Associate Principal, Operations Report

Thank you all for your efforts and support this past term.  I suspect we have all learnt a great deal about ourselves and those to whom we are close.  I hope our students can enjoy a restful break and a chance to re-charge batteries: have a good holiday but senior students will need to plan to do some work also.

We wish Mrs Fran Agar well for her Long Service Leave for the remainder of the year and also hope that Mr Paul Carroll enjoys his period of Long Service Leave next term. We will welcome back Mrs Erin Parker to look after Mrs Agar’s areas of responsibility: Mrs Parker filled in for Ms Bolton a year or so ago and so is well attuned to the needs of Student Support in the College.  Mr  Carroll will be replaced for Term Three as a Geography teacher by a fellow named Drummond who has previously taught in this area.

To fill a vacancy at Year 7 in the History area, Mr Ough will move from 7A Maths to 7C History next semester.  In his place, Mrs Sue Shimmin, an experienced teacher of Middle Years Mathematics who has taught most recently at Launceston Grammar School, will join us to be part of the Year 7 Maths teaching team with Mr Ough and Mr Hawthorne. Mrs Shimmin has a strong background in Mathematics teaching and with technology; she comes with a very strong endorsement from her former Principal.  We look forward to welcoming her to the College.

We are hopeful that the holidays will see some updated advice and recommendations to schools for managing COVID-19.  Perhaps we will be able to re-open locker rooms, for instance, in the new term and we hope some requirements on boarding houses can be eased.  We are delighted that the South Australian border restrictions have an end-date.

Our international students who are overseas remain at the forefront of our thoughts and we admire their perseverance and efforts.  We do hope that it will be possible for them to return to Australia before too much longer has elapsed.  I encourage them to take note carefully of the advice Mrs Manifold is providing about opportunities to make special applications to tertiary institutions – some excellent fall-back options are out there.

Pleasingly, there is a good change, I think, that some sort of hockey season will occur next term.  If all falls into place, the intention is to start games on the second weekend of term. Hockey players: get your sticks out over the break and get into some sort of form!

Keep safe over the break: remember to continue practising good hand hygiene and have a relaxing time.  We all need to be raring to go when the start of term comes around.   

Neil MacLean