A theology student from Charles Sturt University (CSU) has told a very personal story of giving up a child for adoption in the 1960s as part of a new exhibition at the National Archives of Australia.

Mrs Jane Craig's experience of giving up her son when she was a 15 year old girl is featured in the new exhibition, Without Consent: Australia's past adoption practices.

At the exhibition opening on Monday 30 March, Mrs Craig met former Prime Minister, The Hon. Mrs Julia Gillard. She took the opportunity to thank Mrs Gillard for the National Apology for Forced Adoptions she delivered while Prime Minister in March 2013.

Mrs Craig from Canberra was eventually reunited with her son in 1992 when she travelled to South Africa to meet him.

A video telling Mrs Craig's story is featured in the exhibition as well as the plane ticket she purchased to be reunited with her son after almost three decades.

Mrs Craig said it is important to tell her story through the exhibition so that people know what really happened in those days.

"Many people think that we willingly gave up our babies, which in many, many cases, was not the case," she said.

The exhibition is part of the government's response to a Senate Committee Inquiry into forced adoption policies and practices. The government provided $1.5 million for a website and exhibition by the National Archives of Australia to record the experiences of those affected by forced adoption and increase awareness and understanding of these experiences in the community.

Mrs Craig is doing a Bachelor of Theology through CSU's School of Theology and St Mark's National Theological Centre in Canberra.

Without Consent: Australia's past adoption practices runs until Sunday 19 July at the National Archives of Australia, Queen Victoria Terrace in Canberra.

Parts of this News Release were first published by on the St Mark's National Theological Centre site here.