SCHOOL NEWS

2023 VICTORIAN GLOBAL YOUTH SUMMIT

On Tuesday 18 July 2023, a group of Year 9 and 10 students attended the 2023 Victorian Global Youth Summit at Melbourne University organised by TOGETHER FOR HUMANITY. 

Students from 15 participating schools of diverse cultural, ethnic and faith backgrounds focussed for a day on Diversity & Connection.

After a Welcome to Country by a Wurundjeri Elder, the keynote was delivered by Sri Lankan refugee Joseph Kolapudi who raised awareness about the stereotyping people with different backgrounds experience in Australian society. The story each person has to tell was highlighted and Joseph´s story definitely increased empathy in all present. The difficulty of feeling a sense of belonging for some in our society and to improve this situation was the focus of the day.

Following the opening keynote, students from all schools gave their presentations which they had prepared for this summit. Thank you to Ilya Zyuzin 11P (and Shauri Pedavalli 10Mfor assisting with final changes) for creating a great visual presentation demonstrating how McKinnon SC aims to create a place of belonging and how we learn, grow, have fun, and celebrate together. The video shows the diversity, acceptance and varied opportunities for students, staff and parents (present and past) to engage with each other.

It was presented on the day by Ignacy Swider-Figureoa 10OandDionne Tran 10O(as Ilya was also engaged with the German Model UN on the same day), explaining our goal for the future to further increase the cultural learning at our school.

Many issues such as stereotyping, racist language and the lack of understanding world religions and cultures were raised in presentations by other participating schools. 

After a morning tea break, schools were put together in groups and discussed the most concerning issues to create solutions and present them to a panel of political and community leaders, among them the Minister for Youth Kathleen Matthews-Ward and Nathan Lambert, Parliamentary Secretary for Multicultural Affairs. Politicians and community leaders listened attentively to the student group representatives and commented on the excellent ideas students presented. Congratulations to Maleesha Dharmadasa 9F who requested government support to create a student network that would assist in developing and sharing resources in Victoria to create a better understanding of the different cultures in our community. 

After only a short lunch, students had the opportunity to further their learning in different workshops with guest speakers from the Islamic Museum of Australia, Asia Education Foundation, ARK Centre, Peace Inc and Together for Humanity. McKinnon students split into groups and attended different workshops in the preferred area of their interest. 

In the closing remarks students were praised for their excellent and encouraging contributions in their preparations and on the day. All participants left this summit with the further goal in sight to spread this learning throughout our school. 

I would like to congratulate the following participating students for their excellent contributions to this event: Anya Aquende 10A, Abby Butterworth 9M, Maleesha Dharmadasa 9F, Obert Han 10F, Yanmeng Jia 10G, Avani Kulkarni 9C, Ava McLaughlin 9K, Ignacy Swider-Figureoa 10O, Dionne Tran 10O and Leo Yang 10Q. 

Thank you to Together For Humanity (Andrea Hogg, Education Officer at Together For Humanity and all panel participants and presenters) for a very engaging and enriching event.

Thank you also to Mr Kan who supported the participation in this event and our transport for the day. 

Andrea Fowler

German Teacher 

Global Citizenship Coordinator

YEAR 10 PORTSEA CAMP

The McKinnon Secondary College Year 10 camp was fantastic this year. We visited Portsea Camp and had an amazing time there. The youngsters had a great time participating in every activity. The Portsea camp's educators and staff were friendly and fed McKinnon students the tastiest meals ever! There were nighttime activities that we really enjoyed.  There was a Movie Night and a Trivia Night.

The dorms were great to hang out with our friends and the ocean views were lovely. We had the opportunity to visit the beach, have a stroll along the shore, and take in the fresh sea air! There were so many enjoyable things to do there for us to pass the time. I loved the Year 10 camp this year because it left everyone completely stunned. We had the loveliest memories and all of the students are extremely grateful for the chance we were given. 

Mia Le

Year 10 Student