Paluma Environmental Education Centre

Where is the Paluma Environmental Education Centre?

The Paluma Environmental Education Centre (PEEC) is nestled in the tropical rainforest village of Paluma atop the Mt Spec Range. Just 85 km north of Townsville, Paluma is the gateway to the Wet Tropics. Once called 'Cloudy Clearing', Paluma is famous for the mountain mist that rolls in over the rainforest canopy most afternoons.

Usually hard to see tropical wildlife including catbirds, other bowerbirds, water skinks and birds of paradise frequent the centre grounds. The Bandicoot Bench (nocturnal mammal observation station) is a very popular night activity with students. Mammals likely to be seen include the Wet Tropics' infamous giant white-tailed rat.

What does the Paluma Environmental Education Centre provide?

Nearly all of our learning experiences take place within the surrounding rainforests of the Mt Spec section of the Paluma Range National Park and adjacent Mt. Spec State Forest, but we do offer in-school lessons for classes taking up one of our new off-site units of work.

Paluma Environmental Education Centre offers schools:

• activities progressively updated to the Australian Curriculum syllabus documents and C2C units as released
• a residential experience easily embedded within an extended classroom unit of work
• safe and easy access to the Wet Tropics World Heritage Area rainforest within 90 minutes of Townsville
• individualised support for visiting class teachers in differentiation of their excursion program
• a variety of cross-curricula learning experiences to choose from
• support for schools in building their School Environmental Management Plans
• resourcing and in-school support in the implementation of specialised units of work eg. assessing biodiversity, water quality management.

Facilities

Facilities in Paluma include two accommodation blocks capable of housing 40 people and a dining hall with attached commercial kitchen.