Student Musings on Remote Learning

Larry the Llama by Natalie Barr

This week we found out that Natalie Barr of 7I, was the recipient of the 2020 Encouragement Award for her story Larry the Llama. Natalie will receive a certificate, gift voucher and a wonderful pack of the Young Writers’ Award titles from previous years. This is an outstanding achievement given the volume of entries from across Australia.

Maroondah Youth Award News

What a first day for the 2020 Maroondah Youth Awards! ✨

Kick back and enjoy this awesome performance by Jazzlyn Lennox to finish up our celebration of creativity 🎤 

https://www.facebook.com/maroondahyouth/videos/272116534119750/

Year 10 Creative Writing Competition

Year 10 Creative Writing and Ms King ran a week long competition for her class.

They were given a mystery prompt word every morning at 9am in MS Teams Chat and they had to write a 30 word story.

In week 4 we had a judging online lesson in Teams with guest judges Mr Morley and Ms Watson.

Please read the Finalist stories.

Ms Lara King

English & English Literature Teacher

We Miss You

“The Humanities staff at RSC have really missed their students, and have a short movie to share.

Please click on the link below.

 ‘We Miss You’: 

 https://web.microsoftstream.com/video/584503bc-6a4c-4114-b837-7f304e055b15   

Annette Niven

Humanities

VCAL hard at work with their Artwork

Enjoy the artwork from the VCAL Students

Oliver Dixon

Year 9 English Writing Task - 'Should we Return to School due to Covid-19'

A class task was to write a micro letter of approximately 200-250 words to send to your Principal about why we shouldn’t return to school this term due to COVID-19, even if the government lifts the stage 3 restrictions. 

 Note to Principal: They are aware that this is not solely your decision! 😉

Good morning Mr Phillips,

Even though the government has lifted the stage 3 restrictions in Australia because we have been constantly declining in COVID 19 cases, I believe that going back to school is not the right thing for your students and staff members.

Why should we trust the government to tell us when to go back to school when there are so many things that they refrain from telling us, the people of their own country? What if one of your students or staff caught the virus? Do you have a plan to further prevent the spread within our school? Do you realise that you’ll most likely have to shut down the school again, which leaves the students and staff stuck at home longer because of the careles rush just to get back into the swing of things?

Some members on the RSC community are at risk if they get Coronavirus, such as teachers 60 years or over as they are more likely contract the virus, and staff or students who have health problems as they may not be able to recover. Recovery for mild cases take approximately 2 weeks and is 3-6 weeks for patients with severe or critical disease. So, is going to school this urgent if it could take a month to recover in solitary isolation?

Online school has currently been working well and students are remaining well educated so I say don’t risk it for the biscuit and wait until the time is right.

Chloe Biggs 9H

Good Morning Mr Phillips,

As you may know the Government is starting to lift restrictions around Australia, which would mean a return to school for all students quite soon. I am writing to you to inform you about my concerns around this issue as I strongly believe this isn’t the right decision for our school.

We both know that when we come back to school students will engage straight into conversation and completely forget about the deadly virus that may still be around, playing sports together and sitting next to each other they will be disobeying the social distancing rules. It’s been proven that virus’ have a 60% higher chance of spreading in schools as students spend so much time with each other. Would you want our school to be in headlines about bringing back the Coronavirus?

Tim Head the chief medical officer of Australia said at the beginning of the lockdown we would be staying like this for until at least the end of June, and now we are coming back already? The Government change their mind as fast as lightning. Bringing back schools this early would be a horrific idea. We also can’t forget that 4% of Ringwood’s teaching population is over the age of 60. Tim Head stated that this was a very vulnerable age to contract the virus, so why should we be letting these staff come back to school?

 Remy Maclean

Dear Mr Phillips,

I understand that the government is deciding to lift the stage 3 restrictions, and that schools are deemed a safe place once more. But I disagree. It’s not the students we’re worried about. It’s the teachers. The teachers at the school are the most likely to suffer from the virus. The most common age group of contracting the virus is 20-40 years old. Not to mention what happens if an older person gets it. We really don’t want the staff of our school to suffer, because we decided to return to school. The students can also pass the virus on to other people as well. Do we really want the virus starting up again? It’s better to be safe than sorry.

We have 1600 people in our school, with an odd 100-150 staff. The classrooms and lockers will be perfect for spreading the virus. The staffroom, the tables everything. Schools are simply not safe to be at just yet. If we just wait until term three to be 100% sure, I believe we will be all ok.

So to beat the virus once and for all, I suggest that we wait until term 3, to return to schools.

 Antony Pankhurst 9H

Dear Mr Phillips,

Despite the Victorian government’s decision to lift the stage 3 restrictions concerning the COVID 19 pandemic, I am writing this letter in hopes of convincing you to keep our school closed. Opening the school again would cause less learning and more separation in the school.

I am aware that as a year nine student I am not as involved with the outbreak as others, yet many of the staff have worse symptoms if receiving the coronavirus. COVID-19 is mainly transmitted through droplets generated when an infected person coughs, sneezes, or speaks. Being too heavy to hang in the air, they quickly fall on floors or surfaces. You can be infected by breathing in the virus if you are within 1 metre of a person who has COVID-19, or by touching a contaminated surface and then touching your eyes, nose or mouth before washing your hands. As a principal you can only do so much, children and teacher spend 60 minutes in an enclosed classroom, which can easily transport the virus for one person to another. The carelessness of students and teachers could cost them their lives and those responsibilities of others fall into your hands.

Many hospital sites and experienced doctors have made statements saying people who are older or who have existing chronic medical conditions, such as heart disease, lung disease, diabetes, severe obesity, chronic kidney or liver disease, or who have compromised immune systems may be at higher risk of serious illness. With many students and staff being unaware what medical conditions their peers may have due to privacy reasons, they cannot stay safe around them. As the school ranges from many different ages.

I understand you are expected to follow the guidelines of the Department of Education, but think of the safety of your school. Do you really want to risk someone getting sick all because you wanted to open as soon as possible?

Payton Parker- 9H

To Mr Phillips,

I am a student in year 9 and I am concerned that you will open up our school too early, putting our students, staff and even the community at risk. Your decision affects so many vulnerable people and you need to take every precaution.

Opening schools again would be a risk to your staff and students. Many of whom go home to their families, putting them also at risk. Closing schools would allow students and teachers to self-isolate decreasing their chances of contracting the disease by 75%. This is amazing news for the school community, so why not continue what is happening when it is so beneficial?

If any one of the innocent staff and students, many of whom go home to their families, were to get the virus, it would be putting all of the community at risk. Going to school doesn’t just include exposing yourself to the students and teachers, but also on the way to and home from school students come in contact with many other people. Imagine what would happen if one of your students came in contact with someone with coronavirus on the bus or train. Would you want to be responsible for that?

As a student at the school, I know how smoothly the at home learning is going, so why stop it? We can’t let the school risk the community, so please, allow us to stay at home just a bit longer!!

Mia Weatherburn