August

The education department will become one of the world’s largest clients of Google following the selection of a new email provider for NSW students. Learn more here.

It was once an Aboriginal mission site known for some as the last stop before Cootamundra Domestic Training Home for Aboriginal Girls. Now, thanks to the passion of a principal and a local community, it has been transformed into the department’s first education centre dedicated to Aboriginal culture. Find out more.

Auburn North Public School is running a program called Maths for Mums, which is giving their student’s mothers from war-torn Afghanistan an experience in a classroom environment and teaching them basic mathematics. Learn more here.

“If you want to see us in the future - save us now!” That was the resounding message when 500 students from Sydney’s northern beaches presented their “Project Penguin” information campaigns during an expo day at Taronga Zoo last term. Find out more.

Forty-two students from Eastwood Public School are about to discover what it feels like to walk on the moon when they set off for space camp at the US Space and Rocket Centre in Huntsville, Alabama. Read more here.

If having a magnetic personality is a key leadership quality, Year 11 students Dewayne S and Kelsey M have it in abundance. That is the assessment of the director-general Michael Coutts-Trotter after he spent the day with the students as part of the Director-General for the Day event held during Education Week. Read more here.

A school-based community mentoring program in the New England region is having success re-engaging teenagers at risk of leaving school with education or further training. Find out more.

While shareholders can be a difficult bunch to impress, Microsoft Australia’s managing director, Tracey Fellows, discovered during Education Week that Kindergarten kids can be a tough audience, too. Read more here.

What do authors Patrick White, George Bernard Shaw and T.S. Eliot have in common with a little boy from south western Sydney with cerebral palsy? All of them have valued highly the act of writing their thoughts on paper as a means to share their worlds with others. Find out more.

Over the past three years Tuggerah Public School  has raised about $3,500 for the Vietnamese charity Blue Dragon Children’s Foundation and sponsored 11 children from poor rural families – who are at high risk of dropping out of school – under the foundation’s Stay in School program. Read more here.

Textile and design students from NSW public schools rode on the sheep’s back at the Australian Wool Fashion Awards with their prize-winning designs. Find out more.