UniSC Moreton Bay Archives - North Lakes Today

Petrie Campus Scholarship Program Reaches Milestone Supporting Nearly 100 Undergraduates

Twenty-three students scattered across the bustling North Lakes, Petrie, Mango Hill and Kallangur corridor are suddenly finding room to breathe as fresh financial backing targets the escalating costs of modern higher education.

Strengthening the Local Pipeline

Why should a bright academic future depend entirely on the state of a bank account? Local leaders refuse to let household budgets dictate who gets to succeed. Operating out of the Petrie campus, the annual City of Moreton Bay Scholarship Program has steadily built a reliable net for local learners since 2020.

Ninety-one students have now navigated their university years with this backing, transforming raw potential into professional capability right where they grew up.

Adapting to Economic Realities

Bursaries jumped from $2,000 to $2,500 this year, responding directly to the pinch of inflation. Administrators also introduced the programme’s inaugural Indigenous Study Support Bursary, widening the gates for regional participation. Beyond these sixteen flexible cash grants sit seven major undergraduate scholarships, each worth $8,000 annually for the entire duration of a degree.

Could a few thousand dollars really mean the difference between dropping out and earning a diploma? For many young adults juggling rent and textbooks, the answer is an absolute yes.

Fueling Tomorrow’s Economy

Petrie is expanding at breakneck speed. Where will the region find the engineers, teachers, and innovators it needs tomorrow? The answer is sitting in today’s lecture halls. By removing financial barriers, the collaborative initiative ensures homegrown talent stays put rather than drifting away to bigger cities.

Graduates step straight from campus into local enterprises, feeding their newly minted expertise back into the neighbourhoods that supported them from the start.

Updated 2-September-2026

Inside the Plans for Petrie’s New $60-Million TAFE

Architect's perspective. Subject to change. Photo Credit: Dept of Housing and Public Works

Trade workshops, an industrial simulation tower and virtual-reality training spaces are among the features planned for Petrie’s new $60-million TAFE, with the development application providing the clearest look yet at what is proposed for the Moreton Bay Central site.

The four-storey building would accommodate up to 450 students in about 5,700sqm of floor space, with training focused heavily on construction and allied trades. Plans show practical training areas on the lower levels and classrooms and specialist facilities above, including spaces for carpentry, electrical and plumbing training.

The proposed campus would be built at Moreton Bay Central, near UniSC Moreton Bay and Petrie railway station.

Funding has been committed and procurement is under way, but the project remains at the planning and tender stage. The lodgement of a development application does not mean development approval has been granted, and construction has not been confirmed as having started.

Trade Workshops Anchor the Ground Floor

Much of the hands-on training would take place at ground level, where the plans provide workshops, training areas and storage as well as a food and drink outlet.

Construction, engineering and electrotechnology have been identified as key training areas for the Petrie campus, while the funded project also includes an Advanced Manufacturing Hub. Among the more distinctive features shown in the plans is an industrial simulation tower extending through the building.

Upper levels would contain classrooms, seminar rooms, staff and student services, amenities and a student kitchen, along with specialist teaching spaces. A VR/XR hub is also included, bringing virtual and extended-reality technology into the training mix.

It is a different layout from the sprawling workshops often associated with trade training. At Petrie, practical areas, classrooms and specialist facilities would be stacked across four levels.

Room for 450 Students

The proposed TAFE has been designed for up to 450 students, with planning material indicating normal weekday operating hours of 7am to 5pm and occasional evening classes potentially continuing until 9pm.

Plans show 67 standard car bays, two accessible spaces and four motorcycle spaces, as well as parking for 29 bicycles. Provision has also been identified for another 38 car spaces if required.

The campus would sit close to Petrie railway station, giving students travelling from North Lakes and other communities along the Redcliffe Peninsula line a direct rail connection to the precinct. Wider planning for Moreton Bay Central also provides for pedestrian links between the station, education area and surrounding development.

$60 Million Across Several Years

The $60 million attached to the project is government funding to construct the Moreton Bay TAFE Centre of Excellence, rather than the value of an awarded building contract.

The original funding program provided $60 million over three years, with $6.6 million allocated to commence delivery in 2025–26. Procurement has since progressed, with four preferred contractors invited in June to tender for the first stage of the Petrie and Caloundra TAFE projects.

A builder had not been announced by 19 August, when the Department of Housing and Public Works was still listing the head contractor for the Petrie project as “yet to be appointed”.

The Government has previously forecast construction starting in 2026 and completion in 2028, subject to construction market conditions and material supply. Those dates remain the project timetable; the planning material does not establish that building work has begun.

TAFE Joins Petrie’s Education Precinct

The new campus is planned within the former Petrie paper mill precinct, where UniSC opened its Moreton Bay campus in 2020.

Moreton Bay Central has continued to develop around the university, with education, employment, recreation and other uses planned across the site. The TAFE would add a substantial vocational-training presence, particularly in construction, engineering, electrotechnology and advanced manufacturing.

For Petrie, the development application puts considerably more detail around what the new campus could look like on the ground. Subject to the remaining planning and procurement steps, workshops, classrooms, simulation facilities and digital training spaces would all be brought together in a four-storey building within walking distance of the railway station.

Published 1-September-2026

Old Petrie Town Revival Mirrors Petrie’s Changing Identity

Photo Credit: Peter Akers/Google Maps

For years, Old Petrie Town stood as a reminder of the suburb Petrie used to be — practical, familiar and shaped by its industrial past. Now, as restoration works move ahead across the historic village, the site is becoming part of a much bigger story unfolding north of Brisbane, where Petrie has steadily shifted from a commuter suburb into one of Moreton Bay’s fastest-changing education and lifestyle precincts.

A Suburb Once Defined by the Paper Mill

Long before the arrival of university students and new commercial developments, Petrie was closely tied to the Australian Paper Mill, which operated beside the North Pine River for decades. The mill shaped the local economy and identity until its closure in 2011 left behind a massive industrial site near Petrie railway station.

What followed was one of the largest redevelopment projects in the region.

The Queensland Government later declared the area a Priority Development Area, paving the way for what is now known as Moreton Bay Central. The project spans hundreds of hectares and includes public spaces, commercial land, future housing and the growing UniSC Moreton Bay campus.

This period marked the first major shift in how Petrie was being viewed.

Moreton Bay Central
Photo Credit: EDQ QLD

UniSC Changed More Than the Skyline

When the University of the Sunshine Coast opened its Moreton Bay campus in 2020, the suburb began attracting a different mix of people. Students, researchers, hospitality businesses and new residents started moving through an area once known mainly for train commuters and passing traffic.

The campus has continued expanding, with three major buildings added in 2024, including health, engineering and research facilities.

That growth has flowed into surrounding suburbs including Kallangur, Lawnton and North Lakes, where increased demand for housing and local businesses has followed the area’s population growth.

New student accommodation proposals and upgrades around the lake precinct have added to the sense that Petrie is no longer developing around a single project, but through several layers of change happening at once.

Old Petrie Town Finds a New Place in the Story

Against that backdrop, Old Petrie Town has taken on fresh importance.

City of Moreton Bay has committed millions of dollars towards restoration and maintenance works across the heritage village, including upgrades to ageing buildings, infrastructure repairs and improvements to public areas. The council has also flagged plans to refurbish the Heritage Hotel and Function Centre following the retirement of its long-term leaseholder.

The village has remained a regular stop for markets, weddings, school excursions and community events over the years, even as the surrounding suburb changed around it.

Rather than removing the area’s older identity, the current works aim to keep one of Petrie’s best-known landmarks active while newer developments continue reshaping the district.

Council statements linked the project to preserving the site’s historical value while improving the visitor experience and supporting future tourism activity.

Growth Around Petrie Starts Reaching Further North

The changes taking place in Petrie are also being felt across the northern corridor, particularly in North Lakes, where population growth and transport links have increasingly tied the suburbs together.

Petrie railway station remains a key connection point for workers and students travelling between Brisbane and Moreton Bay, while nearby road upgrades and commercial investment have continued drawing attention to the area.

The transformation has not arrived in the same way as masterplanned suburbs like North Lakes, which expanded rapidly over a shorter period. Petrie’s shift has happened gradually through redevelopment, education investment, public infrastructure and community projects spread over several years.

That slower pace has made the changes less dramatic day-to-day, but more noticeable over time.

A Different Future Taking Shape

Old Petrie Town still looks much the same in many places, with heritage buildings, market stalls and timber shopfronts remaining central to the site’s character. But around it, the suburb has entered a very different chapter from the one many long-term residents remember.

Between the university expansion, redevelopment of the former mill land and continued investment in community spaces, Petrie has become one of the region’s most closely watched growth areas.

The work now happening at Old Petrie Town reflects that broader shift — not replacing the suburb’s past, but finding a place for it inside a rapidly changing part of Moreton Bay.

Published 20-May-2026

Haley Cobb Heads to National Final with Focus on Cancer Prevention and Mental Health

Haley Cobb/Facebook

Haley Cobb has spent five years turning a love of pageantry into something much larger than a crown, and this month the 28-year-old Narangba resident steps onto the national stage as one of eight finalists in the Ms Galaxy Australia division of the 2026 Australia Galaxy Pageants National Final.

The Crowning Gala takes place on Saturday 2 May at Bankstown Sports Club in Sydney, marking the pageant system’s 15th anniversary. But for Haley, the competition itself is only part of what drives her. Since entering her first pageant in 2021, she has raised almost $15,000 for various causes, earned the Miss Australia International and Miss Charity Australia titles, and built a community presence in Moreton Bay that stretches from school classrooms to retirement villages to clean-up days along the coast.

“I fell in love with pageantry,” said Haley, who graduated from UniSC Moreton Bay at Petrie. The campus at Petrie, approximately 30 kilometres north of Brisbane, was the first full-service university campus ever built in the Moreton Bay region and the place where Haley’s identity as both a student and a community advocate began to take shape. She now holds a Masters in teaching and works as a financial controller.

A Platform That Actually Does Something

Haley’s pageant platform is cancer prevention, and she has developed her own approach to communicating it. She visits schools and distributes health and wellness colouring-in books for children, accompanied by information flyers designed to help parents understand the message behind the activities. The approach is deliberately accessible: complex health conversations translated into something a child can engage with and take home.

Haley Cobb uses pageantry as her platform to spread awareness — Photo Credit: Haley Cobb/Facebook

“Pageant is about getting individuals out and about in the community, volunteering and fundraising and making sure the next generation of leaders is out there advocating for change,” Haley said. “We have our own platform, mine is cancer prevention. I do things like going to schools and helping educate children about being preventative in a kid-friendly way.”

Beyond cancer prevention, her diary reads like a map of Moreton Bay’s community calendar. In a single five-day stretch recently, she helped at a Share the Dignity collection in Petrie, delivered a school speech, attended a hospital Giving Day, joined a Tour de Cure lunch for cancer research, participated in a Conservation Australia Clean Up Day, and helped restore houses with Habitat for Humanity. She has also helped with gift wrapping, marshalled fun runs and spoken in retirement villages.

“I find my way into every community and charity group!” she said.

Why Mental Health Is Personal

This year’s Australia Galaxy Pageants competition requires every finalist to raise $2,000 for batyr, the national youth preventative mental health charity. Batyr is a youth-led mental health organisation pioneering preventative approaches through peer-to-peer education and lived experience storytelling, creating safe, stigma-free spaces where young people feel empowered to prioritise their mental health before challenges escalate.

For Haley, the connection is personal. She moved out of the family farm at 17, began university, and navigated those years with the support batyr provides. “I grew up with mental health issues. Batyr guided me,” she said. “It has young adults, those your own age, talking to you, rather than people like your mum or dad. It focuses on young adults or those who have been through similar situations, helping those from teenagers to university students make their way through mental health.”

The experience has shaped not just what she advocates for, but how she does it. Knowing firsthand what it feels like to arrive somewhere unfamiliar and uncertain has made her a more grounded and empathetic voice in the Moreton Bay communities she serves.

The Community Behind Haley’s Journey

Haley’s connection to the region is not incidental. She credits the Moreton Bay community with shaping who she has become, and that sense of belonging is what makes representing it on a national stage feel meaningful rather than simply competitive.

“I genuinely find the Moreton Bay community to be incredibly welcoming and supportive,” she said. “Moreton Bay has played a significant role in shaping my journey, which is why it feels especially meaningful to be representing and fundraising within the region.”

The 2026 Australia Galaxy Pageants National Final runs from 29 April to 2 May at Bankstown Sports Club in Sydney. Tickets are available here. To support Haley’s fundraising for batyr, visit australiagalaxypageants.com or follow her journey on social media.

Published 13-April-2026

Eco Fest Returns to UniSC Moreton Bay with Dr Karl Leading the Green Conversation

Photo Credit: What's On Moreton Bay/Facebook

Petrie’s UniSC Moreton Bay campus will transform into a sustainability hub as the Moreton Bay Eco Fest returns this November, bringing families, community groups, and experts together for a day of learning and action.

A Day for the Community

The free community festival runs on Sunday, 9 November 2025, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at UniSC Moreton Bay, Petrie. It is presented by the City of Moreton Bay and delivered by Tourism and Events Moreton Bay.

The Eco Fest promotes simple, practical ways for locals to live more sustainably. Families will explore interactive activities, workshops, and live demonstrations covering topics from recycling to gardening and conservation.

The event invites everyone to take part, whether they are long-time environmental advocates or residents looking to start small changes at home.

Dr Karl Takes the Stage

Australia’s well-known science communicator Dr Karl Kruszelnicki AM will headline the main stage, offering his signature mix of curiosity and clarity to help visitors understand environmental science in everyday terms.

His appearance is arranged through Claxton Speakers International and adds a strong educational highlight to the festival.

What to Expect

Festivalgoers will find community stalls, educational booths, and local food vendors throughout the venue. The main stage will feature a full lineup of entertainment and sustainability talks announced later in the year.

Entry is free, but organisers encourage early arrival to enjoy all scheduled activities. The campus’ status as a wildlife reserve means pets are not permitted, though service animals are welcome.

Supporting Local Action

Mayor Peter Flannery said Eco Fest gives locals a chance to connect, learn, and take small steps toward positive change. Stallholder registrations close on Friday, 5 September 2025. Businesses and community groups are encouraged to showcase sustainable ideas and products.

Partners like Belgravia Leisure, Australian Trade College North Brisbane, Epic Assist, Bishopp, and Akyra Strategy & Development support the shared goal of making sustainability part of daily life.

Published 13-October-2025