Assistant Principals' Report

We kicked off Term 3 with focus on Careers and Pathways across the College, this focus is very important for our Year 7-11 students as it provides an opportunity for conversations around students short- and long-term goals. All students are participating in the subject selection process and our students were able to engage with Universities, TAFE’s and professionals who have shared their journey. Our Course Counselling sessions for Year 9’s & 10’s was a fantastic opportunity for families to engage in the conversation around what course selection is appropriate for their child and the aspirations they have. We are very impressed in the way our students have invested time into their career pathway.

Our 2026 production Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was a smash hit and gave students across the whole school a chance to collaborate and perform together, developing their confidence and teamwork skills. Their ability to immerse themselves in the characters and stories and bring to life this wonderful tale, we are so grateful to all the staff who supported the students to engage in this amazing event, led by director, Amanda Egglestone and supported by Wendy Howes, Nick Dean and Lucinda Dance, lastly congratulations to all in involved in this outstanding showcase.

Attendance

We are implementing a range of processes to ensure that students and families are supported by the school to maximise learning growth. Attendance is a part of this important work. 

If your child has been away for more than five days, you should expect contact from the respective Year Level Team, regarding supports and interventions as required. Attendance is linked to key educational and life outcomes, and we wish to partner with all families to support each child’s attendance. We also know that students are healthy and happier when they have the routine of school. Our Wellbeing Team is extensive and here to support students and families that need it to keep attendance percentages positive.

90% attendance is required for students to achieve a satisfactory result in all units and subjects across Year 10 to 12. The 90% attendance standard will continue to be reinforced throughout 2026 and into 2027. If your child is absent from school for an assessment, a medical certificate is required. Please note that attendance below 90% without medical documentation in 2026 may impact a student’s subject selection options across the College.

We all want our students to get a great education, and the building blocks for a great education begin with students coming to school every day. Students develop good habits by going to school every day – habits that are necessary to succeed after school, whether in the workplace or in further study.

Missing school can have a big impact on students academically and socially. It can affect their test results, it can affect their relationships with other students, and lead to social isolation.

There is no safe number of days for missing school – each day a student misses puts them behind and can affect their educational outcomes.

Each missed day is associated with falling behind in subject topics and assessment tasks, and lead to fewer subject choices and may impact on achievement in years 11 and 12 and post-school pathways.

It’s never too late to improve attendance. Even in the middle years, when school can seem the most challenging for students and when attendance rates can be at their lowest, going to school more often can make a big difference. Everyday counts.

Senior School students must also remember how vital it is to not miss school days. We have a 90% attendance requirement that exists to support students to meet requirements of the courses being undertaken. It is nearly impossible to complete all aspects of outcomes and receive an S, when you miss more than 90% of classes. Absences during a SAC require a medical certificate. We understand that gaining access to a GP can be very difficult at the last minute, so please keep in mind that medical certificates can be attained from most pharmacies.

Teaching and Learning

Our teachers and educational support staff continue to reflect on how our practices align with the science of learning and its impact on the learning process, with our learning focused on three key areas of ‘cognitive architecture’:

Attention: Calm, orderly environments reduce competing demands and help students focus. 

Working Memory: Explicit instruction, careful sequencing and scaffolds manage limited capacity.

Long-term Memory: Retrieval and review strengthen knowledge so it can be used again.

This term, our Learning Area teams have continued focused on the routines and practices which support a calm, orderly environment, such as the implementation of Seating Plans to reduce decision-making and maximise learning time, as well as the consistent implementation of Entry Routines to ensure a regulated and systematic beginning to every lesson. Teachers are also establishing more explicit signals for gaining student attention that cue students in to the learning and explain what focus and attention looks like.

In addition, our Curriculum Day focused on the task of prioritising and sequencing knowledge to support the management of student’s cognitive load and an explicit teaching approach, in line with the Victorian Teaching and Learning Model.

Our Maths and Science teams engaged with external presenters from the Department of Educations Victorian Lesson Plans team and from Think Forward, another organisation developing sequenced curriculum to support explicit teaching. The Australian Education

Research Organisation (AERO) describes explicit teaching like this:

“Teachers directly explain to students how to complete a task, why the task is important, and how the task relates to and extends their previous knowledge. Demonstrations of how to perform tasks or solve problems are provided, often using worked examples. Regular checks for understanding are undertaken to allow teachers to identify and address misconceptions and support students’ learning progress.”

Our Arts and Technologies and Health and Physical Education teams prioritised learning about a knowledge-rich curriculum and specifically the use of procedural knowledge to support the explicit teaching of skills in their domain in order to ensure specific knowledge is built for students across their journey through school.

In the Humanities and English teams, there was a focus on how a guaranteed curriculum can be presented through the use of shared lesson plans that embody explicit teaching and retrieval practices. Teams reflected on existing curriculum and looked for opportunities to refine their lesson plans to include elements like high participation from students through universal Checks for Understanding.

All teams will continue this work throughout the year by looking at the first key stage in the Department’s model for explicit teaching, Focus the Learning, which explores the use of Learning Objectives and Success Criteria as well as the activation of prior knowledge or learners to support connections with new learning and promote retention of knowledge.

In this way, we work to achieve equity and excellence in every classroom for all of our students, and support them to develop a strong foundation of knowledge and skills across English, Mathematics, Science, Humanities, Health and Physical Education, Languages, and The Arts and Technologies. This foundation will enable students to think critically and creatively, communicate effectively, solve problems, and continue learning beyond school.

Child Safe Standards

Doncaster Secondary College Child Safe Standards Policy supports to create and maintain a child safe organisation and protect students from all forms of abuse. As a Victorian school we continue to build and our existing child safe practices with the aim to strengthen our culture of child safety and protect children and young people from abuse.

The Child Safe Standards include requirements to keep children, young people and students safe, including:

• involvement of families and students in child safety
• schools’ focus on safety for Aboriginal students
• better management of child abuse risks in online environments
• governance, systems and processes for keeping students safe.

We provide multiple opportunities across the year to engage our School Council and staff with training and the opportunity to share practices that maintain the Child Safe Standards. This year we have identified through avenues of feedback that we need to increase our students to the exposure of the Child Safe Standards language and resources available. We encourage families who are keen to understand more about our practices to review the Child Safe Standards powerpoint that describes each standard and a summary of some of our practices.

If you would like to read more about Child safe standards you can access our policy on the school website or visit the Department of Education’s Policy page Child Safe Standards: Policy | education.vic.gov.au

Senior School Priorities

As our year 12 students move into their final months, DSC has arranged for trial exams for all year 12 subjects. Some of these exams will be assessed by a VCAA examiner. These experiences and the feedback students receive is essential for preparing them for the final exams, but also to help them understand what they need to be focusing on during their private study time and their final study weeks in term 4. It is important to remember that the term 3 holidays are not traditional holidays for our year 12 VCE students. They should be revising and engaging in practice exams to feel and be as prepared as possible.

Senior School and classroom teachers are also supporting students to be as prepared as possible by running Masterclasses for many subjects. These are additional opportunities for students to gain support, ask questions and prepare for the final examination period. Students should refer to the timetable shared by the Senior School or pop into the Senior School to ask directly about when and where these Masterclasses are taking place.

Additionally, we have employed several Academic Advisors whose role is to work in the classroom and individually with high performing students to help maximise their results. These advisors are three ex-students, all 90+ ATAR performing students, who are wanting to give back to the DSC community.

Cheers from the Assistant Principal Team,

Wes, Elisha, Kristin, and Scarlett