A STATE politician and a former shire executive will join the 10th edition of the Cambodia Schoolies Alternative Trip.
Member for Murray Plains and leader of The Nationals, Peter Walsh, and his wife, former Gannawarra Shire Council chief executive officer, Rosanne Kava, will be involved as leaders during the first week of the trip.
This year’s participants received their team shirts at the Rotary Club of Kerang headquarters.
Rotary established the program to enable students to undertake community projects following the conclusion of their Victorian Certificate of Education examinations.
There are 26 Victorian students taking part this year, including 13 from Cohuna Secondary College, seven from Kerang Technical High School and six from Kerang Christian College.
Kerang Christian College students are taking part in the trip for the first time, after expanding to P-12 this year.
Sharon Champion, who has led the trip since 2007, will again be in charge, while Colleen Scriven will be the Rotary representative and teachers Kathryn Thomson and Sam Kennedy will also participate.
The group will also be joined by 20 students and four leaders from Darwin schools, including the Northern Territory Open Education Centre, Milingimbi Community Education Centre and Xavier College.
Students are hard at work fund-raising, recently completing a wood raffle and commencing a battery drive. All types of vehicle batteries can be dropped off at MVP Feeds in Cohuna and Lipp’s in Kerang until June 30.
All money raised will be used to support house-building and other projects in Cambodia.
The trip will run from November 26 to December 10, with the group spending the first week in Siem Reap, before travelling to Phnom Penh.
Projects in Siem Reap are yet to be confirmed, but last year they included two days of house-building with the Life and Hope Association and visits to New Hope – an organisation providing schooling and medical care to residents of one of the city’s poorest slum areas – and Green Gecko, which is supporting street kids with food, shelter and education.
Projects in Phnom Penh will remain the same. Last year students visited the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum and Choeung Ek, one of former dictator, Pol Pot’s killing fields.
They also went house building with the Tabitha Foundation, contributing to the construction of 10 simple homes.
• ANGUS VERLEY was a leader during last year’s Cambodia excursion.
