Letter from 10-year-old wins the 'trip of a lifetime'

Alysha-Marie Holmes from Orere Primary, centre, with Samantha Richings and Crystal Coates.

Students at Orere Primary School are to jet their way to Queenstown.

The school - 68km southeast of Auckland - has won the Jetstar and Herald on Sunday competition to send 20 lucky students and four guardians to the 2016 Hilux New Zealand Rural Games in February.

A judging panel, which was looking for a school whose students would benefit from the trip to Queenstown, considered letters of nomination written by students, parents and teachers saying why their respective schools deserved the trip.

Orere Primary School's letter was penned by 10-year-old student Alysha-Marie Holmes. She wrote: "We live a long way from Auckland. We have limited trips. No internet.

"We would love to go to Queenstown because some of us have never gone on a plane. This would be a trip of a lifetime full of wonderful opportunities."

Orere Primary School has a roll of 46 students and principal Evan Robson said they were "blown away" by the win.

"We always tend to think our little school wouldn't ever win something like this," he said. "[The prize] is a great thing for the kids because it shows that if you actually do have a go, you can win these sorts of things. It doesn't matter where you are from.

"I think [all the students] were stunned - then we popped all the streamers, the kids got more and more excited and did dances, jumped up and down and sang songs."

The judging panel - which included representatives of Jetstar and the Herald on Sunday - ruled Orere Primary School was fully deserving of the trip south.

Robson said most of his school's pupils had never been to the South Island.

"We are a decile three [school] and for most of our parents, money is an issue.

"Most of them are on low wages so a lot of the kids out here would never get the opportunities of perhaps students from more-affluent areas," he said.

"All small schools struggle for money and you have to fundraise like hell just to even get teacher aides.

"There is very little left over to get anything special so this is a great boost for our school and our pupils."