Community rallies for Te Pohue school building refurbishment

Rachelle Coles (left), Graham Storrar, Craig Goodspeed and Paul Whiteside have been hard at work renovating Te Pohue School's house. Photo / Supplied

The old saying "many hands make light work" is no more evident than at Te Pohue School, where the community has rallied together to welcome the new principal.

The small country school has a roll of 27 students and after years of having their teachers travel from town to school every day, one family decided to initiate the full renovation of the school house for their new principal Richard Gillespie and his family to move into.

Since late last year, right through the Christmas holiday break, Board of Trustees members Rachelle Coles and Graham Storrar have worked tirelessly.

A callout for help for demo work and paint has brought parents, past parents, parents from Richard Gillespie's previous school, Eskdale School, and members from the Te Pohue and Te Haroto district.

Mr Storrar has a building background and along with his partner, Ms Coles, is a local farmer.

He believed the building had been there since the 1960s and said it was a "pretty solid building".

They are hoping to have Mr Gillespie move in the next few weeks, with the kitchen, bathroom and floors left to do.

Mr Gillespie said the show of support had been "amazing".

"From my perspective as a new principal who has only just started out this year, to see that sort of commitment from the community for people that they don't really know is pretty special.

"There is no place I'd rather be than out there working with these people just purely for that fact that the people there are amazing and that the community is something else."

He noted that a builder from Auckland up for a holiday with his family spent two days helping to fix the gib and help out with structural work - something which "blew [him] away".

Mr Gillespie believed he and his wife and two children were "pretty lucky" and said it "is going to be a fantastic resource" in the coming years.