Narrogin Senior High School’s Lakkari Kickett wins football guernsey design competition

Narrogin Senior High School student Lakkari Kickett has won the Stephen Michael Foundation’s football guernsey design competition for her artwork representing her Noongar culture.

The Stephen Michael Foundation was formed by the South Fremantle Football Club in 2017 to support the development of young members of the community through school-based sporting and leadership programs.

The Rising Leaders school program utilises sport to engage and encourage schools students to be leaders within their communities.

“Each student in WA was provided with a blank template and asked to design a guernsey based on their own family, their culture, their community and their school,” foundation operations manager Liam Anthony said.

“The students who are finalists need to have a story that aligns with their design, you can’t just draw something awesome with no meaning behind it.

“We really want them to reflect on themselves as a person whether that is as an individual, family or community.”

Lakkari’s design reflects the six Noongar seasons and the 14 clan groups within the Noongar Nation.

The animals — yongka (kangaroo), karda (goana) and weitj (emu) — featured on the design reflect her Aboriginal culture and highlight how they travel through each of the six seasons and find their food sources.

Mr Anthony said Lakkari’s guernsey was picked due to her detailed and meaningful design.

“Lakkari Kickket took part in the competition and her design was fantastic,” he said.

“She came a long way in the program, she was quite reserved and shy early but she built herself up to the point where she was invited as one of four students from Narrogin to our end of year camp.

“We are proud of her and she did really well throughout the program.”

The Year 9 student was a student counsellor last year and is an active member of the Shooting Stars program which aims to empower Aboriginal women in regional communities.

She also plays basketball and netball in Narrogin.

Lakkari said she was enjoyed taking part in the program.

“It felt really good to win because it’s the second competition I have won for drawing and design,” she said.

“It was really good to do footy, because we don’t do much of that at school, and playing games.

“Also the awareness sessions, which were about things like social media and cyberbullying.”

The Stephen Michael Foundation has been running at NSHS for the past four years, with the rising leaders program running for selected year groups.

Associate principal Karen Thomas said a group of Year 8 students were selected to be involved in the program which ran for two hours every Monday.

“The program aims to develop resilience and self confidence in young people,” she said.

“The SMF accommodates boys and girls and students from both Indigenous and non-Indigenous backgrounds.

“The footy guernsey design is one of the activities in the Rising Leaders Program and Lakkari is the second NSHS student to win this award.”