Cranbourne Campus News

Start as you would like to finish, and finish as you would like to start.

In years to come I wonder whether we look back on 2023 as the year we banned mobile phones on campus. Of course it would be sad if that was the case considering all the amazing things that have happened this year, however when that announcement was made at the end of 2022 and reiterated in this publication at the start of 2023, there was a sense of panic amongst students. The panic and disbelief resembled something out of the  story of ducky lucky, that ‘the sky was going to fall’ but as we reflect back on the year we see positive results of that policy shift. We see more interaction between students, more activities and ball games at lunchtimes, less arguments with teachers and less distractions in class. With these changed behaviours, I suspect we will see greater engagement in learning and improved learning outcomes over time. We will not be reintroducing mobile phones into the everyday student experience at St Peter's any time soon!!

Then buoyed by the successful implementation of the Mobile Device Policy and data about the need for improved routines in the classroom, we introduced for Years 7-9, routines to begin and finish each lesson. Lining up at the class door, standing behind one’s chair before a formal greeting and instruction to sit down saw improved classroom organisation and calm as the lesson began.  Furthermore, the formal goodbye at the end served to bookend the lesson effectively and led to a calm departure for those students and teachers who supported this routine consistently. Again, the early ‘talk’ was that these routines were archaic and from an era of yesteryear. That was the ‘talk’ until teachers reported improved classroom control and calm and a subsequent desire to expand the roll out of these routines to Year 10 in 2024 and even the suggestion to expand the routines to include the way teachers structure lessons. This is all part of a Wholeschool Approach to Positive Behaviour support that ensures that the classroom behaviour and student levels of respect at St Peter's ‘buck the trend’ of other schools in Australia, who the current Senate Committee into Classroom Behvaiour would suggest are losing the behaviour battle. Our expectations of each other and of our students, the support of our families, and the follow through of our teachers to infractions of these expectations, reflect the very best of the young people we care for and the fact that we won’t settle for second best or ignore poor behaviour. 

The challenge that awaits us in 2024 is how parents and students will respond to the third element of reestablishing our expectations, of having greater accountability to students who fail to meet the uniform and punctuality expectatioins that are outlined in our Uniform Policy. As a Pastoral Team at the campus we are warmed by the knowledge that more than 80% of the students are on time to tutor group and class and do show pride in themselves and their school by the way they wear their uniform. As the lessons of the Mobile Device Policy and the classroom routines have shown, despite the initial shake-up of a shift in policy or a focus on reasserting a former practice, when the dust settles and the ‘horror’ subsides, our students raise the bar and demonstrate to all who see a student in a St Peter's Uniform, that we are a community who takes pride in who we are and what we can achieve.

I wish all our families a safe break from school and blessed Christmas, and give thanks to you for again entrusting us with the responsibility to help work alongside you in shaping the young person in your care this year.  

God Bless

Mr Jeremy Wright

Deputy Principal - Head of Cranbourne Campus