General News
1 June, 2022
Education Week reconnects students
TERANG College welcomed generations of former Dux students back to class as the school celebrated the past, present and future last week.
TERANG College welcomed generations of former Dux students back to class as the school celebrated the past, present and future last week.
The school held an open day and evening showcase as part of Education Week, which this year celebrated 150 years of public education.
The school prominently displayed historical memorabilia and student artwork, some of which dated back more than 60 years.
The occasion also provided an opportunity for former Dux students to reconnect with the school community, from 2013 Dux Hannah Duffus through to Donald Bradshaw from half a century prior.
Mr Bradshaw said it was a “strange” feeling to be back on campus, but he had maintained a strong connection to Terang.
“It’s strange to be back but I’ve never really left the district so I still feel very much connected to Terang,” Mr Bradshaw said.
“I was the only child who started in 1950 at the primary school who actually completed Year 12 here. They all fell by the wayside.
“I’ve only seen about three of them ever since, but I still feel very much connected to Terang College.”
Mr Bradshaw said being named Dux was not his fondest memory of the school.
“It was when we won the Western District Schools Football in 1962 when we thrashed Warrnambool Tech 17 goals to about eight,” he said.
“We were helped by the fact we had some excellent footballers, a couple who went on to play league football.
“My parents lived here all their lives and died here, so I’ve got fond memories here and fond memories of good teachers.
“A bloke called Trevor Treadwell was a wonderful maths teacher, so all of us went on and did humanities rather than the sciences – but if I had my life over again, I would like to have been an engineer.”
Fiona Giblin, Terang College Dux of 1987, said she was interested to see how the school had changed “immensely”.
“I can see there is a trade centre, we’ve got a rainbow flag which I am delighted to see, there’s a breakout room for the kids in counselling so I can see the soft changes in terms of welfare.
“I would suggest it’s always been there with Terang College. It’s always been a very good school.”
Ms Giblin said her experience with the school was defined during the 1983 Ash Wednesday bushfires.
“We went through at night in 1983 when the whole community was decimated in the bushfires, so our experience of the school community at that point is probably quite different to other generations,” she said.
“Our farm was burnt out and our home was lost but the school community really supported the families in a very caring and practical way.
“I think it’s always been there, but to see it now more formally put together is a wonderful thing.”
Terang College principal Kath Tanner said the occasion provided an opportunity for past and present students to see education from a new perspective.
“Our former students and community members really appreciated looking at our historical display and seeing parts of their history reflected in those books,” she said.
“We had some students giving tours of the school to our former students and it was like a two-way gift.
“The visitors appreciated what the students had to say about the college but then the students learned so much from the visitors about the history of the school as well.”
Former 170-game AFL star Chris Heffernan, a Terang College graduate, joined the school community at the evening showcase to deliver a speech to around 100 people and engage with a range of activities.
“We had a real mixture of past community members and current families, which was really lovely,” Mrs Tanner said.
