Boarding

Boarding at Kinross Wolaroi is integral to the heart and healthy functioning of many of our senior school students and their families. We encourage the students in our care to be curious, open minded and keen to explore new ways of thinking in order for them to grow as both learners and individuals. Likewise, we encourage our Boarding Staff and particularly our Heads of Boarding and Head of Houses to engage in quality professional learning so we can bring back new ways of thinking into our boarding community and develop best practice models for the care of our students.

This term, boarding staff have had a wide variety of wonderful opportunities to engage in professional learning and have been exposed to some new ideas, research into the latest strategies for boarding wellbeing, and have engaged in excellent professional development encouraging our wider staff to think and reflect on the needs of the boarders in our care. 

Kate Callaghan (Head of New House), Nathan Short (Head of Weymouth House) and James Perrin (Head of Wolaroi House) travelled to Sydney last week to participate in the annual AIS Boarding Symposium: Balancing Wellbeing, Mental Health and Risk for Boarding Students and Staff at Pymble Ladies’ College in Sydney. The day was focused around a series of keynote speakers delivered by Dr Kate Hadwen, Head of Pymble Ladies’ College and Dr Jessa Rogers from Queensland University of Technology. Both women have extensive experience leading boarding communities and conducting research into the impact of boarding and boarding practices on Indigenous Boarding students in particular. The speakers were engaging, informative and inspiring in their delivery and provided opportunities for collegial discussions along with some excellent strategies to take away from the event and utilize in our practice at Kinross Wolaroi. Our staff feed back their learning to their teams upon their return to campus to ensure that the invaluable information gained through professional development is then shared with their colleagues.

All our boarding staff are committed to being life-long learners and the opportunities and exposure to professional development strengthens our boarding community. Each term, staff complete a number of ABSA courses to build their professional capacity and ensure they are keeping abreast of the latest research in boarding. This term, many of our staff have engaged in short courses focusing on issues as far reaching as boarder wellbeing, literacy strategies for improving academics in boarding, effective sleep routines in boarding and cultural awareness practices in boarding. By committing to continually improving our professional knowledge and practice, staff in boarding roles at Kinross Wolaroi are able to tailor our programs to best deliver a holistic boarding education to the many students in our care.