A school/church partnership gives the gift of life

June, 2009

Beaconhills College has had a long and fruitful partnership with St. James Anglican Church in Pakenham, dating back to the College’s beginnings in 1982.

St. James and St. Johns both continue to be represented on the College’s Board and thus the strong connection between the College and the church at the governance level has continued throughout the school’s existence.

In the mid 1990s, it was clear that the original site of St. James in Pakenham had become too small and, in another act of partnership, Beaconhills College leased land at the rear of the school on Gembrook Road to St. James to construct a new church there. That facility has since been shared, with the school having access to the building every Thursday for assemblies, church services and House meetings as well as staff church services at the start of each term and special Easter and Christmas services.

The partnership between St. James and Beaconhills took a new and unusual twist in 1997 when the church’s governing body allowed the school to use the narthex as a venue for the Red Cross’ Mobile Blood Bank. For some years, the school had been taking interested students to the Pakenham Hall to become new blood donors, but the demand to become new donors had become so great that a mobile blood bank unit was sought.

After some initial misgivings, the arrival of a new vicar, Rev. Hilary Roath, in 1997 resulted in a show of strong support for the venture – perhaps not surprising given, at the time, Hilary’s granddaughter was the public face of the Red Cross’ drive for new donors!

Since that time, the Red Cross Blood Bank has used the facilities of St. James on over 20 occasions, with up to 50 students becoming first time blood donors on each visit. In all, over a thousand students have donated blood in the church’s narthex, with the Red Cross collecting almost 500 litres of blood over the past 12 years – and with not a drop of blood being split on the narthex floor! In fact, the only hiccup over the whole time was one occasion when the church was accidentally double-booked for the Blood Bank AND a funeral! Even then, the church and the College managed to ensure both events went ahead with a minimum of fuss.

In addition, during each visit, members of the St. James’ congregation volunteered to supervise the kitchen where the student donors received morning or afternoon tea after their ‘ordeal’.

This wonderful relationship, where St. James has been able to strongly support this important school community service project, has now come to an end, but for positive reasons – the demand by students to become donors has continued to grow and the narthex is no longer big enough to cope with this demand. So, from July this year when the Blood Bank returns, the donations will now take place in the College’s Performing Arts Hall where a six-bed donor unit can be set up rather than the four-bed unit in the St. James.

So, while the strong relationship between St. James and Beaconhills will continue at many levels, this unusual aspect of the partnership has served its purpose and the school wishes to publicly say a big thank you to St. James for their generosity and their unstinting support of this wonderful venture.

Tony Sheumack
Beaconhills College Headmaster