Boots and smiles that make a difference
Year 11 student Che Gorr Burchmore saw an opportunity to turn a school project into a chance to change the lives of other soccer fans from underprivileged areas.
Year 11 Wesley College student, Che Gorr Burchmore, represents his school at the highest level on the Firsts soccer team, earning his Honour Colours in 2021. When tasked with coming up with a topic of research for his major IB Middle Years Program project, Che looked at what inspires him the most: soccer.
‘I wanted to work on a project that I wouldn’t forget, and something that would be useful to others,’ Che said. ‘I decided to turn my passion for soccer into something that could help underprivileged communities, particularly Indigenous children.’
Che asked friends and teammates for their help and they were all happy to get behind him, donating 40 pairs of soccer boots, toys and books. ‘When you’re a growing teenager, you need new soccer boots nearly every season’, explained Che, so finding an item that his friends could easily donate was easy. The hard part was finding the right charitable organisation to work with.
Che did some research and found Boots for One & All, a family-run organisation based in Queensland who helps Indigenous families in about twenty small communities across the Northern Territory to play the sports they love.
‘I asked questions about what the charity did and how they operated, as well as where the boots would go to,’ Che said.
His genuine interest in the community and their needs impressed the founders of Boots for One & All, who wrote the following message in their newsletter:
‘If you have been following us, you may have seen us post about a teenager in Melbourne called Che, who took it upon himself to collect donations for our organisation as part of a school project. Che interviewed me and asked all the right questions about what he could do to contribute to remote Indigenous communities.
‘Che, educated himself about Indigenous communities and using his initiative, determined how we could work together to give kids and adults the opportunity to become an active part of the community and play the sport they love,’ Boots for One & All wrote. ‘Thank you to Che and his family. We wish we had Che’s all around the country.’
The aptly named ‘Personal Project’ was a passion project for Che, who took the opportunity to turn a school project into a deeply personally endeavour outside the classroom. ‘I made a big effort to help a community and it made me feel pretty proud. They showed great gratitude in return,’ Che said about the real-life impact of his project. The project, which students completed over several terms, was demanding at times, but as Che said, ‘the reward of a smile at the end made it worth it.’
