General News
The Victorian Student Health and Wellbeing Survey
The Victorian Student Health and Wellbeing Survey
Dear Parent/Guardian
This letter is to inform you of the About You survey, and provide you with information regarding the project.
Introduction: The About You survey assesses the health & wellbeing of young people in Victoria. It has been developed by the Department of Education and Training, and is being conducted by Colmar Brunton Research on behalf of the Department. Students in all Government schools in Years 7, 8, 10 and 11 are taking part.
The survey will be used by Nossal to monitor the health development, learning, safety and wellbeing of students. The information collected will assist in the development of programs, resources and services aimed at meeting the needs of young Victorians. The survey asks questions about young people’s thoughts and feelings regarding their school, family, friends, health, their experiences, including questions regarding alcohol, drugs and sex and about their community.
Funding Source: This project has been fully funded by the Department of Education and Training.
Timing: The survey will be conducted at Nossal with two sample groups over two sessions. The first will be for Year 10s from Garuda and Griffin Houses and will be done on Friday 6 September and the second for Year 11s from Pegasus and Phoenix Houses will be held on Friday 13 September. Both sessions will be held in the theatre.
Benefits: In our experience the majority of young people enjoy the chance to have their say. The collective information from the survey will be used for planning services for young people in Victoria.
Risks: We do not expect there to be any risk to your child if he/she does the About You survey, in fact the survey has been designed carefully to ensure the questions will not cause your son/daughter any distress. However, all students will be provided with appropriate contact information for counselling resources, in the event that they are required.
Confidentiality: Students will be provided with a unique login to complete the survey. The student login is an assigned identifier that may be used to link data for statistical and research purposes only. All responses to the survey are kept anonymous in the survey data. Personal identification data will not be recorded in the survey data. This ensures that the confidentiality of student responses is protected at all times.
The survey data will be stored on a secure server that only the staff working on the project will have access to. The information will be non-identifiable. This means that the information is anonymous and will not have identifying information (such as your child’s name or contact details). While we will collect date of birth, once this has been used to calculate your child’s age in years and months, the actual date of birth will be removed from the data.
The data will be stored on a databank within the Victorian Department of Education and Training (DET) for research and planning purposes. While information provided by participating child/ren is confidential there are some things that by law must be disclosed and some things that the law permits to be disclosed.
Reporting of Results: School level data will be reported to the principal of each school, no individual students will be identified. DET will use the data for reporting and publication purposes and to design and implement programs, projects and resources to target the needs of young Victorians. School level data will not be reported publicly.
Options for Participation: While participation is not mandatory, we would actively encourage all students to fully participate in order DET can develop plans and programs to students and we too at Nossal are better informed about the needs of our students in relation to these matters. The survey is anonymous, once your child has completed the survey we are unable to remove his or her survey from our project. Could you please give your child the enclosed Student Information Letter as the survey is voluntary and if he or she does not wish to take part, complete the details and return it to their Head of House. Students also have the option not to answer individual questions within the survey if they prefer.
Your decision whether to allow your child to take part or not, or to take part and then withdraw, will not affect your relationship with your child’s school, or the Department of Education and Training.
Consent Process: If you do not want your child to do the survey you must either:
- Return the Opt Out Refusal of Consent Form included, to your child’s school by the day before the survey, 5th September. It is important that we receive the form before visiting the school.
If we do not receive a Refusal of Consent Form from yourself before the survey date mentioned above it means that you give your consent for your child to do the About You survey. A hard copy of the survey has been given to the school. Please contact Leanne Ansalde (Director of Wellbeing) if you would like to see it before the survey is administered.
This project has been approved by Bellberry Human Research Ethics Committee, accredited by the National Health and Medical Research Council.
If you have any questions, or would like further information about the project, please call the study support line on 1800 834 196.
Yours sincerely
Naomi Downer
Account Director
Colmar Brunton Research
Gillian Davenport
Senior Project Officer, Data Collection
Performance and Evaluation Division
Department of Education Training
If you have any concerns about the project, or the way it is being conducted, and would like to speak to someone independent of the project, please contact:
Bellberry Limited
Phone 08 8361 3222
Email bellberry@bellberry.com.au
Address 129 Glen Osmond Road Eastwood South Australia 5063
Website www.bellberry.com.au
City Week Reflection
City Week at Nossal High School extends beyond an a typical tour of the sights of Melbourne City. Students are granted a booklet, basic information and a group to support one another… yet little direction. We were tasked with formulating a ‘Big Question’ about a topic of significance in city, that necessitated analysis, filming and extensive research. Succeeding a mere handful of nine-time lessons, all 208 of us were plunged into the new experience of City Week, a period of self-navigation, that placed immense trust in our cohort and opened our eyes to the culture of Melbourne’s City.
Before we started on our big adventures, each morning, we had to plan out what we hoped our day was going to look like. Whether this meant pinpointing the exact locations you planned to visit or detailing the questions you were going to ask the public, our plan had to be written with specific detail in order for the teachers to confirm it as well as us students following said plan. Throughout the week, groups collated footage from their journey as a crucial aspect of their video. Some groups were even lucky enough to escape the 'Hoddle Grid' and expand the scope of their research. However, most groups stuck to the grid and found expert interviews within to aid them with their question. We also conducted public surveys to see what Melbournians truly thought about our different topic. At the end of each day, we were required to write a reflection of our progress and experience for future use but also as a point of reference to change for the next day.
Other than extensive research and planning, we were also presented with another challenge in city week, the Great Race. Each group was assigned numerous locations where they were to take a group selfie. We were given two heated hours to run all around the city and take as many selfies as possible. Although it was quite an agonizing experience, it was by far one of the most memorable events of city week.
Throughout the week, all of us were exposed to the complex issue of homelessness through the Melbourne City Mission sessions.
Homelessness is a very common issue which too many Melbournians are facing every day. In the sessions we learnt about the various causes and effects of homelessness and the conditions which so many people put up with. We were also asked to reflect on the emotions and experiences which individuals might feel during such a difficult time. The session allowed each of us to share a better awareness about homelessness and the important role that Melbourne City Mission played in assisting each of these people.
Angel, Minsandi, Alicia & Ruth
City Week Group 22
Keep up to date with Nossal
Are you following our social media channels?
While we post notifications on Compass, send home emails and/or text messages when important events and information need to be shared with our families and community, and keep you informed about what has happened with our fortnightly newsletter, Nossal also has a number of social media pages which we use for reminders and also to share exciting news.
If you don't already follow us though one of these, please consider joining or liking our pages and get all the reminders and news we share on social media!
Follow us at:
Did you know?
Did you know our newsletter can now be translated into a number of different languages? This is a relatively new feature of the software program we use and can be turned on or off using the language selector in the lower left corner of each page.