Low Cost Options for reopening Hall Primary School
13 August 2009
Hall residents described four inexpensive options for reopening their treasured primary school in a meeting with Liberal MLA Vicki Dunne at the school today. "Reopening it as it was – a preschool to Year 6 school – is just one option" said Jo Hall, local parent and secretary of the Village of Hall and District Progress Association. "The government could choose from at least three other low cost solutions. Blue Gum Community School is interested in a community school, we could have a shared arrangement with overflowing Gungahlin schools, or it could be a preschool to year 3 school. None of these options are costly".
There is already a playgroup and a preschool on the site – and a high quality school museum in the original school building. The rest of the buildings have been empty since the government closed the school at the end of 2006. They estimated the cost of refurbishment at that time to be $145,000.
Residents have high hopes that the current Assembly inquiry into school closures will recommend reopening Hall along with Flynn and Tharwa Primary Schools. They also trust that the ACT Government responds positively to such a recommendation.
"We need to fill the educational gap left by the school closing, support our children's rural identity and help our rural parents to come together" said Ms Hall. "We are working towards a fully functioning school by 2011 – one hundred years since the original school was opened".
It is expected that the Assembly Committee's report will be tabled in mid-September. The government is then required to deliver its response to the report within three months, which will be mid-December.
Contact: Jo Hall: 62064583 (work) 62302166 (home)