Petition to Save Tharwa School
The ACT Government is set to close Tharwa Primary and Pre-Schools. Tharwa is the oldest school in the ACT with much historical and heritage value. Tharwa primary delivers real educational outcomes for families who have chosen to educate their children in a small school environment.
To close Tharwa would be to ‘close down’ the Tharwa community, which has been recovering from the devastating 2003 bushfires.
Please sign our petition to support the Tharwa Primary School and the Tharwa community.
Tharwa School Motto - Students In Harmony With Each Other And The Environment Experiencing Success and Challenge - A Century of Learning 1899-1999
November 5th, 2006 at 9:36 am
Living in Conder, our choice for Tharwa Preschool was a deliberate decision due to the learning environment Tharwa offers. Our two children were given a wonderful introduction to formal education. They flourished in the small-school environment and have gone on to become confident and happy children who enjoy learning and think school is fun!
I hope the government will recognise the value in retaining a small-school option in their education system.
August 29th, 2006 at 10:52 am
I like the Stanhope billboard “Bush Capital with NO rural schools, Towards 2020″ Very Funny!
August 15th, 2006 at 9:57 am
To close a school that has been the heart of the Tharwa community for over 100 years is akin to a criminal act. Having attented Tharwa school for preschool through to year 5 I fully understand the amazing experience that is a childhood in Tharwa.
In situations such as these the size of the school is irrelevent next to the benefit it can offer to its students. The size of the school and the classes enabled students to develop close relationships with each other and with the staff. These relationships last a lifetime, unlike the relationships formed in larger schools.
There have been suggestions that larger schools would offer a better range of opportunities to students. Whilst this is the case for some small-middle size schools, Tharwa is a diferent story. The size of Tharwa actually gives students more ‘room’ to develop as individuals, learn at their own pace (be it faster or slower than the other children in their year), and gives students a sense of community, something that is not developed in many larger schools.
We must do everything in our power to save this wonderful school. We must give our children a future, and this school is the one I would choose for my children.
August 14th, 2006 at 7:20 pm
As a former student of Tharwa Primary School, and a Tharwa community member I would like to offer my support for the Save Our Schools effort. My brief time at the school is still a fond memory, and I have always appreciated how the school brought the community together. My experience of the school was that it was a creative, vibrant and unique institution with a fun atmosphere for learning that celebrated it’s agricultural surroundings. Major advantages were the strong sense of community and a strong relationship with staff, all in all exceeding any other public system that I have experienced. It would be an enormous social, historical, and communal loss to have the school close - it really is the heart of small Tharwa, and I am very proud to say that I once attended.
August 11th, 2006 at 11:49 am
I have a child presently at Tharwa Preschool and would have liked him to continue on to Tharwa Primary school. We are in area for Tharwa School and William is my third child to attend the school. However, the absolutely unworkable decision of announcing whether the school will close after 6 Dec 06 for the following year has meant that I have had no choice but to accept a position at another school.
I am both appalled and disappointed how badly this issue has been handled, with no thought to the teachers or parents throughout the ACT & surrounding region who will have work and live with these decisions.
The timeframe is completely unrealistic and unkind to all involved.
Not to mention the fact that the school is the center of the Tharwa community.
August 3rd, 2006 at 6:45 pm
To close Tharwa School is a crime to the people of the Tharwa Community. Not enough thought or planning from those that were voted in by this same community has been done in regard to this proposal. This proposal has the potential to cut people off from members of the community and scatter us to the four winds. For those of us without family close by the school community is like a substitute family, I am damn sure I am not going to get that anywhere else if Tharwa gets shut down. It just shows how out of touch the polititions are with the people who are the real backbone of our country. By shutting down our school they are penalising us for living a rural life, dictating to us what is right for our children and taking away our choices.
August 3rd, 2006 at 3:16 pm
Someone from the Chief Minister’s Dept., apparently, has made the comment, in relation to the proposed closure of schools in the ACT, that “it doesn’t matter how loud you shout, it is what you shout that matters”. A sensible attitude I thought, given that, for whatever reason, money must be saved on ACT Schools now. And there is plenty of substance in our plea to save this little school. Tharwa School(s) is (are) really different from other schools in the ACT. Its historical and heritage values and the value to those “who have chosen to educate their children in a small school environment” have been commented on already. Then there is another aspect different to other Schools: Many of us live at the “wrong end” of town and bringing our children to the nearest school, which happens to be Tharwa, already means a 1.5 - 2 hrs commute by car every day. Closing Tharwa Schools will extend this commute substantially. The length of commute is not a really strong argument; the heritage value, school being a corner stone to community and all the other arguments expressed here all are strong though! When money must be saved on schools that are half empty, it is understandable. But why closing schools that do not suffer from this problem and that are in high demand and popularity because of the service to community that they provide? Anything else we could save money on Mr Stanhope? No idea, really???
July 25th, 2006 at 5:53 pm
I have been to to Tharwa, but not to the school. Nevertheless, I was charmed by this serene and beautiful place.
The value of children experiencing life in a small and closeknit school community in this rushed and increasingly reckless world is priceless.
I am part of a smallish school community, it is a joy.
Keep Tharwa school open.
July 20th, 2006 at 5:11 pm
Tharwa is more than just a collection of houses across the rickety old bridge. It is a community of people who work hard, who own businesses, and want to raise their kids in a positive environment. Tharwa School is one of those environments. The teachers are fabulous, the atmosphere is fantastic. This alone should be worth saving!
This is not just an emotional plea - this about keeping a reason and a purpose for people to stay working on the land and in rural communities - so they can manage to educate their kids without having to drive a long ditances to dump them in an anonymous super school.
July 18th, 2006 at 5:23 pm
What a shame it would be to see Tharwa School close.
My 3 boys all attended Tharwa Pre-school and I was looking forward to my daughter attending Tharwa pre-school also next year.
It is a beautiful little school, a very positive start to a young child’s education.
PLEASE SAVE THARWA SCHOOL