Green thumbs beat flames

By Lilly O’Gorman
The school won the Gippsland category of the small school section and now all of its 28 students will attend the state final at the Royal Botanic Gardens on Wednesday 3 December. They will travel to the awards by train.
Judges arrived at the school by helicopter on 9 November to inspect the garden, which was constructed largely with help from Pakenham Rotary Club volunteers.
Ian Wake was one of the Pakenham Rotarians who helped with the garden last July, sourcing materials and working with students to construct a vegetable patch, compost box and to plant trees.
Mr Wake said a cubby had been donated since the initial works. He thought the layout and positioning of plants could have been a factor in what made it a stand-out garden.
“On the day we split the school up – big kids built the compost and vegie patch under Rotary club supervision … and the little ones spread the mulch,” he said.
Other pupils put in the plants.
“We made one whole day of it,” Mr Wake said.
The Rotary Club of Maitland donated $6000 to the Rotary Club of Pakenham to be used for bushfire-related works.
“Pakenham Rotary Club then took money from this which was used for the school,” Mr Wake said.
Tristan Mether, principal of Labertouche Primary School, said the students were enjoying the new garden, most of all their involvement with the Rotary volunteers in rebuilding the school grounds.
“It’s good, especially because the school was fire-affected, and burnt around the edges of the property,” Mr Mether said.
“It is a good way for us to bounce back when there otherwise wasn’t much hope in the school community.
“Students showed the judges around and spoke about different aspects of the garden and how the school had recovered from the fires.”