Homework club fosters love of learning in Gracemere

Nicky Cody has been engaged in the community-building process at Gracemere, south of Rockhampton, for several years. Building chook pens, helping in the community garden, guiding the homework and reading activities, and cooking for children at various events, she has watched as her neighbourhood has grown from strength to strength through various social action initiatives and the help of many hands. 

“There is a keen interest from neighbours and the community at large to engage in this community building process,” she says. 

“Drawing on the arts has been an attractive feature.” 

According to the Universal House of Justice, “the emergence of social action happens naturally, as a growing community gathers strength.”¹. Social action efforts might be related to health, sanitation, education or agriculture, and typically emerge out of growing collective consciousness born from the institute process. Most projects are of a fixed duration and aim to improve some aspect of the life of the local population. 

One of the mainstays of the local community-building process in Gracemere has been the local Homework Club. “The credit goes to one of our junior youth who expressed in his class the need for help with his homework,” Nicky says. The club currently has five families with up to eight children attending every week.

The club includes activities and games and ends with a warm homemade dinner provided by one of the neighbourhood families. Nicky says the children seem to enjoy the initiative, which has transformed into a space where the entire family becomes part of the learning process. 

“One of the best qualities of the club is that parents and children are all involved in helping provide that environment for learning that hopefully will be fostered in other areas of life,” she says. 

“I love the eagerness to learn (from) the community, the vibrancy, the willingness to help and come together.”