“It shows me that anything can happen when you put your mind to it,” said Towers.
Canterbury Girls’ head of senior school Amanda Jackson said she knew Rosé when she was attending the school.
“I remember when Rosé was in year 10, she came to see me and told me she was going to Korea to pursue a career in singing,” Jackson said.
“I remember being surprised about that news, and I wished her well at the time. Now we are so proud of what she has achieved.”
Principal Mary Cannon said the school was happy Rosé had been so successful. “It is always pleasing to see former students achieve what they want to achieve,” she said.
Year 12 music captain Sophia Hamilton said it was inspiring to know that such determination in pursuing music could “take you so far”.
Rosé’s solo pivot has already spawned a chart-topping smash with her Bruno Mars collaboration, APT.
The pop star’s time at the school is a drawcard for new students, too. Acting principal Georgina Padula said Rosé’s success had created quite a buzz among parents and students.
“Even on school tours, last week we got asked – even by younger students – is it true this is the school Rosé came to?”
Kew East Primary School principal Matt O’Hern said that while he wasn’t at the school when Rosé was there, the pupils were “pretty impressed”.
“I mean we’re obviously rapt that a past student has achieved such an amazing and significant award within the music industry,” O’Hern said.
“You can definitely see a number of the students are really inspired by the feats that she’s achieved.
“I think having that connection to someone, you can see that it’s possible, even for someone that’s at a primary school, and at Kew East primary school you can obviously make it on the global stage,” he said.
Rosé was born in New Zealand but moved to Australia with her family when she was seven. Within two months of passing her audition, the then-16-year-old flew to Seoul to train at one of Korea’s big music companies, YG Entertainment.
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“In Australia, I didn’t think that there was much of a chance for me to become a singer – especially to become a K-pop star … I was living so far from the country that it never really occurred to me as a possibility,” Park told this masthead in 2017.
She spent four years training and ended up at the top of iTunes charts in 18 countries with one of the best-selling groups of all time, K-pop band Blackpink.
In 2021, she premiered her solo single, On the Ground, and has amassed millions of fans worldwide. She also became a fashion ambassador for Saint Laurent, Tiffany&Co, Rimowa and Puma.
When she’s back in Melbourne, Rosé says she does “the whole nostalgic thing”.
She drives past her old house in Bulleen, her old school, sometimes she drops in and says “hi” to her favourite school teachers, she told Nova FM in 2024.
“I didn’t really have friends around me who became singers or anything. It’s just like normal, I went to school and I really didn’t think of it as a possibility,” she said.
“I always liked music, but [it] was never my dream to become a singer, because I just didn’t think it was possible and so it kind of all happened one day.”
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