BusseltonSenior High School is a comprehensivepublicco-educationalhigh day school, located in the Busselton suburb of West Busselton in the SouthWest region. By 2012 it had an enrolment of 562 students between Year 8 and Year 12, approximately 6 of whom were Aboriginal. The school was established in 1952 as Busselton Junior High School, serving students from primary years up to year 10. In 1958, it was made a three-year high school and it was separated from the primary school in 1960. In 1962, it became a five-year high school. The land on which it is situated previously belonged to Carlo and Flora Sayers, a pioneering Busselton family, who had both expressed wishes that their land be used for an educational institution after their death; Flora died in 1955 and the land was then transferred to the Education Department. The school was struck by tragedy in 1980 when in May holidays of 1980 a number of students from Busselton Senior High School flew out of Perth airport for a school excursion in New South Wales. After landing in Adelaide the students boarded buses to drive through outback areas of South Australia and New South Wales. Just out of the town of Hay on Mothers Day one of the buses ran off the Sturt Highway, resulting in the deaths of the Adelaide bus driverJohn Mackenzie and two students Tracy Blum and Ann Lloyd both aged 15 years. With so many people injured much of the town of Hay was mobilized to help. Parts of the school including the Administration area, Staffroom and Geographe Education Support Centre were vandalised and then set alight in September 2009 causing an estimated $150,000 in damage. A longstanding competitor in the High School Country Week tournament the school won the champion school award in 1986 and 1996. Enrolments at the school have declined over the past five years with 980 students enrolled in 2007, 880 in 2008, 806 in 2009, 699 in 2010, 585 in 2011 and 562 in 2012. Raelene Harris was the principal from before 2009 to 2011 when she left for long service leave for 2012 and was replaced with Terry Sanbrook. Soon after in 2014 Dainon Couzic replaced him and went on to be principal. In 2015, the school introduced Year 7 students into the high school.
