PRINCIPAL'S REPORT
Dear Parents and Carers,
There has been lots happening at the College over recent weeks despite the end of Term 3 being a typically tiring time for both students and teachers. I’ve been extremely impressed to witness all the activities in classrooms and beyond and would like to acknowledge the dedication and commitment of our staff and students at this time of year.
Year 12 Final Weeks
This is a crucial time for Year 12 students as they complete final assessment tasks. For Vocational Major students this includes ensuring they have completed the tasks required for them to be assessed as ‘competent’ across a range of skills. For VCE students these final weeks include their last SACs for Unit 4 subjects and finalising products and artworks for Technology and Art subjects.
For our VCE students, this holiday period is a vital time to begin focusing on exam preparation. This preparation should including mapping out an exam study schedule for the coming weeks, preparing study notes and resources, accessing past VCE exams and examiners reports, attending revision lectures and completing practice exams.
As a father of a VCE student myself this year, I can empathise with parents who may also be feeling a little bit of extra pressure over the coming weeks with regard to supporting our children as they prepare for important final assessments. If you have any concerns whatsoever with regard to your child’s preparation for exams or progress on assessment tasks, I would encourage you to reach out and speak with your child’s teacher at any time.
Subject Selection and Pathways
Planning for 2024 is well underway with student subject choices completed and timetabling commenced. Ensuring all our students can access the learning pathway of their choice, while maintaining learning programs that balance an academically rigorous core curriculum with specialist learning opportunities is definitely a logistical challenge.
Andrew Brown, Assistant Principal for College Operations, is leading the logistical elements of this work with Lara Campbell, Assistant Principal for Teaching & Learning and Rachel Barney, Assistant Principal for Wellbeing & Engagement, ensuring that we focus on providing a well balanced academic program that will allow all students to learn, grow and succeed.
We are happy to share that 2024 will see the College maintain breadth and depth of subject offerings, flexible pathway opportunities and exciting co-curricular programs. We are also exploring ways to expand student learning supports, enhance physical learning environments and ensure our teachers have the highest levels of expertise in the subjects they are teaching.
It’s a very exciting time for the College with some changes on the way and we look forward to sharing more information with students and families over the coming months.
Vaping
Sadly, vaping has become an increasing challenge in secondary schools across the country and SCSC has not been immune to this problem. The College takes the health, safety and wellbeing of our students extremely seriously and over the last few weeks we have made a concerted effort to address this problem.
Vapes (also known as e-cigarettes) and vaping are banned in all Victorian schools. It is illegal for anyone to obtain, posses or use nicotine e-cigarettes (vapes), cartridges containing nicotine or nicotine liquids for use in a vaporiser without a prescription. Further, it is illegal to sell e-cigarette to, or buy e-cigarettes for any person under the age of 18 years whether or not the e-cigarette contains nicotine.
With this in mind, members of the SCSC leadership team have spent the last few weeks tackling this problem with a renewed focus and a new process. The results have been immediate and effective. Here is the data on the reduction of vape sensor alerts at SCSC in recent weeks:
I’d like to reassure all parents that we will do everything we can to educate our young people on the health issues related to vaping, the legalities of this behaviour and their need to respect and comply with laws, school policies and Department of Education guidelines.
V-Fest
Congratulations to our VCE Vocational Major team as well as our amazing VET Music crew for the inaugural ‘V-Fest’, an evening where style met sustainability with some great food and music in the mix too! Our VM students worked for weeks leading up to the event restoring old furniture, gathering vintage fashions, potting plants and re-designing skateboards with new artwork. There were no fixed prices and the theme of the night was ‘donate what you can’. The team raised over $640 with all funds going to Feed Me Surf Coast.
I’ve no doubt V-Fest will become a regular event on the school calendar so if you missed out this year, be sure to look out for it in 2024!
Kokoda Trek
Last week two SCSC students, Colin and Anthea, embarked on the journey of a lifetime when they joined a team of young people from around the Barwon area for the Geelong Youth Engagement Kokoda Trek 2023. At the time of writing, Colin and Anthea are trekking through the jungle in the highlands of Papua New Guinea, carrying their own equipment and dealing with all the challenges you’d expect on such an arduous yet exciting experience.
We are very much looking forward to having Colin and Anthea share their stories and photos with us when they return.
Work Experience & Snow Camp This Week
This week we have two activities happening that see a select group of students being active in the community. We have approximately 20 Year 10 students undertaking a week of work experience and approximately 24 students from Years 9, 10 and 11 participating in our annual snow camp. I am sure that all these students will have a great week in these two extra-curricular activities.
For all other students in Year 9, 10 and 11 is it business as usual this week. All classes are running and attendance is expected from all students.
This is our last newsletter for Term 3. I’d like to thank all parents, carers, student and teachers for the valuable contribution you’ve made to a great term at SCSC.
Take care,
Shane Elevato
Acting Principal