Credit: Jake Weirick on unsplash

As of November of 2022, the dream of a return of the William Clarke College Big Fun Day Out (BFDO) has been brewing in the heads of the Year 11 leaders. Over the past 9 months, this dream has grown up and morphed into a formal idea. That proposal has worked its way all the way up to the office of the headmaster, to whom a delegation of Year 11 leaders pitched this idea to last week (August 8^th). The fact that there is now a possibility, however slim, that the BDFO returns has prompted me to write this article to outline what an event such as this might look like.

For those of you who weren’t at the school in 2017 or prior, you might not know what exactly a ‘Big Fun Day Out’ is, I’m sorry that you’ve had to miss out on such a fun event. The BFDO was the William Clarke equivalent of a school fete or carnival. It was held every second year and had an expansive range of activities and stalls that provided fun for everyone of all ages as the BFDO was open to all people in the school and wider community. It was an extremely fun day to bring friends from inside and outside of school to. The activities were many and included carnival rides, motorbiking, a dunking contest where students would compete for the chance to pour water over their favourite teachers. There were also many stalls from local businesses that had sponsored the event and showcases from the students such as art exhibits and the occasional music performance. These were all run on school grounds usually spanning from the oval across the whole school. This event was almost certainly the highlight of the year for those who attended, having been run on a Saturday in late August in previous years. For all those who have not attended a BFDO, it is encouraged that you ask someone who has about the event, I’m sure there are several funny stories you’ll hear.

Why bring this up now? Whilst writing an article on a past event might be fun, there is more relevance to the BFDO than simply an event of the past. As mentioned at the beginning, there is a chance that the BFDO might be returning to the school. This chance however is still quite slim, to quote Reverend Koch’s views on a BFDO running, “Don’t get your hopes up, but don’t have no hope.” Clearly there is a fair bit more work and planning will be needed before a BFDO becomes a viable option for the school to run. Despite that, a large amount of effort has been already put into developing this idea into a proposal that has any chance of working. That work has come mainly from the Year 11 leaders who worked to propose this idea to the SRC twice and then to the headmaster. That proposal included an over 4000 word written document proposal as well as the year 11 leaders having to do research and speak to multiple members of staff to gain financial info on past BFDO’s. Overall, a lot of effort and hard work was put in to getting the proposal this far and there is certainly more work to come to hopefully make this dream into a reality.

Hopefully, the idea of the Big Fun Day Out returning appeals to you as much as it does to the Year 11 leaders. We welcome any suggestions or ideas for a potential future BFDO feel free to write them in the comments or come up to me or any of the other Year 11 leaders and tell them to us directly.