Teaching & Learning

We were pleased to see that many of our students and families had the opportunity to engage in Parent Student Teacher Conferences across the week. We have received really positive feedback from staff, students and families that the PTS Conferences were a supportive tool around providing a forum for positive discussions around our student’s strengths and areas of for future growth.

Staff who were not present for PTS Conferences will contact families in Term 4 to arrange an alternative PTS Conference time or feedback method.

It has also been pleasing to see the positive impact of the minor changes and improvements we have made to our Remote Teaching and Learning Program based on the feedback from our students, staff and families. 

In our first week of implementing the new program the overall video sharing time for the week was up 4000 hours per day. There was also a significant increase in the number of student meetings organised per day (460-480 student support meetings were organised per day). There were also 3067 one-on-one calls placed between our users and 103,744 chat messages in the last 7 days.

We hope all of our students and staff have a lovely holiday break with their families and we look forward to returning in Term 4 for our final 11 weeks on our single Campuses before we move to our brand-new school as one in 2022.

Naplan

Individual student Naplan information will be mailed to families in Week 1 of Term 4.  Please contact your child’s Learning Mentor if you have any questions or queries. 

This year students in year 9 who excelled in an area of Naplan, or showed significant growth from their Year 7 results, have received a certificate of achievement as part of the Naplan package.  These will be presented to students when we return to on-site learning and this will be shared with our school community via Youtube.  

Families/Carers of students who will receive a certificate will be notified via Compass and a link to watch the Award Ceremony will also be shared.  We congratulate all of our students who will receive this wonderful acknowledgement of their learning.

McGuire Campus Update

It has been an interesting last four weeks to Term 3, with a fortnight of learning while in quarantine, and a further two weeks of Remote Learning while in Stage 4 lockdown.

For our long-suffering Year 12 students it has simply been another challenge they have been asked to overcome. This is the seventh term in a row there has been a switch to on-line learning since these young people started out on their VCE or VCAL journey. Most have now finished their courses while on-line. They should give themselves a well-deserved pat on the back.

Students in the lower levels have responded to the changes to the way Remote Learning is operating. After a couple of teething problems, they seem to be using the check-in lessons well. Thank you to those students who took the opportunity to make positive suggestions to make things better after the first couple of days.

Fingers-crossed we will be back on-site for the start of Term 4. What another term of change!

Ian Goldrick

Assistant Principal McGuire Campus

Mooroopna Campus Update

Firstly, a huge thank you again to all the parents who arrived early to collect their child/ren from the Mooroopna Campus.  Your support meant we were able to effectively isolate quickly and calmly as soon as possible to ensure the safety of our students and school community.

The students responded brilliantly – and have resumed remote learning extremely well.  We are tremendously proud of the student’s commitment to their learning and to our teachers who are providing engaging lessons for our students.  Our Learning Mentors are meeting daily with their students and are working behind the scenes to provide additional supports and care for our students.  It is terrific to see the students checking in with their Learning Mentor and attending lessons in every session of the day.  

We know that remote learning is more challenging for many students and their families, and this time around we had a new experience of isolation, on top of remote learning.  

Take care of yourselves and your family and know that we are here, as part of the community, to help out in any way we can.  As a community, we have just demonstrated our care and commitment of each other.  We are so looking forward to when we can resume on-site learning.  Information to families and students will be shared through Compass.

Stacie Lundberg

Assistant Principal Mooroopna Campus

Wanganui Campus Update

The students at the Wanganui campus are to be commended for the way in which they transitioned into remote learning at very short notice. It was also under extremely trying circumstances, with the 14-day quarantine requirement. 

As we moved out of the strict quarantine period, the college transitioned to the updated remote learning experience. This saw all of our students following their daily timetable and connecting with their teachers, just as the Year 11 and 12 students had been in previous lockdowns. It has been terrific to see the continuation of learning in a variety of formats. Class teachers have been impressed by the range of work submissions, from catchy TikTok videos showing the preparation of a meal for a foods class, to infographics in another language and other creative digital works; some of which is shared a little further on in this newsletter. 

Pleasingly, our students have been well supported by the wider community as well. An example of this was the generous support of the Goulburn Murray Local Learning and Employment Network, who provided our VCAL students with an opportunity to connect with community in an authentic manner. This allowed the students to continue to work toward components of their VCAL subjects at a time when many activities had to be cancelled due to the lockdown.

As I write this report, we have many of our Year 12’s back on site today. It has been wonderful to welcome them back to school before the holiday break, allowing them to re-connect with their peers and have face to face contact with their teachers. Of course, we are nearing the end of formal schooling for our Year 12 cohort. In the holiday period, a number of our VCE students will be attending some on-site revision classes. Some studies will also have access to online revision sessions that are being hosted by external providers. This is a wonderful opportunity for our students to supplement their understanding as they prepare for their final exams.

We are looking forward to welcoming all of our students back to on-site learning here at the Wanganui Campus. In the meantime, however, we wish all of our students a terrific holiday break. It will certainly be well deserved.

Kirsten Tozer

Assistant Principal Wanganui Campus

Megan Michalaidis

Associate Principal of Teaching & Learning