Students Penelope Caldrow and Abby Wall received Gold Awards from Prince Edward at The Duke of Edinburgh’s International Awards at Government House in Melbourne last week.

College vice-principal Trevor McClure received a Long Service Medal for his involvement with the award and helping students at Edenhope College through the award levels. Miss Caldrow said it was a surreal feeling to meet royalty. 

“Meeting the prince and actually talking to him… it was something to really come to terms with,” she said. 

“He is just a really down to earth guy, which made it really easy to talk to him.

“He was talking about some funny moments on the adventurous journeys you do as part of the programs and was making jokes. I was pretty lucky.”

The first step of The Duke of Edinburgh’s International Awards is the bronze award, where a participant has to do one physical activity, volunteer, and learn one skill and document it for six months. 

Once a participant gets to the silver level, the time frame is made longer, then longer again for the gold level.

Miss Caldrow said the award was about self-motivation and documenting everything yourself.

Mr McClure said he had been involved with the award for more than 12 years, 10 of them as the lead co-ordinator of the award for Edenhope College.