From the Acting Principal

The scriptural context for our 2020-2024 Strategic Vision calls us to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with God (Micah 6:8).

This can be a gentle guide to live a good life, but in actual fact it is a serious challenge for us to examine our everyday lives, and importantly, our choices and to be attentive to the impact we have on others. It is easy to think generally about our day and judge it a good day or a bad day, but how often do we actually take time to reflect on the individual interactions and encounters?

I recently told a story to our students that I heard in a speech by author David Foster Wallace:

Two young fish are swimming along, and they encounter an old man fish swimming the other way. He says to them, “Morning boys! How’s the water?”. The two young fish swim on and then one turns to the other and says,  “What’s water?”.

The point of this story, although I’m sure you can interpret it yourself, is that we can become so familiar with our environment that we cease to notice it. It is a call for us to take more time in our day to really see the people we interact with, notice the dynamics and be more vigilant to the waves we create as we move through our day. And then, take charge of ourselves, exercise our self-control and be more careful of our language, our non-verbal communication and our choices.

A key strategic action underway at the moment is a review and refresh of our approaches to the support of our boys to develop positive behaviour, and how we respond when their behaviour does not meet our expectations. Thank you to the many of you who have responded to our request for feedback. The messages from you and the boys are being heard and we are in the process of weighing these, along with staff voice and research around boys’ psychology and best-practice to produce a new approach.

We aim to launch this in a trial phase for Term 4 this year. During this phase we will test and refine the strategy through inquiry and evidence gathering with a view to full implementation for the start of the 2022 school year. 

We look forward to continuing to work with you in the formation and development of our boys.

Senior Years Launch 

This will be an exciting evening as we launch our building and educational plans for Year 11 and 12 whilst also articulating the Year 9-12 pathway for your son. Please make every effort to attend with your son. All details are contained in the flyer below: