- Read more about the students trip by clicking here.
STUDENTS from Bega High School going on the trip to Cambodia and Vietnam this year said ‘thank you’ to the community on September 3.
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Members from the community had helped with their fundraising for their trip, so the students held a morning tea in the school’s hall for them.
The money raised wasn’t going towards the students themselves, but instead to NGO’s in the two South East Asian countries.
Examples include donating $2000 to Get Set Go, a women’s library in Siem Reap, Cambodia and $4500 to About Asia Schools to fund sustainable gardens, walls and to flood-proof a playground.
Bega High teacher Denise Perry said while they had aimed to reach $25,000 in fundraising this year, they had surpassed that amount and were on over $27,000.
She said over the past three-and-a-half years $82,000 had been raised from the community to donate to NGO’s in Cambodia and some in Vietnam during each of the school’s trips there.
“We are very, very lucky to be in the community that we live in,” she said.
Ms Perry also thanked Bega High teacher Sharon Champagne, who had helped kick off the first overseas trip.
“We started to raise cultural awareness of the students in the Bega Valley,” Ms Champagne said.
“What’s been happening over the last few years, and is still building, is the way Denise [Perry], Jo [Riley-Fitzer] and all the others have turned it into a community event.”
Colleen Dixon had given the Welcome to Country address at the start of the proceedings, and was thanked for her donation of two of her paintings for a raffle that was drawn on the day.
Joe Stewart and Robert Thatcher from the Tathra Uniting Church Op Shop attended as the committee had donated $1000 to the school group.
Mr Stewart said the first time he had visited Vietnam he had been “blown away” by the beauty of the country.
“It’s going to be a life changing experience for all of you,” he said to the students going on the trip.
Tony Toussaint of the Robin Hood Service Club, Merimbula presented a cheque of $3200 which was going towards building two flat-pack houses for Global Village Housing.
A call had been placed out to the community to help make teddy bears to take overseas and give to children there.
Three people responded, Denise Lightfoot, Cheryl Woodhouse and Shirley Bateman, who made over 100 teddy bears between them.
The Year 12 Hospitality class at the school had run a school café this year as an assessment, and donated $300 from the earnings to the trip.
The students will fly out on September 20 and return October 6.
