At the halfway point of the school year, competition is quickly heating up among North Queensland schools battling it out to become school attendance champions as part the North Queensland Toyota Cowboys Try for 5! program, supported by the National Indigenous Australians Agency and Rex Airlines.
Participating program schools are working hard to top the inter-school challenge leaderboards, named after club co-captains Chad Townsend and Jason Taumalolo, as they compete to win a framed, team-signed Cowboys jersey at the end of the year.
Each leaderboard tracks schools’ attendance performance, measuring the change in average attendance compared to their attendance goal week by week, term by term to determine the 2023 winners.
After term 2, Western Cape College - Weipa top the Taumalolo leaderboard, only narrowly ahead of Cooktown State School and Balaclava State School in second and third respectively.
Over in the Townsend Challenge, Western Cape College - Mapoon are leading the charge with Garbutt State School and Vincent State school in hot pursuit, making it two from two for the schools in the Cape at the halfway mark!
The challenge is on for Heatley State School and Bloomfield River State School to continue their charge having won their respective challenges last year, while all schools will be trying to hold them off and make a late surge themselves.
The friendly competition is all in the spirit of driving increased school attendance across North Queensland communities in order for students to reap the benefits of academic, social and personal development through consistent attendance.
Students have been encouraged throughout the 2023 school year, with the Try for 5! program incentivising attendance through regular player ambassador visits, individual term and fortnightly prizes and the newly introduced MVP initiative.
Through the MVP initiative, Program Ambassadors are establishing mentor relationships with a small number of students, setting goals and working on strategies to increase their average attendance.
Program ambassador and NRLW player Tahlulah Tillett said the closeness on the leaderboards shows how the school communities are prioritising their students getting to school five days a week.
“It’s fantastic to see so many students placing increased importance on getting to school so they can win the challenge and reap all the rewards of education,” she said.
“We’ve had a great year so far getting out to all the schools and meeting with teachers, students and their families to encourage them and show them what a great place school is to be.
“The leaderboards are such a great tool to show these kids that coming to school five days a week leads to success, and we’re really looking forward to watching the competition heat up as schools increase their attendance figures.”
The Cowboys Try for 5! program is an inter-school challenge, designed to address short and long term impacts of students missing foundation learning in their primary years through poor school attendance.
Try for 5! motivates and rewards individual classes and schools for their attendance record during the challenge period, and engages students and families using the club’s profile and ambassadors.
Poor school attendance has been linked to lower academic outcomes, early school leaving, substance abuse, poverty, unemployment and negative health outcomes.
The Cowboys wish all our participating schools the best as they continue to work hard climbing the leaderboards in pursuit of school every day!
