Official Visit to Port Curtis Road State School

Thank you Principal Northey. I am delighted to visit Port Curtis Road State School today, and I am very glad that the Acting Mayor and Councillor Wickerson could also be here.

I love visiting schools. Just last week, I went to schools in Mackay, and inland at Charters Towers – including the School of Distance Education – and then to Clermont State High School, which is celebrating 150 years of education this year.

That’s in the same league as your School – Port Curtis Road State School – which opened 142 years ago, in 1875, with 110 students enrolled!

And while you may be a small school community – with now, I believe, 56 enrolments – you are a very important part of Rockhampton, and our State.

I went to small schools as a child – in Longreach, west of here, and in Maryborough, a few hours south.

You don’t have to go to a big school to achieve your dreams. But what is important, is that you try your very best at everything that you do, and do not give up! If you work hard, and take advantage of the opportunities presented to you, you will succeed. That is something I know your teachers encourage you to do at Port Curtis Road State School – to “play the game”, which is your motto.

I was very pleased to read of the importance the School places on honouring its history, especially through the memorial I will shortly visit commemorating past students who served in the Australian Defence Forces.

And on another matter of heritage, you may have noticed the Governor’s Standard flying above your School, indicating the Governor is here! The Standard flies also on the car in which I am travelling today, which additionally bears the Crown numberplates – Port Curtis Road State School is certainly receiving today the full “vice-regal treatment"!

I look forward to meeting many of you – students and staff – throughout the course of this afternoon. All of you are part of a wonderfully warm and uplifting School community, and it is a great pleasure to visit and support you.