Message from the Principal  

Practices of High Performing Schools

On Saturday the Sydney Morning Herald (1) reported on high-performing schools. They highlighted the features demonstrated in common and the measures used to make that judgement. Some of the schools quoted were Primary only, but the features mentioned were consistent across the age range.

What interested me as a Principal of a P–12 school is how closely these aligned with our school and the various intent behind our Strategic Plan. 

Whilst I know that we are not perfect, I was pleased to note that many of the characteristics mentioned in the report, featured below, are aspects of our school that are evident or that we are working hard to achieve as part of our planning. It is a reality that all schools, no matter how good or not, are and should be committed to continuous improvement and growth. The features of high performing schools included:

Data-informed practice

Data-informed practices were embedded in the cultures of ambassador schools. Teachers used their knowledge of students’ prior achievement and needs to provide appropriately challenging work. Calrossy is doing a lot of work in this area, to track and follow student growth using qualitative and quantitative information on student achievement.

Explicit teaching

Teachers ensured students were clear about what they were learning in each lesson and how they would know they had achieved that learning. Much of our professional learning as teachers is centred on this, including informal and formal feedback.

High expectations

The expectation that every student could and would achieve was conveyed through appropriately challenging work and systematic encouragement and support for students and their families. The culture of a school is important, focusing on learning. 2023 has seen a reemphasis on this. The confidence of students as learners is vital.

Instructional support and leadership

Differentiated instruction was used to ensure that students were appropriately challenged and supported to learn. Leaders were focused on the school’s core business – student learning – and ensured that the routines and structures were focused on supporting teaching and learning. Meeting the needs of all learners has been part of our staff training.

Classroom management

The routines of explicit teaching contributed to orderly classroom environments. There was a relentless focus on maintaining the conditions in which learning could occur. Whilst this is always a challenge, we are relentless in wanting to establish consistent and positive classroom routines to support learning.

Whole school vision/approaches

Leaders had a clear vision for their school based on shared values. Effective practices were instituted consistently and coherently. Parents and staff are committed to ‘Excellence in a Christian environment’. Our vision is to work together to consistently support student progress.

Positive teacher/student relationships

Interactions between teachers and students, and principals and students, were consistently positive. Students appeared to enjoy talking with their teachers, and principals interacted with students during the day. Student voice and engagement is an important aspect of ‘Growing our People.’ We are a strongly relational school.

Focus on student wellbeing

The schools were proactive and systematic in providing support for students. The approaches adopted were based upon deep knowledge of students, their circumstances, and needs. Calrossy has deeply invested in this area and we are excited with our progress, continuing to focus on an monitor wellbeing.

Teacher and student agency

Trust and respect underpinned relationships in the schools. In the context of explicit teaching, students had choices about the degree of challenge with which they engaged. Empowering learners is critical and we are wanting to grow in this area, planning to support engagement, to grow the critical relationship between students and teacherss.

Growth orientation

Classrooms were focused on learning rather than competition and performance. Students could challenge themselves and learn from failures as well as success. Our new reporting system in Secondary is designed to support growth and provide feed-forward, to assist every learner to improve and grow. This is a school-wide project we are pursuing.

The article was stimulating but also provided a helpful measure and context through which to evaluate our school and learning at Calrossy. In many ways it reinforced to me that we are heading in the right direction and need to be relentless to ‘grow our people’ and ‘learn in partnership’, seeking to provide wonderful outcomes for our students in our school environment.

1. https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/ten-secrets-of-success-across-high-performing-nsw-schools-20231114-p5ejrt.html

Stand Tall Event for Secondary Students

Thankyou to the Calrossy P & F for supporting our Secondary students to attend this wonderful event at the TREC last Friday. Over 4000 students around the North-West were part of the experience, involving an array of inspirational speakers and musicians, many of whom told stories of encouragement and overcoming adversity and struggle. The event takes place annually in Sydney each year but was brought to the Tamworth region for the second time, as part of a commitment to the wellbeing of regional and rural students. The attendees heard from experiences of a range of people, from Drug dealers to cancer patients, who have each been challenged by adversity and hardship in their lives, but learned to get through them to flourish and prosper.

Several of the speakers stood out and I encourage parents to ask their teenagers to retell the messages or inspiration, courage and hope that they heard. Amongst many, the story that impacted most on me was that of Danny and Leila Abdullah, who lost three of their children in a tragic accident, hit by a drunk driver on a suburban street several years ago. The powerful part of their story was their public display of forgiveness of the driver (who ended up in prison), despite his culpability in the loss of their young children. I found it hard to imagine forgiving that way, should someone have killed one or more of my own children. However, they explained their response, based on what they wanted to demonstrate for the good of their existing children and for their own recovery, also being driven by personal faith. 

We learned that they have formed the I4give movement, promoting the concept of being ‘forgivers’. They have a special day on February 1st, the anniversary of the sad incident. It is hard to put their story into words but it reminds me in a school context how courageous it is to be sorry to others when make mistakes and asking for forgiveness is part of the healing process. Forgiving others was part of the Abdullah’s message. It reminded me of the relevance of the Christmas story in the Bible, that God sent Jesus as a baby to grow to adulthood, so that all have access to his forgiveness, given that we all stuff up and need to say sorry. 

There were many such positive stories as part of Stand Tall and I trust that the inspiring stories will make a difference to our students, as we learn to live together in community.

Calrossy School Uniforms

The New

The end of this year marks the conclusion of the two-year transition of the new school uniform. With the exception of Year 12 students, all Calrossy year groups will be wearing the new uniform in 2024. 

Given that some of our community currently wear existing items of apparel with the old Calrossy Crest (PE shirt, blazers) I have agreed provide an additional year of ‘grace’ in the wearing of these items, up until the end of 2024. This applies to internal wearing of items. Where students are representing the school externally, we require them to display the new school crest, that has been in use an applied since 2020.

The Old

Our School student leaders have been working on the concept of using charitable organisations in donating our (shortly to be redundant) old uniforms, to be used overseas. Noone Wearhouse have already donated their excess stock and we will shortly notify students and parents as to how to direct the ‘old’ uniforms to make a difference to others. Please keep your ‘old uniforms’ and bundle them, so that we can collect them at school at the end of this year and early in 2024. We will provide more information as to the destination as part of the publicity campaign around the old uniforms. 

David Smith

Principal - Calrossy Anglican School