Deputy Principals' Reports

Mrs Mee Liau

Deputy Principal - Intensive English Centre 

Term 3 has seen students and staff of Evans Intensive English Centre (IEC) settling back enthusiastically into face-to-face teaching and learning and the term is almost half way through! 

We are operating with 16 classes and have 160 students currently this term. Thirty nine students are leaving at the end of Term 3; they are ready to transition to high school with an achieved English proficiency or they had been extended and have used up their allocated time in the NSW Intensive English Program.

COVID-19 and travel restrictions have had profound impacts on enrolment patterns across all IECs in NSW. At the start of Term 2, 2020, there has been an 80% decrease in enrolments, compared to the same period in 2019.

NSW Multicultural Education that oversees IECs has developed specific Contingency Strategy Implementation Guidelines 2020. The strategy aims to support staffing at IECs during a period of falling enrolments, to preserve expertise inherent in the new arrivals setting until times when enrolments could return to normal. Transition to high school is a critical time for our students and many students feel most vulnerable entering high school environments, expressing feelings of anxiety, disengagement and an overall inability to cope with sudden growing demands of academic language, contents and skills, in addition to new social demands and re-adjustments to new learning routines.

In Term 4, Evans IEC will send teachers to support students with high needs to Evans High School. We look forward to this great collaborative teaching opportunity with our high school colleagues. We hope staff across the two sites will benefit from this extra time and resource to actuate measurable learning improvement in our students’ learning.