From the Principal

Sue Harrap with Northcote High School finalists at the VCAA Top Screen Opening

Come and catch the first glimpse of the NEW Performing Arts Centre – this Thursday 21 March!

I look forward to seeing a full house at this year’s Annual Report to the Community. This year will not only examine and report on our annual performance for 2018, we will also look at the achievement in relation to the goals and targets of the 2015 – 2018 Strategic Plan.

In a break from tradition, our guest speakers will be our school captains, Noah Sutherland and Marco Bellemo, who will speak to us about the issues important to young people. There will be a musical performance by Harmony Vocals. The students will hand over to me to take us through the performance indicators in our past strategic plan and in 2018. Also, for the first time this year, we will report on the success of the Thrive Fund.

Light refreshments will be served just prior to it starting at 5.45 pm.

Book your free seat at: https://www.trybooking.com/BBHDH

For the new School Council, the Annual General Meeting will follow from 7.00 – 8.00 pm, where we will elect office bearers and attend to a few minor Council matters.

School Review: Outcome of Day 1 and moving into Day 2 and 3:

We have successfully navigated Day 1 – Validation Day of our school Review. The purpose was to examine our Pre-Review Self Evaluation, that we conducted throughout the second half of 2018, and to identify what the Review Panel would like to know more about.

We established two Terms of Reference (ToR) for the Field Work on Day 2 and 3, which will be conducted by the Reviewer Lucy Glover.

ToR 1: To what extent do teachers and students have an explicit and shared understanding of quality learning?

ToR 2: To what extent do teachers at NHS measure and monitor student learning growth to build agency in learning?

Throughout the two field work days there will be further classroom observations, staff, student and parent focus groups, examination of our documentation of curriculum and other practices, and the assessment of our compliance with the Victorian Registration and Quality Assurance (VRQA) standards for schools.

Congratulations to Alora Young

Alora has recently won the 2019 PEN/Robert J. Dau Short Story Prize for Emerging Writers, which recognizes 12 fiction writers each year for their debut short story. The judges were Alice Sola Kim, Carmen Maria Machado, and Danielle Evans. Alora won the award for her short story, ‘Vain Beasts’ which was published last year in Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet #38. The story will be put in The PEN America Best Debut Short Stories anthology later this year.

Eva Massey 12H – Unicef Ambassador

Eva is one of sixteen Unicef Youth Ambassadors. Even though Eva is too humble to note this herself, my many spies inform me that she has two blogs. Please take the time to have a look, they are truly inspiring pieces of writing about leadership and feminism.

Top Screen

On Thursday last week I had the pleasure to attend, with our VCE Media teacher Dean Ashton, the VCAA Top Screen Opening at ACMI in the city. The afternoon/evening began with an official launch and speeches, followed by a screening of the finalist’s films. There were 14 finalists from 350 entries in the exhibition and two of them were from Northcote High School.

It was great to catch up with Oliver Crawford Smith who is busy immersing himself in filmmaking, post-secondary school. His short film, called Backseat Drivers is an action comedy, set in the streets of the inner north, featuring his father as one of the stars. He shot the film over three nights between 1 am and 6 am in the morning. It was very amusing and professionally done.

Yianni Rowlands was also one of the fourteen, and was there with family and friends. His film, Bugged incorporated a combination of stopmotion animation and live action and was a creative tale of what happens when you step on a bug. Yianni is enjoying being one of fourteen students studying film at the Victorian College of the Arts, and one of his fellow students there, was also a finalist.

It is fabulous work, and can be seen at ACMI from 7 March to 7 May. Tickets at acmi.net.au/topscreen

We congratulate both of our former students, and Dean Ashton, their teacher, for the fabulous work.

On 29 March, I have a date to see the Top Arts and Top Designs exhibition and opening at Melbourne Museum to celebrate the works of three more talented young stars, alongside their VCE teachers Connie Stewart, Paula Andreovski and Rohan Bevan.

Congratulations Georgia Proctor Parkin 10H

Georgia was recently the recipient of the Australian Scout Medallion. Georgia is part of the 1st Reservoir Scout Troup, and has gained this through tackling challenge, through sustained effort over many months and years, plus showing self-discipline, team work and leadership. Only a very small percentage of Scouts ever reach this level.

NHS wins the Annual Lions Club Debate

Congratulations also go to Noah Sutherland, Edie Bush and Ella Baker (and Tilly Brown who was absent on the night) who took out the cup, with a stellar debate in the affirmative, that Social Media is Dangerous. They competed against a formidable team from Reservoir High School. It was an inspirational effort, and Noah was awarded best speaker. Allira Scott, Martin Ramsay and I were among the audience and were suitably impressed by our team.

The team have won a generous $1500 for their efforts. A big thank you to Martin Ramsay for his excellent guidance throughout the competition.