Mike Symon (Deakin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This being a Thursday afternoon adjournment, it is of course time for me to relate another story to the House about the Building the Education Revolution program in the electorate of Deakin and another school that has benefited from great new facilities. On Monday, 25 July, during the break in parliamentary sittings, I had the honour of officially opening the new BER funded classrooms at Croydon Special Developmental School, located within my electorate of Deakin. Croydon SDS is not your normal school; being a special developmental school, it is for students aged five to 18 with a severe intellectual disability. Many students are also autistic or have a physical disability. As demand for these services has increased in the local area, the school has doubled in size over the past 10 years.

As an SDS, Croydon was eligible for funding for all of its students, from the age of five through to the age of 18, unlike a normal primary school. That was under the Primary Schools for the 21st Century component of the BER program. The school got rid of two old and difficult-to-access portable classrooms. They took them away and put in two brand-new senior classrooms with fantastic learning spaces. Because it is a special school, the classes are very small: the two classes that are in these rooms consist of boys, one with 11 students, the other with 10. As the staff at the school tell me, it is quite typical for a school of that type that most of the students are boys. Just about the entire school population is male, especially in the senior years.

The third room that was built is being used as a therapy room, and it is used by students right across the school. Croydon SDS has a team of nine therapists, including physio, occupational and speech therapists, who now can plan programs with students from across the school in an area that can accommodate all their therapy and physical needs—for example, gross motor programs such as PMP, physiotherapy for students in wheelchairs and those with high support needs, sensory programs and occupational therapy. With a 2010 enrolment figure of 117, Croydon SDS received $807,500 in total under the P21 program to build these new rooms.

On the morning of the opening ceremony, I was met by the school principal, Jo Innes, and the previous principal, Carol Shade, at the front door, along with two of the school's students, who were very excited about the occasion, Zac and Josh—and they were very proud to have the task of showing me around their school. Peter Lyall, who designed and project managed the building and who has been involved in building throughout the school for a long time, was also on hand to take me through what had been done at the school. Because of the time of year, the ceremony was held inside, which meant it could not be as big as it might have been; but, in light of the needs of the students, I thought that was a very good move. In the opening ceremony itself, however, I was upstaged by the students—

Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Deputy Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

How could that be!

Mike Symon (Deakin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Because they are much better at performing for a crowd like that than I am, especially the junior class who played music for us—they did a great job, dressed up in very colourful hats and other bits and pieces of clothing—and the senior class, who did a dance routine for the crowd as well. It was really appreciated. I have not seen anything quite like that at a school before, especially from students who have disabilities that make doing that sort of thing very hard. But they particularly like that sort of group activity. I feel most privileged to have witnessed that.

I have opened more than 20 BER projects, and I think this is probably the one that sticks out in my mind as the most individual and the most suited to the school—in particular, by getting rid of old portable classrooms that were suited to a general school and by having purpose-built classrooms put in place for the needs of the school's kids.

Following the ceremony, we had a morning tea where we got to sit down and talk to staff, parents and school council members. We also had a bit of a chat about the upcoming discussions on the NDIS. The Productivity Commission report had not been released at the time; it obviously now has been, and I will be going back there to continue those discussions.

The Croydon Special Developmental School also received $75,000 under the National School Pride Program for a bike path, back in 2009, and that is used daily to get the kids out and mobile on bikes, something they cannot do on the street. I think Croydon SDS is a great example of what the federal government has been able to do to assist great state schools to be even better and to provide better facilities for staff, students and parents of the school community.

Debate interrupted.

House adjourned at 17:00