![The Flinders Christian Community College, Tyabb, sheep show team, with some of their Corriedale ewes and lambs at the Victorian Sheep Show in Ballarat on Sunday. Picture by Barry Murphy The Flinders Christian Community College, Tyabb, sheep show team, with some of their Corriedale ewes and lambs at the Victorian Sheep Show in Ballarat on Sunday. Picture by Barry Murphy](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/229623862/7c2b3dce-677f-479d-b36e-2f3084c87696.JPG/r34_731_3519_2495_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
The Flinders Christian Community College sheep show team dazzled judges with their stock and handling skills at Victorian Sheep Show in Ballarat on Sunday.
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Led by program manager Tess Runting, Tyabb, 35 students from the age of seven to 17, exhibited sheep in several classes.
Many of the kids were from non-farming backgrounds.
The team took home the most successful Corriedale exhibitor ribbon and star Jasmine Daniel (12), Tyabb, was judged as the best sheep handler, 12 years old and under.
Judge Tess Ellis, Sunbury, said Ms Daniel was "just onto it the whole time".
"I walked around and she kept her eyes on me the whole time and she was constantly checking the position of her ram," she said.
"She kept good control of his head and it was more just her attention to detail."
Ms Runting said the sheep show team took on board students from all years but the majority joined in year seven.
"They come in and they discover the sheep show team and they join if they're interested in animals," she said.
"The kids just love coming to the shows and meeting different people.
"They form a real connection with all of the sheep we have at school so they love bringing them along and showing them off."
The school kept 35 sheep and bred 10-15 lambs each year. The best of these were kept for breeding and showing and the remainder were sold on.
Ms Runting's team had just started to take on board some primary students, some of whom were present in Ballarat.
She said agriculture was "one of the most important things for us to be teaching young people about because everyone needs to eat and wear clothes".
"It's pretty important that we teach children about that and where their food comes from," she said.
"It's amazing that we get to do that at school and that they get to do it as an extracurricular program.
"Our kids desperately want to be there and even at weekends, school holidays, kids want to come to school."
![Jasmine Daniel (12), Tyabb, with the Horned Dorset ram she exhibited and judge Tess Ellis, Sunbury, at the Victorian Sheep Show in Ballarat on Sunday. Picture by Barry Murphy Jasmine Daniel (12), Tyabb, with the Horned Dorset ram she exhibited and judge Tess Ellis, Sunbury, at the Victorian Sheep Show in Ballarat on Sunday. Picture by Barry Murphy](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/229623862/41767698-1db5-4fda-a78f-c1789d2da1eb.JPG/r0_207_3872_2384_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
Ms Runting said the sheep show team program was a "real draw card" to get the children to come to school.
"It's so important that we bring more young people into the industry and this is the perfect way to do it," she said.
The show team had a prep day on Friday where they crutched and trimmed their stock.
"They do it all themselves," Ms Runting said.
"Sometimes the sheep don't look perfect when they come out but we actually like that because then it's a teaching moment for them and they can get feedback.
"The school sheep might not always look perfect when they come out but the students are learning a lot."
She said it built the kid's confidence.
"We have a lot of young people that come into the program that don't fit in necessarily to mainstream music or sport," she said.
"You don't have to have any previous skills to be able to do this because we teach everything that they need to know.
"They gain so much confidence, partly because they're working with animals and animals just have that natural ability to make people feel calmer and more confident."
The young show team would travel to Bendigo for the Australian Sheep and Wool Show next month and the program would run a camp for the kids.
"It's the highlight of the year for them," Ms Runting said.
Ms Ellis said encouraging young people such as the Flinders group was "very important".
"I didn't come from a farming background," she said.
"This Ballarat show was my second show ever when I did it with my school's program.
"I love seeing kids come up in the same sort of program that I did."
Ms Daniel said she wanted to be a farmer when she grows up and she loved working with the sheep.