Here at Oonoonba State School, we wrapped our ILF Book Store after eight days, which commenced on Indigenous Literacy Day, Wednesday 4 September.
We were quite concerned that many of our students would not be able to donate books for our store, as we were badly impacted by the Townsville Floods in February this year.
Our school and surrounding suburbs had over 40 centimetres of water running through them for more than two days – in fact, the school was rehoused on two separate campuses for the majority of Term 1. This was indeed a great lesson in resilience, compassion and compromise as so many of our staff and students were personally affected by this devastating weather event.
We were fortunate enough to receive an overwhelming amount of support, and offers of new and pre-loved books from schools and students all around Australia. Our hearts exploded with the generosity of these donations.
Our Leadership Team kindly allowed us to use these books to be used for our ILF Book Store, which was a great success. We had aimed to raise $300, which we weren't able to achieve last year, but at our last count, this year we have raised $455 for the Indigenous Literacy Foundation.
I am so proud of our Oonoonba students, for their great support of this wonderful initiative - raising money and awareness of the need for books in remote communities. Though we have only a small number of Indigenous students at the school, the support for our Book Store in the wider school community is a testament to the strength and character of our students.
Listening to some of our younger students talk about the books they loved and lost in the floods, only for them to find the same book in our Book Store was heartbreaking and overwhelming at the same time. This event has brought back my faith in the future of my school and country, and pride in what we can all achieve together.
I look forward to participating in this event again in 2020.
Maria Cawthorne
Indigenous Teacher Aide
Oonoonba State School
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