By Alana Mitchelson
BEACONSFIELD students visited Nar Nar Goon last week to service a primary school community and assist younger kids with their school work.
As part of McDonagh House Year 9’s community service program, about 40 St Francis Xavier College students helped St James Primary School in classroom support, school maintenance and sport activities during lunchtime on Wednesday 31 August.
With this year’s house motto being, ‘The Impact of One’, students were encouraged to be kind to others and positively impact others’ lives, working closely with both students and teachers.
Carissa Thompson was among the students assisting Grade 2 children with their pieces of writing for the Father’s Day Mass that were projected on a screen for a slideshow presentation.
St Francis Xavier teacher Peter Collingwood said the horticulture students helped weed the vegetable garden.
“Community service is great hands-on learning. We’re trying to create good citizens,” Mr Collingwood said.
“We’re trying to develop more links between our school and the community and to visit some of our feeder schools.
“Schools like St James are quite small and judging by the number of weeds in the vegie patch, I’d imagine that funds would be short. So it’s great to be able to help out.”
St Francis Xavier McDonagh House co-ordinator Emily Noonan said the visit was well-received.
The school plans to continue its involvement with primary schools within the Catholic community and across the region.
“The kids came back with lots of exciting stories and enjoyed it so much that they said they wanted to go again next week,” Ms Noonan said.
“It’s good to see them so enthusiastic about something. It’s a nice way to give back to the community.
