Principal Nick Evans (OW1985) reflects on the early days at Clunes...
‘The first time I went to see what became the campus at Clunes was in 1998. The entire staff of the College was piled into buses and driven up the Western Highway for the first day of Term 3.
Anyone who attended Clunes in Term 3 will know that the weather can be brutal at that time of the year. It certainly was on this day. As the rain pelted down on the convoy of buses, and the temperature dropped into single digits as we approached the township of Clunes, more than one or two of us were wondering what on earth we were doing.
These rather summary judgements weren’t helped by our first glimpse of the site. My overarching memory is of mud. Two churches in a field of mud, in between some houses. I am sure there were other impressions at the time, but this was over 25 years ago. Many of us, as we returned to Melbourne, wondered why we were even looking at this place. Not to be deterred by nay sayers, David Loader persevered, and his vision came to pass. A wonderful experience was had by the sensible, mature and handpicked Group 1 in 2000, but Groups 2, 3 and 4 didn’t quite follow the same path! From this shaky start, and with more programming and support, Clunes grew. Despite the shakiness, there was always learning. And many of my Year 12 students in subsequent years would reflect with great fondness on their Clunes experience.
I really got to see Clunes in action once I became Head of Middle School in 2008. I would spend a night at Clunes every term, which would often involve eating dinners in a house, cooked by the students. There were some memorable meals.
One spectacular dinner was produced by a student who took his own pots, pans and knives to Clunes. His housemates sensibly relieved him of all other duties and he produced, in return, a spectacular dinner every evening. Other meals proved memorable for different reasons.
One time, I remember turning up to a house and was greeted by the welcome smell of roasting chicken. The bird was produced with great ceremony, surrounded by vegetables. A carving knife was produced, flourished and then cut into the chicken. It went in about a centimetre and stopped. The same thing happened on the other side. Confusion reigned. It took 30 seconds for me to think of the important question: ‘Did you defrost it?’ The answer came back: ‘Did we have to?’ It sent me elsewhere for my dinner.
Schools, for a very long time, considered academic learning to be the be-all and end-all of education. But life is about so much more than the completion of assessments and performance in examinations.
The ability to live with others, to negotiate and compromise, to share, to experience life in a different part of Australia, to know you need to defrost a chicken before it goes in the oven… these are just some of the real lessons that a term at Clunes imparts.’
