STUDENT PERFORMANCES

Mr GARDNER (Morialta) (15:48): Whenever I get the opportunity to speak at citizenship ceremonies or, indeed, visit schools in my electorate, I often take the opportunity to point out that those are two of my absolute favourite things that I have come across since getting the opportunity to do this job; and I see the member for Taylor nodding her head. I am sure that it is an experience felt and shared by many members of this house.

When you talk to new citizens of this country and when you talk to schoolchildren, you get the opportunity to see people experiencing the joy, the optimism and the hope for the future, and you can share with them how they are going to help build our state and our country into a better place. It is an absolute thrill.

One of my favourite parts of even that part of the job is seeing schoolchildren perform, because I think that cultural performance is a very significant part of an ideal education system. I think that it adds a great deal to our cultural fabric to see students doing extra curricular activities and offering their best, and it is quite enjoyable as well. I take the opportunity today just because I have had three recent experiences that particularly brought this home to me.

The first was at the graduation and registration ceremony for the Ethnic Schools Board, which brought both the themes of new citizens and schoolchildren performing together, because our ethnic schools are very important. They are very special. I first encountered the Ethnic Schools Association when I was still at university doing temp work and I got the opportunity to spend a few months doing part-time work in the Ethnic Schools Association offices which were then in Hectorville at the East Torrens Primary School, working with Inta Rumpe on preparing some of their materials for the year ahead. I have been pleased to maintain some sort of connection with them over the 11 years since, and it is something I particularly appreciated.

I enjoyed the opportunity to join with the member for Ashford, the Minister for Education, the member for Waite (Martin Hamilton-Smith), the member for Bragg (Vickie Chapman)—and happy birthday to the member for Bragg: it is a great day—the member for Norwood, I believe, and of course the member for Unley (David Pisoni, the shadow education minister), in whose electorate the ceremony was held.

These ceremonies are very important. They give an opportunity for the Ethnic Schools Board to appreciate the registration of their teachers in their schools for the year ahead. John Kiosoglous, of course, is the Chairman of the Ethnic Schools Board, and a great South Australian who does a tremendous job in supporting the ethnic schools in the work they do.

In saying that, our ethnic schools give children from different ethnic backgrounds the opportunity to reconnect with their cultures and learn the languages of their parents' homelands. I think there are more opportunities the department of education could help them out with. It could help them find more rooms within DECS schools, for example, and make them available so that more ethnic schools could flourish.

Putting that aside, I thought the performances were outstanding of the School of St Nicholas Parish of the Russian Orthodox Church, the Sinhala Buddhist School, the Alexander Pushkin Russian School, the Adelaide Kurdish Ethnic School and the Chinese School of the Chinese Welfare Services, and I commend those children.

A couple of weeks later, on 2 June, I was pleased to be involved in the Festa della Repubblica celebrations at Fogular Furlan in Felixstow. On that occasion the Brighton Secondary School, as it always does, performed magnificently, in sometimes trying circumstances. Jeffrey Kong is a great South Australian, and he is the head of music at Brighton Secondary School, of course.

Mr Sibbons: A great man.

Mr GARDNER: A great man, as the member for Mitchell says. He led his students in trying circumstances. The Brighton Secondary School Choir and String Ensemble, with soloists Mark Oakley and Hannah Greenshields, performed despite the fact that some of the VIPs were wandering around the room and talking (some of my colleagues who will remain nameless, unfortunately). Nevertheless, they played on, and Carolyn Lam on the violin was extraordinary and played beautifully in very trying circumstances.

In the last 30 seconds remaining to me, I will mention one of the best high school musicals that I have seen in my life recently, and I have been involved with a few. I commend the students of Norwood Morialta High School for their tremendous performance of The King and I, led by Danielle Greaves, in particular, as Anna, and Justin Rowe as the king. I go to a lot of high school musicals in my electorate and have been involved with these for years, but I can particularly say that was fantastic and I commend all of those students in all of those groups.