Welcome to Destination Boarding - the little podcast that tells the big story about Australian boarding schools.

I’m your host Amanda Ferrari from Boarding Schools Expo and in this series A Road to Mount Isa I’ll be introducing you to our schools that are heading to Mount Isa with us in December. 

It’s our second event up north and this year we thought it was a great idea to coincide with Sports for Bush Kids week - a week where around 70 families travel hundreds of kilometres from Karumba in the north, Richmond to the east, Windorah to the south, and west into the Northern Territory, to take part in a number of sports. It’s hosted annually by the Isolated Children’s Parents Association Mount Isa Branch of the Air and this year, 2024 is their 25th Anniversary.  

During this series we’re looking forward to getting to know our Queensland boarding schools that little bit better. We’re exploring their connections to our most remote families and their commitment or sense of social responsibility to ensure that families have access to face to face engagement with a variety of boarding schools - we all know that a website can only tell part of the story. It’s the people that bring any story to life. 

Boarding school is part of life for our rural and remote families and none more so than those in far north west Queensland and the Territory. We are excited to bring boarding schools closer to them so they can explore their options and meet key representatives from each school and really focus on discussing the key elements of what each school can provide for their biggest asset - their country child.  We’re so grateful to the 14 schools that will be joining us and encourage any others that are listening to register - it’s not too late.

This episode was so so good. I managed to catch up with Katie Brown from Escott Station near Burketown in far North Queensland.

She was smack bang in the middle of Gregory mini-school and still carved out half an hour or so to chat with me about all things ICPA, Distance Education and what it’s like to send kids to boarding school from such remote regions.

Katie went to school in central Queensland, she was a day girl at a school that had boarders and as we know, boarders can have a massive impact in any day kids life given half the chance. She headed north to work as a governess on a station near Windorah, and, the rest is certainly her history. She met hubby Bernard in that first year - he was working on a neighbouring station - and together they have managed stations across northern Queensland and the territory.

Katie is a massive asset to remote northern Queensland. She’s a woman with an infectious energy and to say she’ll have a crack is probably an understatement.

She’s the current President of ICPA’s Mount Isa Branch of the Air - a branch which meets online and covers much of the top end of Australia. Part of her role is ensuring equity of access to educational opportunities for remote children and tackling issues in relation to secondary education whether that’s boarding schools, travel, assistance and the myriad of unique challenges that arise when home is hundreds of kilometres from a major centre.

One of the things we wanted to talk about is Sports for Bush Kids week which is held annually at Mount Isa to bring kids from Mount Isa School of the Air, Cloncurry and other towns together to learn sports, compete in sports and as I learned during our conversation, explore other extra curricular activities that wouldn’t normally be available to these kids.

We could have talked for much much longer but mini-school was waiting!

Hope you love this chat with Katie as much as I did.

Thank you to Courtney Dunn for editing.

History of Escott Station: http://dropbears.com/australia/morning-glory/escott-history.htm

Boarding Expo: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://boardingexpo.com.au/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

Boarding Expo 365: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://boardingexpo365.vfairs.com/⁠