Boarders’ soup sales boost the bus

A GROUP of year eleven boarders from Ballarat Grammar have raised four thousand dollars for The SoupBus.

Since establishing a relationship with the organisation as year 7 students in 2017, the Wigan House boys, including Liam Butler and Oliver Wischer, have volunteered as meal-servers at the bus, and regularly prepare sandwiches for the not-for-profit to provide to their clients.

But in the last three years, the group has welcomed The SoupBus to Grammar twice. Wigan’s year 11s served up some hot fundraisers from the kitchen on wheels, with support from their senior school peers.

“We sold soup to the students, and the funds raised were put back into the organisation to help them feed those that are disadvantaged in Ballarat,” Oliver said.

“We had donations of 500 bread rolls on the day from Baker’s Delight, soup was donated by the dining hall, and some we purchased with funds raised in-house.

“Over the two afternoons, we served and sold roughly 15 pots of soup in the bus.”

OnTrack Foundation founder Craig Schepis worked with the young volunteer fundraisers on both occasions.

“Craig was driving the bus. He was really thankful, grateful and happy about what we were able to do, as we generated a bit more than what was expected,” Liam said.

Oliver learnt that OnTrack Foundation launched almost 13 years ago, and Mr Schepis has been leading it ever since.

“We were on The SoupBus 2.0; the most recent version. The Foundation has been building up The SoupBus’ capacity since 2008, and Craig is really proud of what’s become of it,” Oliver said.

The Wigan boys have pride in their broader school and boarding family’s “community service culture.”

“We’re encouraged to do as much as we can, and we like to encourage the younger students to do the same. Once they become senior students, they’ll take our roles on, and the cycle continues,” Oliver said.

“When a fundraising event comes around, it’s always very well supported and we get a great turnout, especially amongst the boarders. It’s just something that we do.”