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House of Assembly - Fifty-First Parliament, Second Session (51-2)
2008-06-04 Daily Xml
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PREMIER'S READING CHALLENGE

Mrs GERAGHTY (Torrens) (15:02): My question is to the Minister for Education and Children's Services.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

Mrs GERAGHTY: Will the minister provide an update on the Premier's Reading Challenge and the Premier's Be Active Challenge?

The Hon. J.D. LOMAX-SMITH (Adelaide—Minister for Education and Children's Services, Minister for Tourism, Minister for the City of Adelaide) (15:03): I thank the member for Torrens for her question. The honourable member has shown a keen interest in both the Premier's Reading Challenge and the Premier's Be Active Challenge because she knows that these activities through the local schools in her electorate have produced a significant turnaround in many children's daily lives and activities.

I am pleased to inform the house that, due to very overwhelming popular demand, we have extended the reading challenge to include the senior secondary years. This is because many students had reached year 9 and were saying they would like to carry on receiving medals and rewards. We do know that children have responded very well to the opportunity to receive medals and previously we had offered certificates and bronze, silver and gold medals.

Now we have extended the program into further years so that if a student completes five years of the challenge, they become a champion and get a champion medal, after six they can become a legend, and, after seven, they enter the Hall of Fame. This is indeed, as the Premier says, ensuring they are rewarded for being within the Olympics of reading. The awarding of medals has proved incredibly popular and I am very pleased that there is almost a fifty-fifty division between boys and girls receiving these awards.

In the fourth year of the challenge, we now have 95 per cent of schools involved and that is 144,770 students. Of course, this program is ably supported by many volunteer ambassadors who go around the state, some in person, sometimes online. So we have not only ambassadors such as Juliet Haslam visiting schools around the state, as well as our ever popular Mem Fox, but we also have online visits by these volunteers with question and answer periods to schools in distant areas.

In addition, the Be Active Challenge is proving increasingly popular. In its inaugural year 7,500 students completed the challenge of four weeks and 60 minutes physical activity. This has been supported by medals, and 50 of last year's highest achieving schools also received $1,000 of sports equipment. This year participation has more than doubled, with more than 22,000 students already involved and registered. Again, there are one-off grants for schools, and we are finding that the challenge is getting increasingly popular as the months go on.

I would say that, whilst initially there was criticism from those opposite about the reading challenge, it has proved one of the most popular strategies within our schools and one of the most popular events for families. In fact, it has proved that you can make a difference in children's literacy when you reduce class sizes, increase investment and are more creative about working with children.

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