From the Office

Did you attend Ringwood Secondary College as a past student?

Sylvia Tandberg

Alumni Program Coordinator Ringwood Secondary College

RSC 'GREASE' 2021

We are very excited to announce the highly anticipated launch of GREASE tickets on Tuesday 25th May.

Don't miss out this year - get your tickets to come and see our 2021 Senior Production, GREASE at http://www.rscproduction.com.au

Karl McNamara

Director of Performing Arts

Here we are in 2021, from the College Council!

The College Council would like to say a huge HELLO to all in the school community.

The new 2021 Council has settled in nicely and

I would like to introduce the 2021 Council members:

Principal and Executive member:

Mr Michael Phillips

President and Executive Member:

Mrs Teresa Lodge

Vice President & Executive Member:

Ms Sarah Szubanski

Executive Member:

Mr Ian Roadnight

Business Manager:

Mr Joe Gleeson

Parent Members:

Mr Terry Bebe

Mr Andrew Philp

RSC Staff:

Mr Adam Bryant

Mr Shayne van der Heide

Mrs Agatha Fedrizzi

And we would like to welcome:

Mr Corey Lucas-Evans

Student Representatives:

Ms Lucy Philp

Mr Charlie Lodge

Minutes Secretary:

Mrs Karen Carden

Council began the year with a ‘familiar’ set-back of having our first meeting back on Zoom, due to Victoria’s short lock-down, however the meeting ran as well as could be expected and Council members acknowledged how grateful we were to actually have the amazing technology that enabled us to still meet throughout 2020 and now in 2021.

Our next meeting was in March and was very exciting, as it was our first meeting “in person” since March 2020! We gathered on the Wednesday evening and held our normal meeting, followed by our extraordinary annual meeting, whereby we elected the Council positions that needed filling for 2021 with our nominating members.

The meeting opened with enthusiasm and excitement. Council members were keen to continue working on not only helping to ‘keep the wheels turning’ at the college, but to also continue to work on developing many exciting and innovative plans for the college both for the year ahead and into the future. Council welcomed our new parent, staff and community co-opted members, and I would also like to acknowledge and welcome our two new student representative members onto council, Head Prefect Lucy Philp, and Music Prefect Charlie Lodge. Council members would also like to acknowledge and thank all outgoing committee members: Helen Parker, Eleni Stathatos and Jessica Curcio for their hard work and valuable contributions to both Council and the sub-committees over the last 4 years.

Our third meeting for the year was on Wednesday 12th May. Council welcomed Wayne Stephens, Mrs Maria Allison and Mr Corey Lucas-Evans as our guests. Maria will be Acting Principal while Michael Phillips is away on LSL, and will be most welcome at the next 2 meetings in that role. Corey was so inspired we ended up inviting him to be a staff member of Council! We then enjoyed an Architects Schematic Design Presentation of our proposed new STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Visual Arts and Mathematics) Education building by Wayne Stephens from ClarkeHopkinsClarke. It was a fantastic presentation and the preliminary designs of the new building seem modern, ergonomic, current and extremely innovative and we could see that the $14,000,00 of Government funding will be put to excellent use, as was with both our Junior and Senior buildings.

Council are working on “Naming” our new Senior Building with it’s title being interpreted into Indigenous Language, in acknowledgement of the Traditional Owners of the Land in which we conduct the education of our youth. Student representatives Lucy and Charlie intend to consult with all senior students over Term 2 and 3 to gather information and input as to what we would like the Senior Building to be named, then having this name interpreted so it will be known in its Indigenous language interpretation. We are hoping the chosen name will represent the ‘final educational pathway’ of students in their final stages of their secondary education. Any Senior Students who would like to contribute, please see Lucy or Charlie.

In 2021, Council are hoping to ‘raise our profile’ a bit more, so that the School Community and future school students and their families are more aware of who sits on Council and how it runs. We would also like the school community to learn more about why parent and staff members join, and how important the parent representation is to not only the day to day running of the school, but also with planning and shaping RSC’s future and improving students educational experience and outcomes. Please “watch this space” for further features of your School Council and its members!

Council are reviewing how School Camps are structured at RSC, and are gathering information regarding introducing a new all-student school camp for Years 7 and 8, and reviewing the Year 9 camp. Council have the overall plan to modernise and innovate the camp experience for all students in Year 7, 8 and 9 in the future years.

Michael Phillips spoke to his informative and positive Principals Report, with emphasis on how well the students had re-engaged back into school life, the welcomed input and discussions regarding student wellbeing, the challenge with the very diminished International Student Program post-Pandemic, and spoke about the various staffing changes that are taking place this Semester.

Lucy and Charlie gave an excellent report. They spoke about; the highly successful and amazingly fun day at the whole school Athletics Carnival, held at Proclamation Park; how informative, valuable and helpful the ‘Elephant Ed” sessions were for the Year 12 students covering sex education and consent; how amazing the new Senior Building is, and how well utilized it is, especially because of the modern and innovative design and learning spaces; and they also spoke about how successful and enjoyable the instrumental music events and music competitions have been after missing out on them for over a year.

The finance and resourses report from Joe Gleeson was quite positive in these post-Covid 19 times. Joe reported that the College budget and finances are in quite good shape moving forward into 2021 - 2022.

Sarah Szubanski gave a thorough report from the Policy and Education sub-committee. Several policies were updated and approved and she also reported that the Music Association had gained many new parent members which is very exciting as this will ensure the much needed ongoing support for the Instrumental Music Program and also secures the groups future for the next few years. 😊

Terry Bebe updated Council with the Facilities and OH & S reports. There have been many important repairs, improvements, updates of equipment, tagging and testing and general compliance matters all achieved by our hard working and committed Facilities and OH&S committee, led by Chris Salisbury.

Ian Roadnight spoke about the updated and very exciting Future Directions Paper, with determining small sub-groups amongst Council members to work on each area of the paper. There are many plans and visions in the FD paper, and Council will continue to update the school community when all of these plans and visions begin to be realised.

Shayne van der Heide gave a thorough and interesting report, updating Council about the current status of our Ringwood Training facility and programs. Ringwood Training (RT) is a highly successful and important “arm” of RSC and is also an independent RTO (Registered Training Organisation) who run many VRQA approved courses, including pre-apprenticeship and full apprenticeship courses, in Automotive, Engineering, IT, Welding and many more! RT is bursting at the seams with many courses booked out till August. Shayne is currently lobbying the Government for more funding for our highly successful Training Organisation, with the support of Council, so that the facility can be expanded and further resourced as we look to the future.

Overall it was a great meeting and Council look forward to continuing to work hard and strive toward our short term and long term plans!

Go Well

Teresa Lodge

Council President

Facilities Report

Over the last fortnight the main focus of the works around the College has been:

Planting Hill St bank-if you get a chance go for a drive down Hill St and enjoy all the new plants
Installation of aluminium doors to the CAVE entrances and PAC rear entrance. The old timber doors were badly worn out and the new doors allow significant more light into the buildings.

STEM Centre-currently we are still in the planning process and in the very near future we look forward to unveiling the exciting new plans to the school community.

Chris Salisbury

Facilities Manager