Student Voice
Hear from our College Captains
As College Captains, we were privileged to be invited to a regional Student Forum hosted by the Department of Education and Training. Students from over 75 schools from across North-Eastern Victoria came together to share and discuss ideas that other senior leaders have implemented with their community and how they found their VCE experience throughout this unique year.
We had the opportunity to share the positives that came out of the remote learning experience as well as our concerns for the rest of the year as we head closer to the finish-line on behalf of our seniors.
We look forward to continuing to collect, share and act on feedback from our students. Please reach out if you would like to have a chat with us!
Andrew Leap and Stacie Varsamidis
College Captains
Peer Support Workshops
This year our Peer Support Program has transitioned to a peer-to-peer learning model where leaders are given the training and support to construct sessions to share with each other and facilitate with their Year 7 students. Our Peer Support Leaders developed what the program would look like by working collaboratively to plan the lesson activities as well as choosing what topics they wanted to talk about.
Whilst Peer Support is a long-standing program within the college, this is a new structure in our school that further supports student voice within the program and contributes to student engagement.
Although a strong emphasis is on transition, other areas that the leaders had a desire to discuss include study skills, respectful relationships, and fitting in & normality. The content and execution of these sessions were solely up to the Peer Support Leaders, with guidance and structure from senior students and teachers.
This gives them the opportunity to develop their critical thinking, presentation, and planning skills. All leaders are also asked to reflect on their sessions with a mindset of continual improvement throughout the year.
Andrew Leap and Ms Stav Kantzas
College Captain and Head of Grevillea House
All the Year 7s have been attending some Peer Support Sessions, held by the Year 10s, which play a large role in assisting the Year 7s in their first year of secondary school. The sessions included well-planned and enjoyable activities that everyone could get involved in.
The games included opportunities to interact with new people and get to know our Peer Support Leaders. The Year 10s also did a great job at keeping us focused on school and important things which would help us feel more comfortable. Another great thing was that we got to have a break from class, which helped us deal with any issues that had been going on. It also took our minds off the crisis that has been going on and the Year 10s especially helped us feel more comfortable. The games we participated in included a trivia Kahoot, treasure hunts, exploring the school and fun mini-games.
Through these activities, we were able to see the school from a different perspective and learn about SOC more specifically. We had seen the physical structure of the school and the different places and what classes were held there, but we had also seen the past and present of what events and which people were supporting the school.
Everything ran smoothly, and everyone was able to participate. In the end, Peer Support has helped the Year 7s and let them settle into SOC.
Kartik Pardeshi and Lauren Olver
Year 7 Students
As 2020 Peer Support Leaders we have been given many opportunities to improve our leadership skills. Part of this is being given a chance to create and plan out a session of our own, helping our group of Year 7s to smoothly transition into high school.
Together we produced an enlightening and innovative 70-minute session to teach the Year 7 students about the school’s protocols.
Our session was built around a scavenger hunt which involved students running around to various locations in the school whilst completing miscellaneous activities together.
We hoped that these activities we planned would help the Year 7s to understand the basic knowledge needed at SOC.
In the last week of Term 2, we were able to conduct our plannedsession with our group. All Year 7 students took part in the scavenger hunt in the last week. Part of our leadership training involved planning a session that all other leaders would use as well.
All Peer Support Leaders have planned a session and we will all use the sessions as part of the program we developed. Whilst some students may have found it more challenging than others, we believe that all Year 7s had a heap of fun running around the school finding clues and completing puzzles.
Year 7 students gained knowledge, reconnected with their peers and communicated amongst themselves. Overall, judging by the excitement of the students, we feel that it was a huge success.
Maple La and Annabelle Windsor
Peer Support Leaders
Our last peer support session was a workshop for all the leaders. This was an exciting workshop during the period to recap and revisit some of the positive feedback as well as develop new ways to express our gratitude of each other.
We did this through the activity where we wrote anonymous messages to each other. This was a nice ending to peer support for Term 2.
Eleni Stamatiou
Peer Support Leader
COVID-19 impact on young people interview
Recently, I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to share my thoughts and experiences with the Federal Member for Hotham, Clare O’Neil alongside a fellow constituent of the electorate. We discussed the importance of mental health services, particularly for young people throughout this time, the changes to commonwealth supported place fees for university, the importance of greater consultation with young people about the decisions government makes as well as the impacts we’ve seen on the education sector as a result of COVID-19.
I’d like to thank the Foundation for Young Australians for facilitating the meeting and Clare for taking time out of her day to listen to our thoughts.
Andrew Leap
College Captain
