Boarding life at SCOTS PGC | Will’s story

‘My favourite thing about school is definitely the Tech Shed… just working with my hands’

Meet Will Bryant, a SCOTS PGC boarder and boy from the bush who’s about to embark on his senior years of schooling at SCOTS PGC – an education that suits his style of learning and supports his objectives of securing trade skills through a school-based apprenticeship, while also allowing him to complete Year 12.

‘We’ve made loads of things in our Industrial Technology Skills class.  I’ve already made a chair in woodwork and now I am doing a coffee table. We also made a toolbox, fire brazier and fishing rod.  I think Industrial Tech is great because it teaches us life skills and business skills.  We treat the Tech Shed like a business, so we have to plan and calculate what materials we need to use with the least amount of scrap.’

The Bryant family live at their property ‘Cytherea’ which is 80km from the township of Mitchell in outback Queensland.  Bill and Shelly Bryant have three children – Matilda, Will and Phoebe. They chose SCOTS PGC as a boarding school for many reasons.  It was important to keep their children together in a co-educational setting but also be surrounded in a supportive environment that was reflective of their home and the country values they’d grown up with.   For Will, the College’s ‘Tech Shed’, and the agricultural offering were a huge drawcard.  SCOTS PGC has a distinctive ‘country feel’ and to the Bryant family, it felt like home – because ‘home’ has an abundance of wide-open spaces.

The Bryant family checked out five different schools when they were initially looking for a boarding school for their children.  ‘I think it was definitely an advantage for SCOTS having the Ag facilities there. When you drive into the place you can see sheep and cattle in the school’s paddock on the side of the road, so it immediately made the kids feel like they were at home.  Obviously coming where we come from, that was a pretty important thing’ Bill said.

Boarding keeps the Bryant kids busy with an abundance of activities and things to do.  Weekends also provide the opportunity to connect with the day student community. ‘A lot of my day student friends live on farms, so I go and ride motorbikes and drive tractors and help their dads.  I couldn’t see myself doing that at a city school…’ Will smiles.