Ex-teacher, Reader's Comment, Hey politicians, leave those teachers alone, Jane Caro, The Drum, ABC News, 12 March 2013: http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/4565396.html Historical link preserved from the original page.
Wilcannia Central School: allegations.
Wilcannia Central School, 1000 kilometres west of Sydney, New South Wales, has 90 per cent Aboriginal enrolment.
Wilcannia Central School is fighting its way back from a horrific year in 2005, when 55 students were suspended and one-third of teachers left.
In August 2010 35 community members signed a petition primarily against Michelle Nicholson, the school principal.
The signatories to the petition were concerned about the alleged serial bullying and harassment of several staff members.
Some parents favoured a former acting principal.
It was alleged that a male student had grabbed a female teacher around the neck and verbally abused her.
Ms Nicholson was alleged to have failed to discipline this male student.
It was also alleged that a male student had threatened to rape a community elder as she walked out of the school grounds.
And that this student escaped censure.
Bullying claim inquiry at Wilcannia school, Heath Gilmore, Sydney Morning Herald, 12 August 2010: http://www.smh.com.au/national/education/bullying-claim-inquiry-at-wilcannia-school-20100811-11zqh.html Historical link preserved from the original page.
Allen Powell, former science teacher at Camden High School, New South Wales.
Former science teacher Allen Powell worked at Camden High School in Western Sydney, New South Wales in the 1980s and '90s.
He says he had his worries about the school at the time.
After about 1988 when we had a lot of rain here, stuff started oozing out of the ground which was black and sticky-ish.
The school was closed in 2001 after contamination was discovered in soil underneath classrooms.
The school was built on the site of a gasworks that had been in operation since 1911.
Dozens of former Camden High teachers and students have became ill and some have died.
I'm really upset, very saddened by it. It's very distressing. I wish I'd made more noise, I feel guilty about it. " Mr Powell said.
Lawyers say 70 people have joined an investigation into Camden High School to determine the cause of a range of recent illnesses.
The group includes people with various forms of cancer, brain tumours and children with birth defects.
Some members of the group represent former teachers and students who have died.
Lawyer Jim Marsden says the complaints could lead to a class action against the NSW Education Department.
"Ultimately whoever is responsible must be held accountable, " Mr Marsden said.
Several former students blame their illnesses on the old gasworks site.
The contamination at the high school was discovered in 1995 and contained the following year.
Reports from the era include lists of chemical substances which were found such as benzine, banzoapyrene, cyanide and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH).
There was always an egg smell and I always thought that the Bunsen burner gas taps had been left on or leaking, but I didn't know until after I left school that this was a gasworks, " former student Rachel Dowling said.
Ms Dowling attended the school from 1985 and now has thyroid cancer.
But research director at the NSW Cancer Council, Freddy Sitas, has urged caution.
"These investigations can go on for three or four years, and nine out of 10 of them turn out to be nothing.
So it is important not to raise expectations when investigating a cluster and not to call it a cluster when it is not so.