All students from the school were encouraged to help pick the grapes with help from Orange High School agriculture students on Monday, March 11, 2024.

Those who are studying agriculture and primary industries also returned on Tuesday to continue the harvest.

Anson Street Public School principal Melanie Meers said this year's bumper crop will be made into rose which was so popular it sold out in 2023.

"The vineyard's been going since 2006 and this is a bumper year, we are going to pick around five tonnes," Mrs Meers said.

She said in the past few years about two or three tonnes of grapes were harvested each season.

"This year the weather has been with us and it's amazing," Mrs Meers said.

"A huge amount of rose is going to be made, tempranillo rose.

"The tempranillo is a Spanish variety and it makes a nice red but we've now started moving into a rose."

She said all children from kindergarten to year 12 participated in the grape picking.

"Every child gets involved, it doesn't matter if they are in a wheelchair or not, everything is accessible for our children so they all come over," she said.

"We've got a barbecue going, one of our staff members is providing music so it's really lovely and there's parents who come so it's a really lovely day."

The grapes will be processed and made into wine by Dan Shaw from Philip Shaw Wines.

"He donates all his time," Mrs Meers said.

One of the Orange wine industry's pioneers Peter Hedberg also provides advice to the school for its vineyard management and Dan Murphy's sells the school's wine labelled Anson Farm for $15 a bottle.

"They don't take a cent," Mrs Meers said of Dan Murphy's.

All money goes back to the school to fund other projects such as an intergenerational learning project that's taking place in 2024 and a radio school where the students learn podcasting and radio work.

To make a rose from the tempranillo grapes Mrs Meers said they picked the grapes about a month earlier than usual.

"They tested the sugar levels in the grapes and it came up very quickly because of the temperature and the weather that we've been having," she said.

"Normally we would pick late March or early April and so this is quite early.

"If we leave it longer then they'd make the red tempranillo."

She said last year a group of students also went to Philip Shaw Wines for the first time to do the labelling for the wine bottles.

The grape harvest also coincided with the school's first honey harvest.

"We have a bee hive, they are called flow hives and you can lock them down so there's no possibility of, or very small possibility of any stings and stuff," Mrs Meers said.

"We've had the hive now for about a year."

Mrs Meers said the bee hives and vineyard are part of the agriculture unit and primary industries group.

"We've got Orange High School here today helping with the picking of the grapes because it's such a bumper crop so their students are doing agriculture at school and our students do ag and primary industries," she said.

The vineyard began with 1600 vines planted at Anson Street as part of the e2 collaboration between five of the region's high schools. It was also seen as a relevant choice given the Orange wine industry and the chance it gave students to develop experience in the lead up to a potential career in the industry.

Mrs Meers said at that time there was a group called e2 made up of Orange High School, Canobolas Rural Technology High School, Anson Street School, Molong Central School and Blayney High School.

"A vineyard was decided here because it was a farm and Orange High have a farm behind us and they have sheep.

"All of this when I first came nine years ago was just open paddock and sheep," she said gesturing towards an area of classrooms between Anson Street and the vineyard.

"We've now extended because the school's gone from about 80 students to 140 so we've got stage 5, years 9 and 10 over here."