Yvette D'Ath (Petrie, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to talk about the overwhelming success in my electorate, Petrie, of the Building the Education Revolution program. I have had the opportunity previously in this chamber to talk about Aspley East State School’s new library, opening learning areas and multipurpose rooms; St Paul’s School’s new junior library and classrooms; Bald Hills State School’s new multipurpose hall and library; Clontarf Beach State School’s multipurpose hall and extended library; Kippa-Ring State School’s multipurpose hall and new library; and Mueller College’s new classrooms and science and language centres. It is wonderful to see so many schools also using not just the P21 funding but the pride funding to actually purchase and implement smartboards through many classrooms now to give primary school students the benefit of using technology at an early age. Many of the extensions to existing libraries were done to accommodate separate rooms for the computers to once again give primary school children the opportunity to learn how to use important technology early in their lives.

I have seen these facilities not just being utilised by the schools over the last 12 months but actually being utilised by the broader community, as the Labor government planned that they would. I have seen churches using them in the evenings and on weekends. I have seen local communities using them for forums about important projects going on in the area so that they could meet and talk about the views of the broader community in relation to those projects. It is wonderful that these facilities are not just about supporting the schools but about the broader community.

I am very proud of the fact that with the start of the new school year in 2011 Deception Bay Flexible Learning Centre now has a new covered outdoor learning area; Deception Bay State High School has a new language centre; Aspley Special School has a new multipurpose hall; Redcliffe Special School has a new multipurpose hall; Redcliffe State High School has a combined trades training centre and science and language centre; Grace Lutheran Primary School has a new library, tuckshop, toilets and refurbished classrooms across the entire school; and Clontarf Beach State High School has a state-of-the-art environmental science centre, which was visited by the Prime Minister when we had the community cabinet there in December 2010. Also, I am aware that Hercules Road State School is nearing completion of its new sports hall. This hall will be used not just for sporting activities but for outside-school-hours care. The BER programs—(Time expired)