Maria Iatrou consoles her daughter Kassandra after her final day at Mowbray College. 82362 Pictures: JOE MASTROIANNI
By NATALIE GALLENTI
TEARS flowed as Mowbray College students said goodbye to their classmates last Wednesday.
After experiencing an emotional rollercoaster for the past week, students reminisced at a school assembly as Year 7 to 10 students completed their final classes.
School shirts were signed and hugs were given they relished their final day of classes.
Meanwhile concerned parents face the challenge of finding places in already crowded schools across Melbourne’s West.
Many parents expressed their disappointment that calls for a lifeline had fallen through at the last minute.
Distraught mother Maria Iatrou said her daughter Kassandra had not been accepted into other schools and it was just a waiting game.
The Hillside resident said she was shocked when she heard the news and had spent the past week filling out application forms.
A teary Kassandra said from the front gates of the College on her last day, it was daunting not knowing what school she would be attending next term and if any of her other friends would be
there.
“We don’t know anything. I don’t know what’s going on and where my friends are going.”
For one family this isn’t the first time their son Joe has had to say goodbye to a school.
Violette Ali wiped away tears as she met her son at the school gates. Ms Ali said she could not believe he would have to move schools once again after another private school he attended in the area, ICA, closed last year.
Ms Ali said parents had been kept out of the loop by Mowbray College and were given little indication that the school would definitely close until the last minute.
After enrolling her son in four schools in the area, Ms Ali faces a nervous wait to see where her son will be going next term.
She questioned the input the State Government has had in saving the school and said parents who chose to send their child to a private school were taxpayers too and deserved support from the nation’s leaders.
“Maybe if the Government injected more money into the public school system we might be happy to send our schools there, but they don’t do that,” she said.
“How much time will he (Joe) miss from school and will he have to repeat?”
Former students Cristian Reyes and James Fanourakis said the writing had been on the wall for a while and they weren’t surprised when they heard the news that the school was $18 million in debt. Mr Fanourakis said with four principals in the past year, it was obvious the school could not remain sustainable for much longer.
