Executive Director's Welcome

A great education involves lots of questions – asking what, why, how and when – to understand the world around us.  The last few weeks have caused all of us to have so many questions: what will the impact of this virus be; how will we continue to learn when we can’t be at school in person; when will life return to “normal”?

This MITS Family newsletter is coming to you on what would have been our final day of the school term in Melbourne.  As you know, three weeks ago we made the decision to have our Year 7 students and alumni boarders return home early and continue their studies remotely.  We are pleased that we made this decision as a school community early, allowing our students to travel home without interruption and minimising the risk of transmission into our remote and regional communities.

So, while the end of term looked a little different to the normal, today’s newsletter provides a great opportunity to reflect on a wonderful few weeks of MITS in Melbourne, and also the accomplishments of our students over the past three weeks as they’ve continued their learning at home.  As a school community, we should feel proud of how we’ve adapted to the challenges that we’ve encountered!

In particular, we are proud of the way in which our students have continued their learning from home and impressed with their commitment to their studies.  It has been a joy to see students continue to engage with teachers and each other on our group WhatsApp feed, to see samples of the work that they have done from home, and to hear how they have read their class books over the phone to Ryan, Michael and Bella.  I also want to say a huge thank you to our incredible MITS staff for being so agile and supporting our students’ continued learning over the past weeks.

As we head into the school holidays we have lots of questions.  We don’t yet know when it will be possible for our students to return to return to Melbourne.  But we do know how we can continue to provide a great education remotely.  Over the holidays we will deliver laptops and wifi dongles to each student’s home community so that they can continue meaningful learning into Term 2.

When it is possible for students to return to Melbourne, we know what we will need to do as a school to keep ourselves and each other safe: we’ve developed a Reopening Plan and started to think about the social distancing, good hygiene and additional resources we’ll need to keep the students safe.

Our teachers, boarding coordinators and school leaders will continue to communicate with students and families through the holiday break and share information as soon as we can.  For now, I do hope that the holiday break brings rest to you all, and that everyone in our MITS community stays healthy and safe in the weeks ahead.

Edward Tudor