‘Damn, is this my kid?’: The unique snow campus that costs a lot less than Timbertop

In the dead of night, a blizzard wind began to lash their tents.

Thick snow piled up as teachers circulated among the shivering students, reassuring them and reminding them to rug up.

“It was scary at first,” said 14-year-old Olivia Louwdijk, from Bass Coast College in San Remo.

“But it was super cool.”

For some, the experience would be the defining moment of their term at The Alpine School, a school in the snow and one of four campuses of The School for Student Leadership, where 45 students from different government schools across Victoria live and adventure for about nine weeks.

This year, the school celebrates 25 years, ushering 720 students each year through leadership, self-awareness and community connection education. All campuses, which also include Don Valley, Snowy River and Gnurad-Gundidj, run for 24 hours, seven days a week.

The Alpine School campus principal Russell Shem had 10 years’ experience in the independent system before his role at Alpine, including six at Geelong Grammar School’s prestigious year 9 Timbertop program in the foothills of the Victorian Alps.

“These students, young people that come here, their families – it’s about an opportunity unlike anything else, but it doesn’t cost them anywhere near what it would [elsewhere],” he said.

The term costs parents $800, a stark difference to Timbertop’s $22,125 a term.

For some of the students arriving at The Alpine School, at Dinner Plain, about a 20-minute drive from Mount Hotham, it’s the first time they’ve ever seen snow, let alone lived within it.

“It was soft – the snow. It was really cool to stand on, to sink in. It was different,” said Seth Buckland, from Cann River School.

The program involves snow camping, skiing and mountain biking. There’s no social media or phones. The students are immersed in nature and do chores: the dishes, cleaning toilets, washing their clothes, and tidying their bedrooms.

For 14-year-old Mitch Herbert, from Orbost Community College, getting stuck in a blizzard was the experience of a lifetime.

The students unzipped their tents to see everything covered with a fresh 15 centimetres of snow and hiked back to the school in knee-deep powder.

“We were already out there. The option was to hike back or stay the night. It was something everyone wanted to experience … to be able to do that,” said Herbert.

“I’ve done so many cool things I never thought I’d be able to do.”

Shem said the program was perfect for supporting year 9 students’ adolescent stages of development, their brain development, their level of risk-taking behaviour and building relationships.

It also exposed the students to other teens from different cultures, backgrounds and areas.

“We all lead different lives and come together. It’s so good to see how everyone is different and how they’re raised,” said Edie Clutterbuck, from Surf Coast Secondary College.

The School for Student Leadership principal Brendan Pfanner said that in a normal school, students learned for six-or-so hours a day.

“We can do three times the learning they’d get in a normal school each day.”

Each year, the school approaches principals across Victoria for applications. Pfanner said there was always strong demand, and they’d love another “10 campuses”.

Shem said the school was “one of those places or roles that you are prepared to put in the work because you can see the reward, and it’s valued, and it’s making a positive change”.

Stella Oxner, 15, from Castlemaine Secondary College, is testament to that.

“We will all go back as better people,” she said. “We will have grown as people and can go and influence our friends to do the same.”

Ryan Baird from Bass Coast College agrees. “It’s changed me,” he said.

“My parents said on visiting weekends, ‘damn, is this my kid?’. It was really good to hear.”

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