Cashed up classrooms coming soon

FIVE Gympie primary schools have received a total of $12 million in the first round of the Education Revolution stimulus package released on Tuesday.

Checking out the freshly laid concrete slab for Cooloola Christian College's new Multipurpose Hall is (L to R) school captains Eli Villenguez, Grace Manthey, Elisabeth Harris and Jessica Hyett, Principal Leanne McClintock, Head of the Junior School Mark Waltisbuhl and Project Manager Phillip McClaren. Picture: Craig Warhurst

FIVE Gympie primary schools have received a total of $12million in the first round of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's Education Revolution stimulus package released on Tuesday.

Cooloola Christian College, Chatsworth State School and Gympie Central State School each received $2 million for multipurpose halls and resource centres while Gympie West State School and One Mile State School received $3 million each as part of the Federal Government's attempt to stimulate a slowing Australian economy.

Cooloola Christian College's principal Leanne McClintock said the money was a blessing and it allowed the small independent school to fast track the second stage of their multipurpose hall and classroom development.

The Southside based school has already started the first stage of construction with the concrete slab being poured last month and the principal is hoping for a seamless transition to stage two of the construction.

“We had planned stage one and we're going to slowly build to stage two over the next 10 years,” Mrs McClintock said.

“This money has allowed us to complete the whole project in six to eight months instead of six to 10 years.

“We are very thankful,” she said.

The principal said the new hall had a total build cost of more than $3 million and would include a full size basketball court, three music rooms, a drama room, theatre area, kitchen, toilets and a rock climbing wall with an abseiling area.

“It will be able to be used by the whole community,” Mrs McClintock said.

Cooloola Christian College currently has 370 students in total with 210 enrolled in its primary classes.

The new multipurpose hall will enable the school to offer an improved learning and sporting environment and will allow the entire school to meet in wet weather.

“The whole school can only meet outdoors at present, if it rains we have nowhere to go,” Mrs McClintock said.

Project Manager and Cooloola Christian College board member Phillip McClaren said the money would be a great boost to the local economy.

“Local builder Peter Waldock is doing the first stage meaning the money will be injected into the local community,” Mr McClaren said.

Mr McClaren estimates that up to $40 million dollars could be injected into the Gympie area once all of the Education Revolution money has been allocated.

“The first round of funding has only allocated 20 per cent of the entire funding available,” he said.

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Originally published as Cashed up classrooms coming soon