Big hearts at harvest: Every grain counts to help BJPS

Burren Junction Public School Parents and Citizens committee is thrilled grain growers are getting behind its latest fundraising drive, opening their hearts this harvest to help BJPS keep its vital three-teacher model.

“We are loving the traction this fundraising attempt is getting, it has been absolutely brilliant to see and hear of so much support for the kids at Burren,” said P& C president Laura Bullen.

As trucks brimming with golden grain continue to roll into silos this bumper season, the committee has put the call-out to farmers to donate a tonne (or more) to support the rural town’s dedicated teachers, school, and students’ success in 2025.

“It’s so important to us as parents that we keep our model as it is currently,” said Laura.
“For improved curriculum delivery, greater student engagement, and the opportunities to develop the kids’ minds.

“Our kids give us so much of themselves being from the bush, they’re so wonderfully resilient, we want to give them the greatest start.”

Readers would be familiar with seeing the brilliant Burren students in The Courier pages, the small but mighty school community has a knack of rallying together, punching well above its weight, and generously giving back.

But this harvest, BJPS is asking for help. Determined to keep its third teaching position when drought funding runs dry at the end of the year; the P and C hatched the fantastic fundraising initiative urging farmers to transfer a portion of their grain or load to BJPS P & C, using the National Grower Register system.

“The P&C has had their own NGR (13250156) for a lot of years and it was used in the past, by past members, generally when a truck was overloaded then they could dump the spare into the P and C number,” explained Laura.

“Ali Harris is a creative genius, she did the posters, from taking photos to banner printing and delivering them to sites.

“With bumper crops about we’re hoping to raise enough to set us up for a few years. We’d like to go bigger than just our region, as far afield as we can.

“The P & C are 100 per cent committed to raising the funds required for our teaching model to remain the same, so that our third classroom can run.

“The way our teaching staff champion these kids and are dedicated to getting the best outcomes over all aspects of their time at school, be it academic, sporting, arts, it would be a huge loss to our school and its community.”