On its 12th anniversary trip, The Big Lift from the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) are setting themselves across regional New South Wales and Queensland on a mission to share their volunteering movement across the country.

This has been a long awaited journey, as the trip was postponed in 2020 and 2021 due to months of nationwide lockdowns.

Founded on the philosophy of 'Paying it Forward', The Big Lift is a student run, volunteer organisation that takes eighty students on a nine-day bus trip through regional Australia to complete various volunteering projects.

These include painting, gardening, cleaning and simple construction/deconstruction tasks. With a focus on community engagement, The Big Lift works closely with towns across the country to provide support where it can.

This weekend the students will be in The Big Lift bus to visit Carcoar from Saturday evening to Sunday afternoon to help various organisations around the town with general tidying, painting, garden maintenance at Carcoar Public School, Carcoar Showground and the Carcoar School of Arts.

In Millthorpe at the same time a group of the students will help various organisations around the town including Gardens at Mill Green (mulching at Convent Lane, garden maintenance, distributing soft fall) as well as working alongside Millthorpe Village Committee at the Golden Memories Museum (general cleaning and maintenance).