William Duncan State School (WDSS) is a state school located Gold Coast

Gold Coast, Queensland

Gold Coast is a coastal city of Australia located in South East Queensland, 94km south of the state capital Brisbane. With a population approximately 540,000 in 2010, it is the second most populous city in the state, the sixth most populous city in the country, and also the most populous...

, Queensland

Queensland

Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...

, Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

. The school was opened in 1987 with just 186 students enrolled, which has now grown to approximately 800 in present day.

History

With a large increase in population of the Nerang area in the 1980s, the Nerang State School, Nerang's only primary school at the time, was nearing capacity. The Queensland Department of Education decided to open the William Duncan State School in Nerang in 1987. The William Duncan State School was named after William Duncan, was one of the first white men to set foot in the area of Nerang in 1842.