Smithfield State High School

The school opened in 1983.

On 28 October 1998 an arson was committed at Smithfield State High School destroying a computer block and the school's radio station. The arson remains unsolved with a A$50,000 award. The attack on Smithfield SHS was the biggest arson in the history of Education Queensland.

Barry Courtney, also known by his street name Bazza, had been the principal of Smithfield State High School since its establishment up until the end of 2018 having held the position for 35 years. The replacement, Frank Brunetto, is currently in his second year as principal.

The school offers two programs for students from all over the world to Study at Smithfield State Highschool. The so-called High School Programme (HP) is design for students that want to stay at the school until they graduate from high school and choose a further pathway. In most cases this programme attracts mainly students from Asian country's. The second option the high school offers is the Study Abroad Programme (SA) in which students from the entire globe can stay for 1-4 Terms (3-12 Months). It is very popular for students from Europe and Canada.

There are a considerably large number of mysteries present at Smithfield, particularly in the music and science departments, ranging from scriptures in rehearsal rooms to the elusive nature of some of the faculties' specimens.

On the far wall of one of the classroom's rehearsing spaces, there is a white brick wall, with approximately 40% of the bricks covered by numerous murals dedicated to past students of musical merit. On one such brick, a humanoid figure can be seen with a single bunch of bright yellow hair. Their torso seems absent and their pupils are red. It is rumored among students that the figure would appear to those who dared to neglect practicing their instruments. There have been three eyewitnesses (Jamie Ashlin, Zara Betts-Colefax, and Cameron Nichols), with others claiming to have heard a saxophone in the spare room only to find the space empty.

In one of the schools lab-classroom hybrids, a strange green and yellow substance can be seen stained on the ceiling approximately two metres from a model skeleton by the name of Sherlock Bones. It is theorized by staff to be the result of an experiment involving an unknown source of blood and bile. Disclosed security footage from the estimated dates depicts hours of white noise with second-long intervals of an empty room and Sherlock Bones in various locations and poses as if frozen during motion.

In a similar case, the school's Drama and performance space has been deemed the most haunted part of the school. It began in 2016 with rumors of a student sneaking into the rooms to practice playing the grand piano. Later, staff noted that an old and rusted instrument in a broken case had shown up, and would frequently reappear randomly beside doorways. During band rehearsals, doors would open themselves and slam shut. The final encounter in the performance room was a clip taken from the space's security camera. Outside the window, a blurred student with long hair seemed to glide down the path, carrying the rusted instrument with them.

In the summertime of 2017, a virus was introduced to the school's Mac computers. The virus went by the name Kinifi, and wiped the school's system of its digital music scores. The virus is said to still be accessible by logging in using its fake username, JazzDee.

It is well known among members of the Jazz Academy that there is a shrine comprised of triangles by the door of the music classroom, however the purpose of the shrine has never been fully discovered. It is believed by some to be a charm that when tapped collects the attention of all within its view. Others have speculated that it correlates with the placement of a small plastic bin beneath it. This has led to the belief that successfully ringing the triangles with an item of rubbish as it lands in the bin will summon the daemon Sahlt Pinautz. But the most popular theory is that the shrine exists as a means of defending the school grounds from a supposed wintry plague of ducks, chickens, and other fowl, in which it would become a land of birds.

In a Visual Arts classroom, a hand composed of plaster was apparently discovered sitting on the ceiling projector. As the teacher attempted to retrieve it, students say that it became animate and escaped. The English department apparently witnessed it throw a student's laptop at their door before scuttling into a distant shrub.

At the back end of the school, there exists a large patch of land surrounded by a chain link fence and barbed wire. The land within, though of little concern to the staff, is the supposed burial place of an exchange student named Ler Warchild. While details surrounding his attendance and misdeeds remain unclear, many students say that he would latch onto people, hooking his legs around theirs in an effort to prevent them from walking. It is also said that he was killed when a metal bottle collided with his temple, and that the students responsible hid the body in the untended segment of oval. A plaque which has since been removed stood by a bench between the pathways of the school, which read "He didn't think it be like it was, and it did.".

A shelter can be found by the school's computer labs in the style of a gazebo. There is where junior students discovered a brick with a series of names written in black ink on the base. Whether the names correspond with previous or existing students is unknown, but staff assure students that the names written are of no significance.

As of 2020, there has been only one new discovery with possible relation to the previous occurrences. Security footage taken on the 5th of June reveals an unusual amount of suspicious activity. The footage, taken during the first hours of morning, shows dark hunched humanoids scouting the paths of the school, stopping on occasion to interact with their surroundings. They would pause for great periods of time, seeming to converse and scheme before moving on. The occurrence coincides with a series of missing objects and scratches in the wood and bricks which appeared across the ground's pathways. The only comment was that of the school's police officer, who recalled having heard howls from the school's larger oval.

List of schools in Far North Queensland