Peel Primary school wins state wide award following out of this world science showing

A Peel Primary School has won a state wide award for their science skills in the same month their students travelled to Adelaide to compete in a national science competition.

Waroona’s St Joseph’s Primary School won the Teaching Excellence Award at the 2024 7NEWS WA Community Achievement Awards on Friday, just days after students returned from the national Kids in Space Science competition at the Australian Space Agency.

The school was one of two winners in the category, along with Bunbury’s Amanda Draper, who stood out for their commitment to science education and inspiring the next generation of scientists, engineers and inventors.

In the announcement speech declaring their victory, 7NEWS Regional WA presenter Noel Brunning said the school had made a remarkable contribution to regional education through its STEMathon event, launched in 2023.

“This innovative initiative united local schools, home-school groups and the community in a day filled with hands-on STEM activities, interactive exhibits, and workshops,” he said.

“By securing the National Science Week grant, the school expanded the event in 2024 to include nine additional schools and fostered greater community involvement”

School principal Michael O’Dwyer said the win initially caught him by surprise.

“We were amongst some very, very deserving other recipients and nominees, that’s why I didn’t expect our school to wind the award,” he said.

“It was just an honour being nominated and being held in such company. The dedication, hard work and time that the staff put in behind the scenes is why these great things happen.”

“We also have really good support from our parent community that back our school as well, and we also have some individual staff members that go substantially above and beyond. I must make special mention of Mrs Sharni Silvestri, who tirelessly works behind the scenes to help coordinate this.

“However, this school is still a community, and it’s a community of people working together for the benefit of the children. The achievement and the excellent results that our community school has received is only a reflection of the amazing staff that have worked so hard for the children.”

Mr O’Dwyer said events like competing in the National Kids in Space competition would not be possible without their support network.

He said the students who travelled to Adelaide earlier this month for the national competition did an amazing job, despite being jet-lagged.

“Several of our students had never flown or travelled interstate so it was a series of new firsts for them,” he said.

“The other schools from the other states had excellent ideas and it was an honour getting to meet them and our students enjoyed building new friendships.

“It was special being one of the finalists out of 115 school and over 14,000 students.”

Mr O’Dwyer said the highlight of the trip was meeting the first Australian astronaut Katherine Bennell-Pegg and seeing the live action tracking of space debris in or near earth’s orbit.