Donations from around the world help Clifton Creek Primary School rebuild after fires
It has just 10 full-time students but the bush school of Clifton Creek, destroyed in the Victorian bushfires, has captured the hearts of the world and is receiving global support to get back on its feet.
VIC News
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Hope is springing from the ashes of Clifton Creek Primary School.
With just 10 full-time students, the little bush school - destroyed in the devastating Victorian bushfires - has captured the hearts of the world and is receiving global support to get back on its feet.
As the state government delivered portable classrooms to the school site on Friday and services start to be restored, donations have rolled in to help the Gippsland school rebuild.
Donations have come from as far away as Greenland and England, with schools sending books, stationary, sporting equipment, musical instruments and more.
Closer to home, city kids are showing their support for their country cousins by selecting and donating books to rebuild the school library through appeals organised by the Terry Floyd Foundation and The Little Bookroom in Carlton.
Cards with messages of hope and support are frequently tucked away inside the book covers.
And Australian authors have joined in, also donating books and penning notes to the students.
Teddies have been hand-sewn and money raised for the tiny school, that before the fires, few Australians had heard of.
Receiving some of the donations in Bairnsdale last week the Clifton Creek students were “gobsmacked”, principal Sue Paul said.
“To think that children half-a-world away were thinking about them and sending things was really quite overwhelming for some of them,” she said.
The student get-together - the first since the fires - was designed to lift the spirits of the school community.
“So everyone could see that we are all alright and that everything is going to be OK. That, as a school community, we will keep going,” Ms Paul said.
“The two or three days of tears after the fires is now in the past. Onwards and upwards.”
But tears welled for Clifton Creek parent Adam Cooper as he watched his children reunite with their classmates as the donations were handed out, and they squealed with delight.
“The school holidays are meant to be fun but as soon as we found out the school had burnt down my kids were devastated,” the father of seven said.
“They cried when I told them. It’s so good to see them all laughing again.”
The book drive for the little school has been so successful it’s new library is set to overflow with literature when it opens.
The Terry Floyd Foundation’s Daryl Floyd said he had been “inundated” with donations.
“People just want to help in such horrendous circumstances,” he said.
Ten full-time students are enrolled in Clifton Creek Primary for 2020 and five homeschooled students are set to start on a part-time basis.
Education Minister James Merlino said the site had been cleared, old buildings demolished and he was hopeful the school would be back up and running with portable classrooms soon.
“The community can be assured, we said we would rebuild the school and that is exactly what we will do,” Mr Merlino said.
Additional portable classrooms will be delivered to nearby Nicholson Primary School, where the Clifton Creek students will start their school year.
For the sake of their mental health and physical safety, the students will not be moved back to Clifton Creek until landscaping work has been carried out and the area surrounding the school site is safer and greener.
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Mr Cooper said his two eldest children, Stephanie, 17, and Hayley, 15, had graduated from Clifton Creek Primary while Blake, 11, and seven-year-old twins Declan and Lilly-Ann were current students. His youngest children Ava-Rose, 3, and Jax, 2, would attend the school in the future.
“We have told the kids they’ll be going back to school whether the classroom is in a portable or a marquee,” he said.
“It’s one of those schools that is unique. Everything about it. The teaching staff are incredible. They know our kids as well as we do.”