Cecil Hills High School Newsletter

The best school in NSW

Term two begins

Autumn

Shall we all meet in the autumn?

Golden and glowing by autumn

Shall we still be best of friends?

Ahead we plow

Into the darkening night

Can't see the bow

How then to search with only starlight?

‘Autumn’ by Maury Yeston from ‘Titanic’

School Development Day

We had a very successful school development day last week.  The day focused on Strategic Direction #2 in our school plan: flexible, future-focused and innovative teaching practices.  Teachers completed a course to help students produce better written responses in the HSC and then completed modules on various topics including Moodle, differentiated learning, Focus on Reading, Google Suite software, QuickSmart, ClickView and Turnitin.  These tools are vital for our focus on 21st century learning.

Tell Them From Me

Almost every student in the school completed the ‘Tell Them From Me’ survey at the end of Term 1.  This provides us with incredibly rich data from a student’s perspective and informs our future planning.  As in previous years, there is much to celebrate when analysing this data.  When compared with the rest of NSW:

  • our students are more likely to have a positive sense of belonging (6% higher)
  • our students are more likely to have positive homework behaviours (15% higher)
  • our students are more likely to be intellectually engaged at school (10% higher)
  • our students are half as likely to miss school without a valid reason

We will run the ‘Partners in Learning’ survey for parents later in the year to give us more food for thought from the perspective of parents.

Year 12

In terms of my introductory quote, we are into ‘Autumn’ and Year 12 are now more than halfway through their HSC courses.  There are many analogies to describe the HSC.  It could be compared to a marathon.  It could also be compared to a ship going full steam ahead.  Unlike the Titanic, we want the maiden voyage that is Year 12 to be a success.  At this time of the year, Year 12 can feel a tad lost in the ‘darkening night’ but they need to focus on the feedback received following their mid-course exams.  Research continually shows that feedback is one of the best ways for students to improve (http://www.evidenceforlearning.org.au/toolkit/feedback/).  Year 12 need to be proactive in order to maximise their marks:

  • show draft work to teachers
  • complete past HSC exam questions
  • re-attempt mid-course exam questions
  • complete online multiple choice quizzes
  • write study notes and show them to teachers
  • ask lots of questions
  • seek feedback, more feedback and then even more feedback!

Deputy Principal

I am very pleased to announce that Mr Michael Lane was successful in a recent merit selection for our permanent Deputy Principal position. 

Mr Lane has worked as Head Teacher - Welfare, Head Teacher - Teaching & Learning and Head Teacher - PD/H/PE in the past and has immense knowledge of our school context.  During his 12 years at Cecil Hills High School, he has provided expert mentoring and guidance as a Year Adviser and led school planning processes, conference planning and professional learning in a number of executive positions. 

We are very excited to have Mr Lane as a permanent addition to the senior executive team and I look forward to continuing to work with him.

P&C Meetings

Our next P&C meeting will be held at 6:30pm on Monday, 4 June 2018.  There will be a repeat session at 9:30am on Thursday, 7 June 2018.

 

I look forward to continuing to work with the staff, students and parents of Cecil Hills High School, the best school in NSW.

Mark Sutton, Principal