Boort Primary School (School No. 1796; previously known as Boort State School 1877 – 1915; Boort Higher Elementary School 1915 – 1963)

Full description

Boort State School (School No. 1796) first opened on the 15th of February 1877 in the township of Boort, approximately 250 km Northwest of Melbourne.

The school was first proposed in 1874, and a site of 2 acres at 13 King Street was gazetted in March 1876. Upon opening, school was held in an old portable building with teacher’s quarters attached ‘perched on the side of a bald sand hill in a very exposed position’. Average attendance during the first year was 19, from an enrolment of 41. Attendance had fallen to 11 the following year, prompting the school to operate half-time with Woolshed Lake (School No. 1885). In November 1881 Woolshed Lake closed and Boort became a full-time school once more.

In 1882 attendance rose to 20. In 1883 it rose again to 30, and the partition to the unused teacher’s quarters was removed to provide additional space for students. The following year a new school building was erected, and the original building was converted back into a teacher’s residence. By 1891, however, attendance had risen to 80, resulting in severe overcrowding and children under 6 being excluded from schooling. Later the same year the situation was temporarily relieved through the opening of a new private school, and in 1892 the local Mechanics Institute was leased to provide additional accommodation. By 1895 attendance had reached 117 and subsequent overcrowding over the following years resulted in an additional classroom extension in 1902.

The school became a Higher Elementary School in 1915. A proposal to establish a consolidated school in 1946 failed due to reluctance of neighbouring communities and doubts about the capabilities of the district roads in wet weather. In 1963 the school was split, with higher elementary students moving to the newly opened Boort High School (later Boort Secondary College, School No. 7625).

By 1970, the school had been renamed ‘Boort Primary School’. It continued to operate until 2012, when it merged with Boort Secondary College to form Boort District P-12 School (School No. 8882). The Secondary College campus on Malone Street was redeveloped to house the newly combined school. The Primary School campus was closed in 2013, and the buildings were demolished in June 2017. The site was being prepared for sale by the Victorian Government as of 2024.