Grade 9 Proserpine High students shave heads in solidarity of friend battling brain cancer

Year 9 students surprise friend Cody Gibbs. (Supplied: Lauren Carter)

A group of North Queensland Grade 9 students have gathered on their school oval to show a close friend "he's not alone".

After receiving a devastating cancer diagnosis last week, 14-year-old Cody Gibbs went to school at Proserpine High on Monday to say goodbye to friends before he left for treatment in Brisbane. 

It was then he got another shock.

"As he walked up to [his friends] they all took their hats of and they'd all shaved their heads," his mother Donna Davis said. 

"Some of his good friends like Oxsen [Prosser] got together and had organised this as soon as they found out he was coming in [to school]."

The students enjoyed the morning with Cody, not pictured, before he leaves for treatment.  (Supplied: Lauren Carter)

Cody was diagnosed with a brain tumour in his pineal gland in 2018. 

"We've been in remission for the last two years," Ms Davis said.

"We've been down to Brisbane every three months to make sure everything's okay and this last one, unfortunately, it's returned."

The family said the gesture from Cody's friends was a beautiful example of the Whitsunday community's support. 

The community helped Cody Gibbs and some friends go skydiving over the weekend.  (Supplied: Donna Davis)

Grade 9 student Oxsen said his friends wanted to do all they could for Cody. 

"I've known Cody a long, long time, we went to primary school and we've been close ever since," Oxsen said. 

"It was so heartwarming, so wholesome. He was just breathless. It was so amazing."

Oxsen said it had been difficult for the group to come to terms with the news. 

"It's not something you see in a little suburb like Cannonvale, it's something you see in a movie," he said.

"It's really hard to take it in but we're doing our best."

This boys embraced their friend Cody Gibbs after revealing the surprise.  (Supplied: Lauren Carter)

Oxsen's mother Lauren Carter said there was a huge amount of support for Cody's family within the small community. 

"These boys are like a band of brothers. It was such a beautiful thing," she said.

Looking to the future

Ms Davis said a few days earlier, her work friends and other members of the community raised enough money to send Cody for a skydive over the Whitsundays. 

A GoFundMe page has also raised $11,000 so far. 

Ms Davis said the community's support was amazing and would help them greatly as they figure out what was to come in terms of treatment. 

"We go back on Wednesday, we still don't know what the plan is," she said.

"It allows his father to come down and help, and we've got COVID this [second] battle.

"We don't really know what we're in for."