School of new thought - Courier Mail

WHEELIE GOOD IDEA: Samuel Anderson has forgone Schoolies Week to help charity. Picture: Jamie Hanson Source: The Sunday Mail (Qld)

NO CHANCE of a hangover today for Samuel Anderson. The Toowoomba 18-year-old, who finished Year 12 on Friday, isn't partying hard on the Gold Coast with his mates.

He's invented his own take on Schoolies Week, renaming it Wheelies Week.

Starting tomorrow, Samuel will cycle 300km across the Darling Downs to raise money for the West African Food Crisis appeal via Oxfam.

"Rather than hitting the beach and booze," as he puts it, he wants to help change the world, one road trip at a time.

The third of nine children, Samuel, who works part-time in a bakery to fund his sport, will set off on a series of day rides, finishing this Friday.

His modest target of $300 ($1 per km) via his Oxfam website was eclipsed weeks ago, with the dollars pouring in for this inspirational Toowoomba Grammar School graduate.

"There are 19 million people across West and Central Africa experiencing severe food shortages, and over a million kids at risk of acute malnutrition, so I figured trying to help them was a better way to kick-start my life after school."

Samuel Anderson is one of many school leavers opting out of the drink-'til-you-drop culture.

Sure, we'll read about the arrests, the violence and the vomiting in gutters, but there is more to this story.

A recent survey by Unleashed Travel, which organises luxury overseas trips for Schoolies, found only 50 per cent of its clientele listed alcohol as a priority.

The other half was more interested in relaxing on the beach and spending quality time with friends, prompting the company to offer booze-free trips from 2013.

Similarly, Craig Heppelwhite, general manager of Red Frogs - a Schoolies support network that began in 1997 - says there is growing demand for church and community groups to hold break-ups in "non-alcoholic destinations".

Enter the Schoolies Revolution. It began in Victoria in 2010 and takes groups of Year 12 graduates overseas to experience a Third World country.

This Friday, 21 youths will travel for three weeks to Uganda, where they will interact with the poor, aiming to make a tangible difference in the lives of others.

Back on the Gold Coast, things are also looking up, says Heppelwhite. "We're definitely seeing a healthier Schoolies' as the years tick on.

"The whole event has become a well-oiled machine and the education sessions we are doing in schools are making a difference."

Red Frogs now visits Year 12 students in more than 300 schools in the State's south-east, teaching safety tips such as look out for your mates and drink plenty of water.

Beyond words, Red Frogs puts safety into action.

"During Schoolies we run a 24/7 call centre and last year got 10,500 calls - mostly good things, like kids asking us to walk them home if they'd become separated from their friends," Heppelwhite says.

Red Frogs and its growing army of volunteers (800-plus this year, mostly aged 18-25) also make pancakes.

"We turn up at the crack of midday, when they get up, and cook - last year we had more than 4000 requests for pancakes."

Heppelwhite says all this bodes well for young people.

"The majority of kids are having a good time without getting off their heads."

Of course, there are exceptions - drastic cases where lives might otherwise be lost.

"We've stopped someone jumping off a balcony; another time we found a young man about to hang himself; and a young person had passed out in a spa but we got there just before their head went under (the water)."

During Schoolies last year, Red Frogs dealt with 468 alcohol poisonings in rooms, 42 drug and alcohol overdoses and 73 cases of depression and anxiety.

Red Frogs? Angels in our midst, more like it.

The binge drinking culture threatening to destroy young lives needs to be reversed.

Kids being shown a better way forward by people their own age or a few years older is a powerful motivator for change.

It's a slow process, but as fundraiser Samuel told me ahead of his first cycle trip tomorrow, from Toowoomba to the Bunya Mountains and back: "Not everyone my age wants to fall in line with Schoolies; its nice to have an alternative."