Principal's Report

Term 3 Update

This edition of the newsletter contains reports on the highly successful school musical, Honk! JR., student academic achievement, recent student achievements in sport and chess, and information about our Chinese Cultural Day, the Great Victorian Bike Ride, an art exhibition opportunity specifically for Coburg High School students, Science Week, and an introduction to three new support staff (and 'Rex'). 

One of the really exciting things about being a student at Coburg High School is the chance to go on one of our great school camps. In term 3 there are numerous camps.  The annual Student Leadership Camp took place the week before last and this coming week some of our Year 10 students are heading up to Mt Bogong on the Snow Camp. In two weeks' time our Year 9s will make their annual expedition over to Tasmania.

In addition, the next House competition—'Coburg's Got Talent'—will be held later this week and we also celebrate Wear It Purple Day with a significant whole-school event soon. These opportunities, activities and events form an important part of our overall school program. 

Student Achievements

In this edition, we recognise students who have achieved outstanding results in specific subjects during semester one. Congratulations to each of the award recipients who are listed on the 'Subjects Excellence Awards' page.

In addition, congratulations to Mia H (Year 9) for her key role on the victorious Victorian 15 years and under girls AFL team. Well done to both Willow N (Year 7) for being selected for the Kanga Cup and to Poppy O (Year 7) for her recent cross country running achievements.

At the recent inter-school chess tournament held here at Coburg High School, Esther P (Year 9) finished in second place overall which is an fantastic achievement and Max M (Year 10) and Emily F (Year 7) have also made it through to the state finals. There are more detailed reports and pictures from those events in the Sports and Clubs sections of this newsletter. 

Honk! JR Musical

Congratulations to the entire cast of Honk! JR for their sensational performances across seven amazing shows. This year’s musical was based on The Ugly Duckling by Hans Christian Andersen which is a story influenced by his own life and his rise from being a poor and bullied child with dyslexia to become a world-renowned author who would pave the way for children’s literature everywhere. While Honk! is an especially uplifting and upbeat musical, it clearly has an important anti-bullying message at its heart and highlights the importance of accepting and respecting individual differences. The whole cast performed with such great energy and confidence and truly showcased their talents. There were many outstanding performances and I would especially like to spotlight the lead performances of William Kay as Ugly, Sarah Warren as Ida, Ben Pane as Drake and Amalia Sakkatou as Cat. Many thanks to the musical director and producer, Sarah Kate Hanley, for inspiring the cast and orchestrating the performances and a big thank you to the numerous families who so generously helped with set design, costuming and fundraising. 

A very big thank you to the Parent Association for supporting the musical before each show and during intermission with their great food stalls and congratulations and thank you for raising over $1800.   

National Science Week

This week is National Science Week (https://www.scienceweek.net.au) and we take this opportunity to celebrate the sciences and how they enable us to more fully understand the biological, physical and technological worlds, to solve significant problems, and to use evidence-based reasoning and scientific understanding to improve our world. There are a range of special science activities here at school throughout the week. 

It has been a big year in science. This year was the 50th anniversary of the moon landing; Voyager 2 (which launched from Earth in 1977) left the heliosphere and entered interstellar space (NASA’s Voyager 2 Enters Interstellar Space); Cassini completed its voyage to research Saturn up close (NASA Cassini Mission Images); and the MARSIS radar orbiting Mars has detected some liquid water beneath the surface of Mars (Radar evidence of subglacial liquid water on Mars) which is an important discovery because liquid water is essential for life as we know it. These scientific expeditions continue to expand our understanding of our solar system and the universe and can perhaps enhance our appreciation of how fortunate we are to live on Earth, the only habitable planet in our solar system because we live in this narrow range of space that happens to be conducive to life—neither too far away from nor too close to the sun, where water is liquid (rather tham permanently steam or ice). 

Science is important because it empowers us to transcend our human limitations by expanding our perceptions and experiences and enabling world-wide communication and travel. Our ongoing scientific discoveries and technological innovations help us communicate further than ever before in human history, using satellite transmission, phones, radios, television and the internet, and enable us to travel much faster and further than we can on our own, using train networks, cars, planes, drones, submarines and space shuttles. We can also see see further and in more detail than ever before with telescopes and microscopes that are much more powerful than the naked eye.

Science can be great fun to learn and can activate our sense of curiosity. It is also incredibly important because we face many significant challenges, including global warming, potential misuse of genetic engineering, accidental or intentional misuse of nuclear weapons, potential proliferation of nanotechnologies, as well as a range of natural disasters such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, droughts and disease epidemics—and a solid understanding of science is essential to mitigating those risks and navigating those challenges as safely as possible. 

Over the past year, there have been a few positive signs in our efforts to tackle global warming. The Sydney Opera House was certified as a carbon neutral institution this year (https://www.sydneyoperahouse.com/carbonneutral), providing a template for other organisations to emulate. Single-use plastic bags and straws have been banned in many places and sales of electric cars continue to increase. NASA reported that the Earth is greener now than it was two decades ago (Tree planting in China and India dominate the greening of Earth, NASA reports) mostly due to ambitious tree-planting schemes in India and China. Of course, there is much more to be done because these improvements only partially offset overall pollution and carbon emissions into the atmosphere. 

This year the Australian documentary, '2040', was released to great critical acclaim and it provides a hopeful vision of the future in terms of some of the ways we might be able to prevent climate disaster and change the world for the better over the next twenty years (https://whatsyour2040.com/#). I encourage families to consider seeing the film. 

At Coburg High School, we have recently had some really productive initial conversations with the Moreland Energy Foundation (MEFL) and other renewable energy providers about auditing our current emissions and energy usage as a school and installing solar panels as part of an overall school sustainability plan. Thank you to our sustainability team for their ongoing work on this so far and we will continue to update the whole school community about our progress on this priority project. 

Finally, I would like to take this opportunity to point out that we have several world class medical research institutions in Melbourne and to encourage you to find out more about them and about potential future careers with them. For instance, the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute (WEHI: www.wehi.edu.au) is a world-class medical research organisation in Parkville that conducts research into the causes and treatments for diseases at the cellular level and into detecting and treating infections, such as malaria, the mosquito-borne infection that kills as many as 500,000 to 850,000 people every year, in some of the poorest countries in the world. We should be proud of the work of these Melbourne-based institutions because their scientific discoveries, treatments and vaccinations can contribute to saving millions of lives every year. You might also be interested in viewing some of the fascinating 3D images and visualisations of DNA, stem cells and immune systems that are available on the WEHI website (WEHI TV 3D animations). Many of our students of Biology also get the opportunity to visit the nearby Gene Technology Access Centre (GTAC) to learn more about cutting-edge science there as well. 

The theme for Science Week this year is 'Destination Moon: more missions, more science.' Curiosity is one of our four school values and is certainly consistent with the key takeaway for Science Week. As the famous science populariser, Dr Karl, likes to say: Let's be curious and curiouser!

Here is the timetable of science week activities: 

Parent Opinion Survey

Currently we are conducting the annual DET Parent Opinion Survey to find out what parents think of our school. The survey is conducted by the Department of Education and Training (DET) across all government schools through a sample of randomly selected parents. It is designed to assist each school to gain an understanding of parents’ perceptions of school climate, student behaviour and student engagement. We will use the survey results to help inform and direct future school planning and improvement strategies.

Approximately 30 per cent of parents have been invited to participate in this year’s survey and have been emailed the survey link and password. All responses to the survey are anonymous. This year the Parent Opinion Survey will be open until Sunday 18 August. If you have been invited to participate, please take a few moments to complete the survey because we value your feedback. The survey is conducted online, only takes 10 to 15 minutes to complete, and can be accessed on desktop computers, laptops, tablets or smartphones. It is available in a range of languages other than English, including Arabic, Vietnamese, Mandarin, Hindi, Japanese, Somali, Turkish, Punjabi and Greek.

The survey results will be reported back to the school in October. Please contact me if you would like further information.

Stewart Milner

Principal 

Coburg High School