Families fight for project
Warracknabeal families and education leaders fed up with the town’s unfinished education precinct have called on Wimmera residents to help lobby both sides of government ahead of the state election.
Joint school council leaders have launched a ‘Finish What You Started’ campaign and are seeking $16-million to complete a project more than 15 years in the making. The project involves bringing together the town’s primary, secondary and special development schools onto the one site with modern, shared facilities.
The three-stage project is part-funded and construction on stage one is almost complete, however, there is no funding for stage two.
Joint campaign designer and parent Karen Inkster said joint school council members unanimously voted to support and drive the ‘Finish What You Started’ campaign.
“It is time we recognise our children deserve better,” she said.
“Finish What You Started’ is the message Warracknabeal families want made loud and clear to government coming into the state election.
“Our campaign aims to bring attention to and ultimately secure funding for the project. My child sat on the same classroom carpet I sat on 35 years ago – our kids deserve better.”
Mrs Inkster said another $16-million was needed to complete stage two of the project.
“The Victorian Labor government has currently pledged $0 to the project and while the Liberal-national Coalition has pledged $6.6-million if they win the November election, this amount falls well short of the full amount required to complete the project,” she said.
Stage one
Stage one of the Warracknabeal Education Precinct, at the primary school site, includes administration facilities; part of the special development school; and partial facilities for the secondary college.
Warracknabeal Special Development School will move into a majority of the new general-purpose educational spaces at the start of the 2019 school year. School council president Barb Wilson said this meant the school might need to cut back some of its extra-curricular programs, because a majority of its specialist authentic learning spaces were to be built in stage two.
“The agreement was made with the understanding there would be continuous funding for the project and we would be disadvantaged for 12 months,” she said.
“As things stand now we are looking at this being ongoing for at least two years, if not more, and our parents are not happy.”
Mrs Wilson said science rooms built for the secondary college during stage one were unlikely to be used next year due to difficulties involving moving students and staff between the two campuses and maintaining multiple science facilities.
Finish What You Started campaign leaders are seeking support from the wider community to get their message across to the government and opposition.
People can visit campaign website, www.finishwhatyoustarted.com.au, for more information about how they can help the campaign.