and school song. Students were assigned to keep different areas of the school tidy and litter-free, and students monitored their own absences in class and had to explain those absences to the school assembly each week. The school made an Indigenous studies program integral to the curriculum in all years. Steps also included engaging with the community to help build a vision for the school, and engaging local indigenous people to work at the school. Classes and students with the lowest number of absences were rewarded, with encouragements such as free ice blocks from the tuck shop, or trips to McDonald's, or occasionally trips to Melbourne. Sarra's own report on his time at Cherbourg showed improvements were found in staff, student and community feelings of satisfaction with the school as well as a considerable decrease in the number of students identified as requiring additional support in reading and writing. Performance in Literacy and Numeracy overall showed slight improvement. Enrolments in the school increased from 144 in 1998 to 265 in 2002 as parents became more satisfied with the educational standards at the school. In reflecting on the positive changes in the school, Sarra said, "the most important things I did was believe in the people already at Cherbourg, as well as the new teaching team that was established, and be prepared to value and act upon what they had to say.". In 2008, Tom Calma, the then Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner and National Race Discrimination Commissioner, said in a speech delivered to the Victorian Association of State Secondary Principals in Melbourne, In 2004 Education Queensland investigated several complaints against Sarra and upheld four complaints made by students where he was "found to have grabbed, held and shouted" at boys under his care. Sarra explained that he chose to confront bad behaviour rather than suspending children where they would miss school for six weeks." Ken Smith of Education Queensland stated, "Chris has recognised that in those instances he may have overstepped the mark, and has given a commitment that he won't do that in future." When Sarra left as principal in 2005, the principal who replaced him did not share his vision, and Sarra spent a frustrating seven years on the sidelines, watching the school gradually slide with falling attendance and student results. However, in 2011 he was welcomed back to the school by the new principal