Principal's Report

Students, staff, award sponsors, parents, family, distinguished guests, - Welcome to the Edenhope College Awards presentation.

We’re here to acknowledge student effort over 2021. Thank you to all sponsors of student awards.

Thanks to the Leadership Team which consisted/consists of Assistant Principals Dean Greenhalgh (Term 1), and Chad Frost (Term 2 onwards), who is a great acquisition for the school. Thank you also to all of our staff for your efforts over 2021 (previous and beyond).

Members of the school council, thank you for your efforts with policy, finance & general meetings. As a committee this year we went through the tender process that saw a new 3-year cleaning contract granted. Thank you for all the prompt returns of emails during the year, when we needed approval for various submissions. I will be calling for new committee members in 2022, for parents who would like a voice within the school learning environment, please give this some thought and be ready to nominate. It’s not hard work and you’re doing it for your kids! 

Parents & Friends, it has been hard for you to get going in 2021, but your input is valued and I look forward to your growth and partnership moving forward. 

Parents & family, it’s proven that your support in your child’s education strengthens their outcomes. Whilst parent feedback in the school survey was highly supportive of the school, you have asked for more communication between teachers and parents. This is an area of focus for staff moving into 2022 and beyond.

Lastly to the students, well done you’ve made it to the end of the year. The school has focused more on student agency/voice over the last few years and will continue in this direction. Electives for Year 9 & 10 students were changed for 2022 because of student voice. Students were surveyed and their responses have helped shape the curriculum moving forward. Whole school connectedness has greatly improved for students over 2021, which was a pleasing outcome of the school survey and nearly all areas in the survey showed movement in a positive direction, judged by students.

Remote Learning has not been easy for all involved, students, parents & staff. Thank you for all efforts and patience in this area. Hopefully we are on the tail end of all COVID related disruptions.

2021 saw us lose some great staff to new chapters in their lives but it has delivered us some outstanding staff, - graduates and experienced teachers alike. Staff school survey results have moved in a positive direction and this shows with staffroom morale and I’m sure this is a key factor that has led to greater student connectedness within the school, as stated above. 

Thanks to all CRT’s, both teaching and ES staff members, who have contributed to our learning environment over 2021.

Thank you to staff who have retired, moved or are moving on from our school in 2021. We and the students have benefitted from your input over your time here.

Gloria Freeman, Julie Bubner, Ian Shaw, David Bucknell & Victoria Brennan - thank you for service at Edenhope College.

Our 2021 Annual Implementation Plan had us focusing on student wellbeing, covid academic catch up initiatives and community engagement. The catch-up initiatives have been funded into 2022 but will be accompanied with a focus on reading comprehension within all domains. Programs under this banner are the Tutoring Program/MYLNS, both numeracy and literacy-based support programs. Read Write Inc (support), was in place for F – 2 students and will be increased to F – 3 for 2022. On the wellbeing front - Respectful Relationships will continue for F – 10 students into 2022. This program looks to build student self-resilience and social awareness of others (as well as our own feelings). Our core wellbeing team of 7 staff have worked extremely well together and will look to further consolidate their student wellbeing focus. We have had limited opportunity on the community engagement front due to COVID, but are looking to continue building this area. 

To further strengthen our curriculum the college has hired a learning specialist for three days a week to work with staff curriculum development and student engagement. 

There is real positive movement going into 2022. The College has won a three-year annual $75,000 grant to run Before and After School Care. This will start in Term 1 - 2022 and will be provided by the successful 3rd party entity. Expressions of interest to use the service will go to the community over December. It helps work with the current shortfall of childcare in our local area.

Edenhope College has received funding for a wellbeing counsellor for one day a week and have matched that with our own funding, - so we will have an onsite counsellor for two days per week in 2022, as well as our self-funded chaplain Brian O’Leary.

We look forward to our staff member Edwina Price running an equestrian program here at school next year. Our students will benefit from this program. We will compete against other schools and with Eddie guiding the program we are in good hands! Edwina has coached at National level.

Edenhope College will continue to work with Balmoral and Goroke schools in our recently formed cluster – to share our ideas/strengths, looking for better outcomes for our local students.

Agriculture will be a focus through every year level and we’ll work to strengthen our curriculum in this area, Staff and parents alike are looking to build up our school farm and create opportunities for our students. 

We will be seeking more parent involvement within our learning environment, through more regular communication home to parents from homegroup and classroom teachers. We see this as the next logical step to help strengthen student outcomes at Edenhope College

As a school (2021), we’ve put a lot of effort into our learning environment (student/curriculum/wellbeing/staffing), but moving forward we need to continue to be active listeners. Getting better at this gives more people in our learning environment a voice to help consolidate us from just being ‘another’ school into being a great school. 

Thank you for your time, please sit back and enjoy our presentation.

Trevor McClure

Principal