Robyn Morris

Department of Education

I arrived in Katherine in 1957 and the preschool was built after some families worked extremely hard to fundraise for the Centre. They needed 500 pounds, a piano and agree to collect Aboriginal children to attend.

I have always had a close association with the Katherine South Preschool as my 5 children attended and I held positions on the Committee over the years.

The Preschool was opened in 1959 by the late Mrs. Ingrid Phillips.

The Preschool was a special part of the Katherine Community and students who attended would enroll their own children. Many of the teachers and students would often return to visit when they came back to the Territory.

The Xmas concert was always the highlight of the year and to date I helped organize 35 of them! It was a huge night where the families and children came. We decorated the room with children’s work.

The children performed songs, had nativity scenes and shared evening meal. They gave their presents they had made to their parents and Santa would arrive to wish everyone Merry Xmas and give each child and siblings a gift.

Preschool was flooded in 1998. It was a huge job to get it up and running but I was determined to save it so spent many hours with volunteers from Darwin and Katherine coming daily to help clean the building and flood mud off lots of toys.

We needed to move to the Katherine South Primary school site on Riverbank Drive in 2010 to a new shared facility.

In the early days we were able to take the children on excursions to Knotts Crossing and the Low Level swimming, to the Wildlife Park, Phillips and Symes farms and the Circus when it came to Town.

Working with the Preschool children is one of my favourite places to be.

I was required to study for a qualification after 30 years!

I am proud to see many of my ex-students still in Katherine raising their own families and working in the Community in various positions and running their own businesses.