Celia Hammond (Curtin, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to recognise and commend the incredible work done by the team in the Parliamentary Education Office here in Parliament House. In a normal year, the PEO welcomes and educates over 90,000 students from across the country. Since its establishment in 1988, over 2.3 million Australian students have come to Parliament House and had a hands-on learning experience about our Australian parliamentary democracy. I know a lot of us here actually look forward to meeting students from our homes here in Parliament House.

One of my highlights earlier this year—it feels like an eternity ago—was meeting with a great bunch of year 6 students from Loreto Nedlands Primary School. Of course, when COVID-19 hit us, the PEO had to cancel its on-site delivery programs and its outreach visits. While the on-site visits have recently resumed, about 80 per cent of the program visits for this year have had to be cancelled or postponed. Fortunately, the PEO already had experience in doing digital outreach and videoconferencing, and they quickly increased their capacity. They have already delivered video sessions to three times as many students this year as they did in the entirety of 2019. While none of the schools in my electorate did any videoconferencing last year, I know that one recently did, Quintilian School, and that Christ Church Grammar School has got five sessions lined up soon. I would like to commend the great work done by the PEO, particularly in this time of COVID-19.