Principal's Report

The Amazing Brentwood Students – Congratulations!!!

Last night the College held its annual Presentation Evening where a large number of students were celebrated and acknowledged for some outstanding achievements. In particular, I would like to mention our Year 12 students, who on Friday, December 14 all received their results. For our students, families, and staff, this is the culmination of a lot of dedication to their learning and hopefully provides our students with a number of options in the future. It is very important for our students that they realise that their ATAR score, whether it be higher or lower than what they were striving for, does not define who they are or what the future holds. It is the decisions and actions that they take next that counts. I hope that each student is able to find a pathway that they are passionate about and are successful in.

Some of the results for the Year 12 cohort are published below:

ATAR 95+

• Maddison Jackway
• Kevin Sein Tu
• Jack Shan
• Carrie Armstrong
• Serena Harding
• Yemin Rong
• Senodh Jayasinghe
• Owen Leigh-Lancaster
• Sujan Sellathurai
• Daniel Keramitzis
• Jessica Martin
• Nicole Flynn
• Kwan Hei Tam

ATAR 90 – 95

• Sasha Lange
• Cooper Gervasoni
• Han Huynh
• Matthew Lao
• Tsz Chan
• Geenodh Jayasinghe
• Oneli Kulatunge
• Richa Nyaupane
• Christopher Cishishian
• Duy Minh Tran
• Hana Le
• Yunyang Yan
• Angela Ngyen
• Lisa Lao
• Sin Yee Shek
• Boon Lee
• Tim Everard
• Meng How Lee
• Ram Kirubasankar
• Meg Wagner
• Sneha Roy
• Ritchie Leong
• Julian Delos Trino
• Danqing Zhu
• Hillary Tsang
• Jaxon Gervasoni
• Serena Chang
• Andy Liu
• Yu Yang Lee

Please note that all scores may not be published as students must give permission for their results to be published.

ATAR Scores:

Key points:

• 30% of students achieving results above 85. This is an excellent result. These students all achieved in the top 15% of the state.
• We also had 2 students achieve a perfect score of 50 in a subject.
• 8.2% of our students achieved a study score of 40 or more (to achieve a score of 40 students would normally be ranked in the top 9% of students in that subject).

The 2018 Australian Tertiary Admissions Rank (ATAR) is a rank, it is not a score out of 100. It shows a student's achievement in relation to other students. It is developed from an aggregate produced by adding: the scaled study score in one of English, English Language, Literature or English as an Additional Language (EAL); the next best three scaled study scores; and 10% of the fifth and sixth permissible scores. For more info visit - http://www.vtac.edu.au/

Our Dux for 2018

Congratulations to Maddison Jackway who is the Brentwood Secondary College Dux for 2018 with a brilliant ATAR of 99.75. This is an outstanding achievement and we wish her all the very best with her ambitions. We also look forward to her keeping in contact with the Brentwood Community in the future.

This edition of the newsletter also contains a list of award winners from our Presentation Evening on Wednesday night. I would like to congratulate each one of these students on their achievements and I hope that this recognition further motivates each of them to continue striving to be the best learner and person they can be in 2019.

In addition to the students who were recognised last night, all of our students have progressed and achieved in various areas of school life. I am very proud of each student’s ongoing growth and development across the school year. It is important that we all encourage the students and their families to make sure they acknowledge their achievements this year and also reflect on what goals they may have for the 2019 school year.

For each one of our students, their growth and academic improvement is a team effort. I would like to thank all of the families and friends who supported and challenged our students to be the best they can this year. Our wonderful teaching and support staff at Brentwood also contribute an enormous amount to each student. On behalf of the entire community, I would like to thank each of our teachers and support staff members for their ongoing dedication, professionalism, and support of each student in the learning and overall development. Besides the family unit, our teachers have the biggest impact on student learning at Brentwood and we value their amazing contribution.

2018 School Captains

Katelyn Connolly, Samuel Corea, Kevin Sein Tu and Meg Wagner were the 2018 School Captains. They have been outstanding role models, ambassadors and leaders in our school community. They are also amazing young men and women in their own right. At the beginning of the year they wanted to enhance school pride and leave a legacy behind for others to follow. They certainly did this and more and I am very proud of their achievements. On behalf of the school community we wish them well for their next steps in life and are grateful for their contribution to our school community.

Staff Retirements

Jenny Lamond, David Newcombe, Marie Rizzo Judy Sanguinetti and Leigh Wright will all retire in the early part of 2019 after taking leave. Each of them has made a significant contribution to our school community and the students who they have taught. We are so very grateful to have had them making a positive difference to our students at Brentwood and I wish each of them all the very best for their future endeavors.

Staff Changes for 2019

The following staff will be leaving Brentwood this year and I would like to thank them for their years of service to our community and wish them all the very best for their futures:

• David Andrews
• Zac Ansell
• Melissa Antoniuk
• Annabel Barton
• Glenn Bennett
• Aimee Blackman
• Lisa Bradley
• Monique Chisholm
• Mitchell Cohen
• Sharon Duong
• Felicity Eastwood
• Briony Heneberry
• Danielle Hradsky
• Shane Hunt
• Tim Mannix
• Sarah Sturgeon

The following staff will be taking leave in 2019. We wish them all the best for the year ahead look forward to their return:

• Tom Bond
• Carly Donohue
• Laura Durham
• Ann-Marie Mackay

The following staff have been appointed to start at Brentwood in the 2019 school year:

• Chad Abersteiner (Head of Yellow House/Maths/Science)
• Kate Bennett (Humanities)
• Heidi Cornelissen (Humanities)
• Lauren Davine (Music)
• Nicole Green (Science)
• Hillarie Haque (Maths)
• Frances Holl (German)
• Sam Hollier (English)
• Melissa Horvath (English)
• Meg Joseph (Science)
• Sophie Kimpton (English)
• Kate Markey (English)
• Kathleen Pryor (English)
• Danielle Roberts (Legal Studies/English)
• Emma Stevenson (English & Learning Specialist)
• Emily Stowell (Science)
• Naomi Walkley (Maths)
• Brendan West (English)

The following staff will be returning to Brentwood in 2019 after a period of leave this year or longer:

• Monique Burke (Health and PE)
• Kelly Hall (Maths)
• Sarah Heemskerk (Humanities)
• Yushan Wang (Japanese)

Volunteers Morning Tea

On Tuesday December 18 I had the pleasure of hosting a morning tea to thank all of our wonderful volunteers at the College. Each year the College has a number of people who generously donate their time in a variety of ways such as helping in the Library, Production, International Students, participating in camps, running a weekly breakfast and more. This community service supports our students in a variety of ways and also models a sense of citizenship for everyone. I’m sure that all our volunteers also gain a great sense of fulfillment and pride from their time at Brentwood too. If there are any other community members interesting in volunteering their time at Brentwood please contact the office.

Performing Arts Awards

The weekend of December 8 and 9 was an exciting time for our Performing Arts Team who were nominated for a large number of awards. We are very proud to report that Brentwood received the following accolades for the musical ‘In the Heights’ and the Year 12 Theatre Studies performance of ‘2012’.

Guild Awards:

• Best Direction of a Junior Production - Joel Batalha
• The Design Award for Settings - In the Heights
• Junior Male in a Supporting role - Campbell Nathan
• Junior Female in a Supporting role - Tori Hronopoulos

Lyrebird Awards:

• Best Production (In the Heights)
• Best Director - Joel Batalha (In the Heights)
• Best Musical Director - Ben Franklin (In the Heights)
• Best Lighting - Brenton Van Vliet (In the Heights)
• Best Set - (In the Heights)
• Best Supporting Actress - Tori Hronopoulos (2012 & In the Heights)

This is simply an outstanding achievement. This really is such a wonderful example of what is so great about our school. Congratulations to everyone involved!

Thank you to our wonderful staff – Going Above and Beyond in 2018!

The Brentwood staff have contributed so much to our school community in 2018 and on behalf of the school community, I would like to thank and acknowledge the wonderful work that they do both in the classroom and through their involvement in the broader school community. Over the past few weeks, I have had the pleasure of reading all of the staff reflections on their own professional growth in 2018. Staff have discussed the latest teaching strategies they have been using to give more precise and useful feedback to students, how they have engaged their students with ‘student voice feedback’ on their teaching so that they can improve their craft, how they have continued improving their skills in using ICT as an effective teaching tool to improve student engagement, collaboration, and feedback…… the list goes on and on. The notion of Brentwood being a learning community is well reflected in the staff who are such active learners themselves. This year the staff had a focus on “High Impact Teaching in a Positive Climate to achieve a Year’s Growth for all”. This mantra has been central to the professional development of the staff and I am proud of the progress made by all.

In addition to their professional growth and the positive impact it has had on student learning, our staff have contributed a significant amount of their own discretionary time to ensure that our school is a real community and provides students with growth opportunities outside the classroom. These extra-curricular programs are an essential part of what makes Brentwood such a wonderful school and help develop our students into terrific people as well as excellent learners. I would like to highlight just some of the programs and or activities that the staff at Brentwood have volunteered their time for the benefit of our students. Below is just a sample of the sorts of activities staff volunteer for that our community may not be aware of. They are also in addition to our regular school events.  

• Supervising our Art Gallery so that students can exhibit their work to an authentic audience and give students an opportunity to participate in an art installation.
• School Production – A number of staff members invested hundreds of hours outside of their work time to give our students a first class experience. This involved the direction, music, sound, lighting, building the set, managing the stage, running the canteen and generally volunteering in any way they could.
• School debating team so that 50 students are able to practice their skills and compete against other schools.
• Running weekly homework clubs for various subjects. This was a weekly activity for more than 10 teachers this year and in addition to all of the out of class support all teachers provide as part of their role!
• Organising the Year 9 City Experience program
• School Photography to capture and celebrate student/staff achievements
• Weekly Art Club – they have produced some amazing work!
• Leading the Brentwood Baristas (i.e. managing the Brentwood Coffee Cart)
• Leading the Great Victorian Bike Ride and running weekend bike rides.
• Coaching any one of the large number of sports teams. There is a large number of staff who have given up lunchtimes, before school, after school and many days ensuring our students are supported in achieving their sporting dreams at Brentwood.
• Volunteering on the 50th Celebration Committee with numerous outside of hours meetings.
• Supporting the School Choir
• Physics Club
• K-Pop Club
• Table Tennis Club
• Chess Club
• Literacy Support Club
• Japanese Club
• EAL Support
• Weights Room Supervision
• Staff Mentor
• Digital Technologies Club
• Student Leadership programs

This is without mentioning the extensive camp program that ran throughout the school year including school holidays. In 2019 our staff led the following camps:

• Year 12 Study Camp
• Year 7 Orientation Camp
• School for Student Leadership
• Performing Arts Camp
• Year 8 Roses Gap Camp
• Year 9 Tasmania Camp
• Year 11 Central Australia Camp
• Duke of Ed Camps
• German Cultural Exchange Tour
• G’Day USA
• Vic SRC Student Leadership Camp

Staff and students have also been actively preparing for the World Challenge Camp and European Battlefields tours which will take place in 2019.

This is a very long list, and it doesn’t include all of the extracurricular or other programs that staff are involved in at the school outside of the classroom. As you can see our students have a very large number of opportunities due to the fantastic staff!

Introducing the 2019 School Captains

Congratulations to Michael Alepidis, Rachelle Dixon, Jake Hume and Cindy Tran who have been appointed as school captains in 2019. This is wonderful achievement and a great honor. I have no doubt they will follow on from the 2018 captains by being strong leaders and role models in our school community.

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

Finally, on behalf of the Principal Team, I would like to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. I hope our students and staff enjoy a wonderful break and we are looking forward to seeing the students back on Wednesday, January 30.

John Ballagh, Principal