Principals Report

Last week we held the Student Leadership Badge Ceremony. This event celebrated our student leaders and was well attended by families of students receiving their badges. 

Our School Captains for 2024 Molly Fredericks and Tyler Flavell made speeches and ‘hosted’ the event, ably supported by one of the Vice Captains, Abby Allen. The student captains worked closely with our Student Leadership coordinator Kate Willmott to plan the event. They all did a splendid job as it ran very smoothly.  

In my welcome speech I made reference to the following quote about leadership:

“the greatest leader is not necessarily the one who does the greatest things. But the one that gets people to do the greatest things” 

Our student leaders are great in themselves, but throughout the course of the year we hope they will be able to support their peers to do great things too! 

“great leadership starts with a willing heart, a positive attitude and a desire to make a difference.” 

I know from chatting to some of our student leaders and the four school captains they have these attributes and definitely want to make a positive difference to others in the school and beyond, into the community.

Within Woodmans Hill we understand the need to enhance the voice, agency and leadership of students, and we follow the Department of Education ‘Amplify’ initiative. This specifically states that: 

‘Student leadership includes listening to and being able to clarify the issues of the students they represent and advocating on their behalf. Student leaders have an increased sense of responsibility to help others and to model leadership principles and values. Student leadership is not confined to a small group of individuals, as leadership potential is inherent within all learners. Trust, autonomy and relationships are enhanced through the development of leadership qualities.’

Our role is to therefore provide a range of leadership opportunities for students to lead themselves, their learning, make positive choices including those about their own wellbeing. At Woodmans Hill we acknowledge that leadership can be learned and our job as educators is to support young people to do so. The student Attitude to School Survey question on ‘Student voice and agency’ is an ideal tool for us to track progress in this area. However, the interactions with teachers and the ownership of student’s learning and wellbeing are important indicators of our success too. By empowering students, we can enhance student engagement and enrich their participation in classrooms, the school and hopefully the wider community. 

In order to expand the leadership development of our students the broader student leaders group attend regular meetings at lunchtime. In addition, we have secured the services of an external provider to deliver on-site and excursion-based experiences for this group of students. The aim of this is to build their capacity to be leaders and I am really looking forward to seeing how their leadership skills and confidence grows as a result. We hope it will help them to achieve their aim of making a difference! 

Finally, I would like to use this space to thank you all for your continued support of our work at Woodmans Hill. We always aim to do our best for all our young people. This is so much easier when working collaboratively with families. 

I extend my very best wishes to you, your family and friends over the Easter period. (I urge moderation in the consumption of chocolate eggs though!) Please have a safe and pleasant term break. We have a student free day on Monday 15th April, so term 2 commences for students on Tuesday 16th April. 

Take care, 

Graham Broadbent

Principal.