Principals Report

Welcome back to school! Term 1 has started very well with a range of activities and events keeping us all engaged with school and learning. From my perspective as the principal of THS, it has been very pleasing to see how well our new students in Year 7 have already adapted to the Thornbury way of doing school - our unique culture of kindness, respect and passion for learning. As these students come from so many different primary schools, they bring different perspectives and expectations, and this all helps to strengthen our existing culture here at THS. All the staff members at THS are committed to supporting all students to achieve excellence in different ways during the six years they spend with us here at school. The Year 7 camp at Lake Dewar Lodge will give our Year 7 students further opportunities to build strong, positive connections with each other and with our teachers. We all look forward to getting to know our Year 7 students better over the course of this term. 

Meanwhile, the feedback from our staff about our Year 12 students has been equally positive, as these students have embraced the challenges and opportunities of their last year of secondary schooling with enthusiasm and dedication. As part of the PROSPER program for senior students, Mr Alessio Conte and Mr Tom Ding last week ran a powerful session for the Year 12 cohort on the importance of developing a growth mindset for treating mistakes as opportunities to learn and grow. In that session, I shared with students an example of how my Korean language teacher gave me regular feedback on the many, many mistakes I made in my writing of essays in Korean, and how each of those mistakes helped me learn and improve my skills. We want our lessons at THS to be challenging and supportive, so that students can learn and grow in a high-expectation, high-support environment in which they use feedback from their teachers to continue improving. 

On a visit to THS last week by the Federal Minister of Education, Mr Jason Clare, together with local Member of Parliament, Ms Ged Kearney, both the minister and Ms Kearney praised the culture at our school, recognising not only the wonderful facilities and resources available here to students, but also the strong and positive culture of academic learning. I was also very pleased to receive very positive feedback from prospective parents and families on a recent school tour in relation to our visible culture of high expectations at THS, and the very impressive way in which our students who assisted with the tour spoke about their experiences at THS. 

At the moment, I’m reading the novel Imperium, by the British author Robert Harris; it’s the first of three novels he has written about Cicero, famous orator and politician in Ancient Rome. For anyone interested in Rome and its history, or anyone just looking for a very entertaining novel to read, this novel is highly recommended. Our THS Library also has two other novels by Robert Harris, well worth seeking out. Of course, students in Year 7-9 at THS have regular English classes scheduled in our Library for our Wide Reading program as well as conferencing with their English teachers. This is an important part of our work in promoting a life-long love of reading for all our students. 

Enjoy the rest of Term 1 and the warm and sunny weather of Melbourne in March.

Lars 

Principal