Helping show the awesome stuff happening at James Cook High School

James Cook High School has so many amazing students and some really fantastic staff. There are a lot of great things happening there, despite being in a very challenging community, and we want to help the school continue to get better and better in its image in the Manurewa community.

Emma Diack is a part time teacher, youth worker and highly skilled photographer. She loves the community of Manurewa and is especially passionate about James Cook High School. Emma (also a parent of a Year 9 student at JC), has committed to volunteering her time regularly to use her skills as a photographer for James Cook High School. Her goal through photography is to help students to feel a greater sense of pride in themselves and their school. She also wants to show the local community that JC is a place they can be proud of and want to be a part of.

Emma has been keen on photography for 30 years, and has got more serious about it in the last 3 years. Emma won a Canon competition 3 years ago which meant she was given a professional grade camera (5D Mark III). She has been supported by Canon with training and has studied photography by distance through SIT. She is most passionate about helping people who can not normally afford professional photography to have access to great photos. As well as being committed to James Cook, she also takes photos for Rosehill (Special needs) School and Leabank Primary School.

She has a facebook page called ‘Reminisce’ where you can find out more about her photography goals and philosophy at www.facebook.com/suchbeautifulhumans

In order for Emma to take the best photos of JC students participating in sport, the Betta-Life Trust would like to help her get a new telephoto lens. If she had the money, she would buy one herself in a heartbeat but sadly the lens is out of her reach financially.

We would love to make it easier for her to get some up close action shots by fundraising to buy a lens perfect for shooting sports.

Canon currently has an EF100-400 selling at a special price of $2699 (normally $3,899). We have asked Canon to put a hold on the lens for a few days. This would be the perfect lens to enable Emma to take great sporting shots easily.

Being able to take great sports photos which JC can share with the local community will encourage more young people to be inspired by their peers to get involved in sport.