By Jed Lanyon
The Adcare community op shop’s dedication to helping the Yarra Ranges community continues.
The op shop recently made a donation of $4000 to Warburton Primary School.
Half of the money raised will go towards supporting the school’s harvest café.
Within the program, children participate in two hour block lessons, planting, harvesting, preparing and cooking food, shared meal times, garden design and garden creation.
The generous donation allowed for the purchase of six garden bed planter boxes, construction materials, garden archways, furniture to upgrade the garden and learning area.
As well as mulch, seeds, plants, ingredients to enhance the cooking element of the program and the purchase of seed and fruit dehydrator to assist with seed collection for future planting and dehydration of excess produce for consumption throughout the year.
Teacher Kerri Middleton thanked Kathy Kearns and the Adcare staff for their donation.
“Our harvest café program is run for all students from prep to grade six.
“It is an essential element of our sustainability environmental science and social emotional learning programs,” she said.
“It is able to operate at a consistent high standard as a result of generous community support.”
Warburton Primary School’s business manager Cheryl, says that this sort of funding is vital for their school programs to survive.
“It’s essential, we’re a little school and there’s not a lot of money so it means the program keeps on running,” she said.
The op shop gives annual donations to schools in the region to help boost their budget.
Adcare’s reach extends much further than just the Yarra Ranges as they donate to communities in Thailand and Cambodia.
In December the op shop made a $1000 donation to the Children’s First Foundation Australia to support the recently separated Bhutan twins, Nima and Dawa.
Locals are encouraged to go down to the op shop near the Seventh Day Adventist Church in Warburton and purchase clothing and toys or to donate their own goods to those in need.
