Service Learning Students and the wider community continued to connect with and support community organisations through fundraising efforts and volunteering in and around COVID restrictions. In total PLC raised more than $52,500 in 2021 as well as contributing hundreds of volunteer hours that supported a range of charitable and not for profit agencies. Activities that supported the service initiatives included Free Dress days, Sleepout for Homelessness, making birthing kits, Cooking for A Cause, small business activities, donations of equipment and personal items, as well as volunteering with Boab Network, and Tech Tips which provides guidance to seniors with their IT questions. For many years PLC students have been involved with The Smith Family Reading programme. The impact of the 31 PLC students supporting their reading partners was that the average reading level rose from 7.5 at the start of the programme to 9.0 after support from their PLC reading Buddy. In 2021, PLC students grew 360 native seedlings which were planted in Guildford to revegetate 34 hectares of land. Within four years, these plants will remove 4.3 tonnes of carbon from the atmosphere each year. Through the environmental committee, PLC also received waste wise accreditation for the second year.
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PLC and Teach Learn Grow formed a new partnership in 2021. Teach Learn Grow is a not-for-profit agency ‘that envisages an Australia where every child has equal opportunity in education, regardless of their location, background or circumstances’. Year 10 students through Quest had the opportunity to tutor primary school children at schools in Esperance and Mandurah making an impact on everyone involved. ‘TLG has been the highlight of my school life, I have learnt more about myself, my peers, my teachers, and the world around me more than any experience before. I truly believe it is one of the most rewarding experiences you can participate in, I have grown as a person having gone on TLG’. Isla, 2021 TLG Tutor and PLC student
