Weeks like the one just gone don’t come along all that often. Sure, our school has an extremely full calendar pretty much right throughout the year, but the convergence of Warrnambool Wellbeing Week, National Science Week, winter sport finals, hosting a UN conference and the Presentation Balls has made this past week pretty special.

I want to start by acknowledging the hard work our science faculty puts in each week to give our students a greater understanding of the world and the universe that we live in. National Science week is an opportunity to celebrate the wide range of scientific endeavours that students can get involved in at Warrnambool College and beyond. With energy and enthusiasm our science staff have put together lunch time science-based activities for students to engage in – it’s been fantastic to see and hear the positivity emerging from these science rooms this week. We have one Science Nobel Prize winner already in the history of our school. Perhaps a future winner walks our corridors at the moment.

Warrnambool Wellbeing week has been 12 months in the planning and it has been a pleasure to join in with various sessions as the week has gone on.

Our senior students have heard from the ‘Rites of Passage Institute’ and the significance of moving from adolescence to adulthood. It has been challenging to think through how we might, as a Warrnambool community, begin to recognise the changes in our young people as they become adults and change our mindsets and relationships to support our students to adopt the responsibilities and privileges of adulthood. The main facilitator of this program is coincidentally living in Warrnambool for the next 4 months so I am hopeful that with his ongoing support we can take the messages from this week and form explicit Rites of Passage structures within our school into the future.

Our middle years students have heard from Jason Ball, an LGBTI+ and mental health advocate that has established Pride matches across the country in AFL football. Jason spoke about his trials and challenges as he grew up ‘in the closet’ in regional Victoria. Our acceptance and sense of inclusion of the LGBTI+ community has grown significantly in the past few years, but there is much still to be done. While Jason was here we conducted a Pride Football and Netball match and raised a Pride Flag that will remain permanently flying at Warrnambool College as a symbol of our commitment to inclusion for all students in our care. It is significant that both of these events were first suggested by the students during Jason’s visit in 2016.

And our junior students have heard from the ‘Project Rockit’ team which focused on how we positively navigate the online world and all the challenges that this can bring. This is of course a vital skill for our students to develop – the internet will be part of their learning, social and working lives and so we need to provide them with various tools to use it successfully and respectfully.

Tonight and Saturday night we will celebrate a Rite of Passage for many of our year 11 students – the Presentation Ball. It’s always a wonderful occasion that brings together students, parents, siblings, grandparents, friends and school staff to recognise in our young people another step towards adulthood. In an era of digital, online, virtual reality, it’s also significant to step back in time a little and enjoy the student’s newfound ballroom dancing skills.

In the midst of all this busyness, I hope that you have a chance to sit down with your child and ask them about their various wellbeing, science and dancing experiences this week. If you get the cliched ‘nothing’ type response, keep persisting – I know so many of our students have thoughts buzzing around their minds that they’d love to reflect upon at home.

Kind Regards,

Dave Clift

Principal

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