Historical information

The photograph is of students at Melbourne's first Greek Community school, established for the Australian-born children of Greek immigrants. They are pictured with four of their teachers, one of whom is Nina Black (Mavrokefalos) seated in the second row, fourth from the left. The other teacher is Rita Black seated 4th from the right in the same row. Sitting on the floor are Vicki Raftopoulos 2nd left and Olga Andrews on the far right of the row.

Significance

Greek parents were very keen for their children born in Australia to be able to speak their language and to understand Greek culture and heritage. It is documented that there were attempts to establish a school as early as 1901 and later in 1923. However, it was not until 1929 that an after school hours Greek school was properly established. Up until 1957 the Greek community schools were the sole providers of Greek language classes. It was not until the late 1960s and the mid-1970s that modern Greek was introduced to Victorian government schools.

Physical description

A mounted black and white photograph mounted on grey board featuring twenty eight boys and girls and four adults, seated and standing in four rows on a stage with a backdrop behind them.