While the legal status of the Frederick Banting Homestead has been debated and bantered around government buildings, it hasn’t stopped three local teens from pitching in to fix the deteriorating place up.

Stephanie McGunnigle, Laura Fyles and Colleen Borland started improvements on the homestead as part of a project at Banting Memorial High School last spring.

Among the list of tasks they took on are replacing the historic place signs, the painting and rebuilding of a fence and the placement of stones and a bench beside the cairn, the last of which has not yet been completed but is planned for the future.

The class - Science and Society - had students work in groups on a charity or public social style issue. While many of the students worked on global issues, the teens thought they wanted something local.

“Other people were doing things like AIDS, but we wanted to do something that really hit home,” said Fyles.

And while the issue is a local one, it is also something that hit close to the school’s heart. Banting Memorial also has an annual diabetes walk, which raises money for diabetes research, as well as honours the school’s namesake. Each spring students can be seen walking, marching, and running from the school, down Victoria Street, and up Sir Frederick Banting Road to the farm.

“We automatically thought of the Banting homestead,” said McGunnigle. “Ever since we have been at Banting, we’ve always done the diabetes walk and come here (to the farm), and it’s always been something that we have not wanted to look at — it’s falling apart. So we decided to do something about it.”

“It wasn’t something to be proud of,” added Borland.

While the girls didn’t do a lot of the physical work, they did all kinds of legwork and seem to have an uncanny ability to co-ordinate the efforts of local businesses that also want to pitch in. Countless lunch hours and after school time was spent e-mailing different people to find out what needed to be done, and how to do it. Their first point of contact was Bob Banting, one of Sir Frederick’s descendents. He pointed them in the right direction.

For starters, the girls were able to get a local sign company to replace the blue and gold sign that marks the place as a provincial landmark. The old ones had been missing for some time, perhaps knocked down or stolen by vandals looking for a unique trophy.

They also recruited materials and labour from a local hardware store. Workers from the store built the fence, with donated lumber, and then the girls painted it, with donated paint. The fence had also fallen into disrepair.

But the students didn’t stop with just the physical improvements to the property. They also launched an awareness campaign within the school.

“We set up a petition in the library as well,” said Fyles. “We knew it was a big deal, but we weren’t sure how people were going to take it.”

The petition ended up as a big success, with about 600 students - about a quarter of the student body - signing their name and adding their comments and messages of support.

“I didn’t really know how many kids our age actually cared. It’s good to see the support we have for the community,” McGunnigle said.

Two of the students have finished their time at Banting, and the other is finishing up a few more classes and working.

Of the two students who have graduated from the high school, one is working to save money for post-secondary school, and the other is at the University of Ottawa studying anthropology.

The month Borland has spent in Ottawa has given her perspective, and made her come to appreciate the things that make small-town life a little different.

“They are really important,” she said. “It is a completely different vibe you get. You don’t get that feeling (in a city). I think it is really important and keep that sort of feeling in the town.”

With the majority of their project complete, Bob Banting said the teens have already made a significant contribution to the homestead. He said not only have they made physical improvements to the property, but they have demonstrated there is a local will to care for the place.

“They’ve made a contribution to upgrading the homestead in a manner that is only consistent with the kind of thing that goes on with local support,” he said.

The three teens still hope to complete the project, with the installation of patio stones and a park bench around the cairn in the future.

E-mail reporter Kurtis Elsner at kelsner@simcoe.com