don't belong. To overcome this, Aurora asks students to pick their own version of success.
"Aurora's vision is a society where First Nations people determine their own aspirations using education and lifelong learning," she said.
"We do this through a structured pipeline of programs, so that Indigenous success happens by design, and not by chance."
"We do academic support plans, where we sit down with families and ask, 'what are the student's goals for this year?'
"And then we support them [to achieve those goals]. And we fund those supports, whether it's a desk, a computer, a telescope, speech therapy; whatever that student is looking to build and aim towards that year, we support them to do it."
Aurora's new venture, Redefining Indigenous Success in Education (RISE) program, will collect data from 800 Indigenous students in education over five years to find out what truly helps Indigenous students feel like they belong and stay engaged in education.
Ms Smith said strategies formed from evidence-based data is the best way to improve Indigenous education outcomes.
"How do we know that the intensity of those supports is right? That the frequency of those supports is right? The evidence base for this kind of stuff is pretty limited," she said.
"Students are saying things like, 'I want to go to school so I can get a job that helps me make change in my community."
Ms Smith said Aurora can measure, for example, how effective tutoring is in helping an Aboriginal person enter a career that helps them contribute back to their community.
She said Indigenous success in education is often just measured through the number of First Nations students who make it to year 12, and doesn't investigate more complex issues, such as why many Indigenous students aren't engaged and feel isolated in education.
You can't be what you can't see
Ms Smith said as an Indigenous female CEO, she sometimes feels she is underestimated.
"I think a lot of women face this, and a lot of Indigenous people face this as well, it's like the starting point is often to first change someone's mind so that they realise that I do actually deserve to be there, and that I do actually have the skills," she explained.
"A switch happened when I started to take on more leadership positions, and it shifted from low expectations to high expectations, and I needed to adapt my approach for that."
The CEO said she is learning how to say no, so she can strongly deliver on her pre-existing commitments, and tries to relieve herself of the pressure to 'do it all' as a woman.
"I think we always need to keep it, not as a footnote, but as a headline, how we look after each other," she said.
"At Aurora, we have an executive network that gets together once a quarter with First Nations executives in the Sydney region, and we just talk about what's keeping us up at night.
"We come away so energised and feeling so supported. It's groups like that, whether it's a group of people, or one or two people, being able to talk about what is keeping you up at night in an informal environment is really, really important."
Ms Smith she sees her female leadership style - empathetic and people focused - as a strength, not just a point of difference.
"For First Nations women, as we step into leadership roles, we might be the first Aboriginal woman, like I am now in the CEO role, to be in that role," she said.
"And we'll notice that the way we do things is very different to the way that the other person, who was most likely a non-Indigenous person, most likely a man if it's in a leadership role, did things.
"We need to not just see that as an interesting thing, but think about what our strengths are: we're excellent communicators, we're typically very good at engaging people, we're usually very good at maintaining a collective focus.
"It means we tend to get better buy-in and we tend to have longer term results, results that last longer, because of that."
Ms Smith said any woman that is aspiring to be a leader should know they have the capability to do it successfully.
"People will say things like, whether it's directly or indirectly: don't be too nice, or don't be too emotional, or don't dress too feminine," she said.
"We feel like we need to fit in with or we're falling short ... [but] we do not need to abide by that at all.
"Don't swim against the stream, just find your own way of doing it."
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