Principal Report
Welcome
Welcome back to all the students, staff and families in the Koonung College community.
In the past fortnight I've discovered what a fantastic college community Koonung Secondary College is. Last week I was able to meet with the Teaching and Support staff of the College and it was fantastic to meet the students this week as they returned for the 2023 academic college year. The genuine warmth and openness of the welcomes I have received from staff, students and parents clearly demonstrate to me that Koonung Secondary College is a friendly, vibrant, dynamic and exceptional centre of learning and achievement. It is a college that supports and promotes students and staff to always be learning and striving to achieve excellence. I am privileged to be in my position and inspired to ensure that Koonung Secondary College remains a college of choice that focuses on ensuring students are successful- academically, socially and emotionally.
My key belief as a teacher and Principal is that every student can be successful and achieve excellence through hard work. This belief is why I was drawn to Koonung Secondary College. It is the same belief that is captured in the college motto of ‘Excellence through Endeavour’. I'm keen to continue that excellent work and keep building on our college motto of excellence through endeavour.
I have been a Principal since 2018 at Reservoir High School but was drawn to Koonung for two main reasons- Firstly, Koonung’s approach to excellence and ensuring that each and every student develops not only as a learner, but also as a whole person. I have been drawn to the vision of the college that students are supported to develop their academic potential while developing their sense of citizenship, and self-awareness- as this vision aligns very much with my belief in the purpose of education. So now my challenge as a Principal is to ensure that every student in the Koonung community, regardless of cultural, linguistic or religious background, or previous educational experience, regardless of lifestyle choices or who they choose to be is supported in developing and improving in the core skills of Literacy, Numeracy, Critical and Creative thinking, Collaboration and Resilience as learners in our college. With these key skills, they will then be exposed to a wide curriculum that will be designed to promote student talents, passions and interests, and then as a college we will work with students and families to turn those passions and interests into pathways and ultimately, those pathways into successful careers and futures.
Secondly I was drawn to Koonung as I live locally in the area. I have three children who attend a local primary school and will be future students at Koonung. My family and I are very much part of the wider community, and the opportunity to lead a college in my own community was one that I could not pass up. As both a Principal, and father of three very different children, I am committed to ensuring that every student who is part of the Koonung College community is supported academically, socially, emotionally and with pathway choices in order to turn their passions, talents and interests into successful pathways, careers and futures.
I look forward to meeting and working with students and families to ensure that every student at Koonung Secondary College is successful and achieves excellence through endeavour.
I would like to thank Marianne Lee, past principal of Koonung for her exceptional work in leading the Koonung Secondary College community and developing and building the college to be a fantastic place to both work and learn. Also I would like to acknowledge Sandra Greenhill for her work as Acting Principal in 2022. I look forward to working with the Executive team of Mary Eade, Stace Kerr, Conor Sheehan and Sandra Greenhill as we work with positivity, creativity and resilience to build the Koonung learning community.
2022 VCE Achievement
2022 was again another fantastic year for student achievement at the VCE level. The College Dux achieved an ATAR of 99.55 and two students achieved perfect study scores of 50. Congratulations to every student in the graduating class of 2022 for their exceptional results, with 9.3% of students achieving an ATAR higher than 95, and 18.6% of students higher than 90. The Median study score for 2022 was 31.
Not only was the achievement in the VCE exceptional, but the pathway outcomes of the graduating students are also very impressive. Firstly, congratulations to Rui Ann Lim who secured direct entry into Medicine at Monash University- an extremely rare and prestigious outcome. It is particularly pleasing to see a wide range of tertiary pathways for Koonung students, including Biomedicine, Science, Engineering, Commerce, Law, Design, Media, Arts, Nursing, Midwifery and Physiotherapy. This highlights that the college provides a wide range of subject choice in the Middle and Senior school and supports students to achieve at their best in areas they enjoy and are interested in.
Congratulations to their students on their achievement and pathways and we look forward to hearing from them in the future through our alumni program.
Staffing Update- New and returning staff
We have been privileged to have excellent staff join or re-join our college community for the 2023 academic year. Over the next few newsletters, we will provide short introductions to our new staff. This begins in this newsletter on the New Staff page. New and returning staff for 2023 are-
Chevalle Alderton- Head Start Learning Leader for VCE Vocational Major
Janna Becker- Literacy Tutor
Shao Chen- Accounting and Business Management teacher
Shan Chong- Admin Staff/Accounts Receivable
Ella Cogger- Student Counsellor/Well-being
Luke Day Smith- Learning Specialist for Literacy and English leader
Nadege Debax- French teacher
Allan Edgell- Senior School Administrator
Shaimaa Farag- Maths/Science teacher
Magdi Ghobrial- Science Teacher
Peter Giapantzakis- Maths Teacher and Year 11 Leader
Andy Guo- Maths Teacher
Chris Henson- Arts Teacher
Emily Lewis- Learning Specialist Numeracy and Maths Leader
Nikita Natsis- Maths teacher
Kirsten Paton- Science Teacher
Rekha Phulara- Science teacher
Brendan Pinto- Maths teacher
Margarita Plarinos- Numeracy Tutor
Emily Ridgwell- Mental Health Practitioner
Madeline Rigoni- French teacher
Tiffany Trinh- English teacher
Maggie Vriends- English teacher
Warren Yuen- Legal Studies teacher
Andrew McNeil
Principal