School Council Update

Hi everyone,

I’m Ben Jensen, the University High School Council president. In an effort to improve communication and understanding across the school, the council has asked me to write a regular update for the school newsletter that briefly details what the council has been working on. It is hoped this will help everyone keep abreast of the work of the school and improve communication between the council and the school community.

But before I jump into the update, I thought I would briefly outline a few things about the school council. The council meets at least 8 times per year (roughly twice per term) and has a dozen members – 8 parent members, 3 teachers, 2 students, 1 community member and Ciar our school principal. The role of the council is to focus on governance; finance, strategic planning, interactions with various sub-committees, monitoring and oversight, school policies,  and dealing with various issues as they arise. A bunch of the policies and related settings contain numerous government requirements but we try and improve what we can.

Each meeting has an extensive focus on Finance as that is a key role of the school council. So we discuss and agree on budget updates and finance reports. The school is in good financial health but we monitor it closely. Each meeting we also receive reports from the School Principal, Students and from the various sub-committees such as the Building and Grounds Committee. This allows issues to be raised with the council and gives the council an opportunity to delve into the key areas of what’s going on around the school. Each meeting we also focus on 2-3 key issues as they arise.  In recent meetings, the key issues have covered things like the scholarship program, school-wide positive behaviour program, CCTV installation, the school’s annual implementation plan (the yearly plan to implement the school’s strategic objectives, and the ongoing efforts to improve school grounds and facilities. Improving the school grounds and facilities is something we are working on and know needs action. We are constrained by budget and by lengthy delays in working with the Victorian School Building Authority, but we are working on continual minor improvements and larger projects that need to be tackled. I am sure you are all aware that the school has many students and like all local schools, is dealing with problems of overcrowding. I would love to tell you there is an easy solution but to be honest, its taking a lot of our time to be able to get these things fixed.     

I will give regular updates throughout the year and hopefully they are useful. I will try and highlight the key issues and not concentrate on the hours we spend monitoring the school bank account – important work but not the greatest fun in the world 😊

Please feel free to reach out to me and/or other members of the school council. We are always keen to hear more voices and engage with the school community. I feel University High is on a really good improvement path; building on strengths and tackling areas in need of improvement.  But always work to do so please feel free to reach out if you want to discuss anything or raise any issues.

Best

Ben Jensen - University High School Council President