Deputy Principal's Report

The Houses

As we celebrate our 40th birthday we have had the opportunity to reflect upon the significance of our House system and how we may be able to continue to build House spirit across the school. The development of House spirit is viewed as an important contributor to students feeling connected to their school and to peers within and across year levels – both of which enhance wellbeing. 

The tradition of the House system in schools originates from traditional boarding schools in the United Kingdom where houses were used to help organise boarders. Most Commonwealth countries have since adopted them in schools for both pastoral care or activity programs.

At Oakleigh Grammar, our House program has traditionally included the annual House Athletics, Cross Country and Swimming events, as well as opportunities to ‘earn’ House points through different activities in classrooms. Over the past 18 months we have introduced House Arts, House Debating (MS and SS) and looked to link some of our charity events to a House e.g. Fraser (blue) on Jeans for Genes Day. We hope to continue to build on our inter House activities with new competitions next year. 

We look forward to growing House spirit through a number of new initiatives and activities in the coming year. We are grateful to our Parents Association who have supported us with these endeavours by funding two new perpetual trophies – for the overall winning House each year, scoreboards for our new cafeteria wall, and new rectangular banners and tear drop banners. 

One of the most significant competitions this year has been the design of our new House logos which had over 200 entries from Years 3 to 9. The creativity and imagination of our student designs were very impressive and our graphic designer, Maribel Arcilla, set about incorporating various elements from as many students as possible. Student advocacy was used throughout all the drafting stages and this culminated in the final vote which saw a distinct majority deciding the final designs. I am pleased to showcase these designs.

In recent assemblies we acknowledged the following students.

Special Commendations on their efforts with the House Logo Competition

- Nathanael Anastasiou Year 9 (Fraser)

- Saverio Arcuri Year 9 (Bradman)

- Tziovannis Konstantinidis Year 9 (Fraser)

- Athena Dimopoulos Year 6 (Fraser)

- Kyana Minien Year 5 (Fraser)

Congratulations on their Significant Contributions to the Final Designs

- Mattea Georges Year 10 (Fraser)

- Joseph Kontos Year 9 (Fraser)

- Olivia Frank Year 8 (Rose)

- Steve Sotiriou Year 6 (Bradman)

- Mikaela Thomaidis Year 6 (Rose)

- Larissa Christodoulou Year 4 (Bradman)

- Xavier Rajah Year 4 (Bradman)

Peter Dickinson

Deputy Principal – Student Wellbeing and Operations