Author talk to boost education support for disadvantaged kids

MULTI-AWARD-WINNING Australian author Jock Serong will lend his time and talent to a fundraiser in Leopold next month, helping to raise vital funds for The Smith Family and the children it supports.

The “Meet the Author” event will be hosted by the Leopold VIEW Club – a women’s organisation that advocates for the education of young, disadvantaged Australians – and will serve as the club’s second major fundraising event since it formed in March 2023.

The club, which has grown to 56 members, sponsors four children through The Smith Family’s Learning for Life program, helping to fund school essentials such as textbooks, uniforms and excursions for students experiencing disadvantage, along with access to support services and additional learning programs.

It hopes the fundraiser will enable it to expand this sponsorship to six students, ensuring they enjoy what former primary school principal and club member Denise Simons describes as a “level playing field” with their peers.

“We’re trying to help children who come from disadvantaged backgrounds get a better start in life,” she said.

“I look at my own grandchildren and I think ‘I’d like every child to have what they’ve got’, and I’m sure people my age feel exactly the same way.

“By sponsoring children from disadvantage backgrounds, we’re actually helping to cut the cycle of poverty and enable the child to get a full education, where they’re not embarrassed about not having the right books and not embarrassed about not having the right uniform.”

The event will give attendees a chance to learn about Serong’s life, inspiration and highly successful novels, the most recent of which, Cherrywood, was released last year.

“We just want to have a nice afternoon out and give people somebody interesting that they can listen to, and an opportunity to get together with other people who are like-minded,” Ms Simons said.

[Serong] is really down to Earth… and really easy to listen to. I guarantee [the audience will] have a really interesting afternoon. They’ll learn something about him and what he’s done, and we know that the afternoons here at the Sportsman’s Club are excellent.”

The event will take place at the Leopold Sportsman’s Club in Kensington Road on August 5 between 12.30pm and 2pm.

For more information, or to purchase tickets before sales close on July 29, email [email protected] or phone Denise Simons on 0407 504 052.