STUDENTS struggling to stay in school have been given a much-needed boost with last week’s launch of The 20th Man Fund 2013 ‘Back to School’ program.
Braybrook-raised author Alice Pung, Sunshine College teacher Alan Dalton and lawyer Robert Stary gave motivational speeches to highlight the help available for students in disadvantaged families.
Carlton footballer Heath Scotland also spoke and donated $20,000 to the cause.
Now in its 24th year, the ‘Back to School’ program will provide financial support during the year to help more than 300 children from more than 70 secondary schools and 20 tertiary institutions.
Since starting in 1989, the program has helped 8000-plus children from disadvantaged backgrounds to stay in school.
Program head Richard Tregear says: “We have helped kids from an assortment of backgrounds — indigenous, refugees, new immigrants, struggling families — and all have one thing in common: they come from a low socio-economic environment, where the funds to buy the essentials for schooling are just not available, and that is where our program steps in.”
Pung said the 20th Man Fund and Les Twentyman had helped many of her friends while growing up in the western suburbs in the 1980s.
Mr Twentyman said he would like the program to expand as the best way to keep children off the streets and from entering a life of crime; it was one way to keep them in school. “The problems out there are huge and we get referrals from schools, youth hostels, refugee support groups, Department of Human Services, Centrelink — even the Salvation Army — and we have to turn away so many due to a lack of funds. To not be able to help so many each year is truly heartbreaking.”
