Principal's Report

From the Principal

Welcome to a new school year - I hope that all of our College community experienced a safe and enjoyable holiday period.

We are delighted to welcome back all of our students for a successful and exciting 2021, and offer a special welcome to the 275 Year 7 students and their families. I am confident that our current students will welcome our new students in accord with our College values of care and compassion, respect and fairness, making them feel welcome and helping them to make friends quickly. 

Importantly, our classes settled very well this week – our first full week of scheduled classes, and I was delighted to witness classrooms full of energy, curiosity and purposeful teaching and learning.

Our COVID Journey Continues…

With the commencement of the College school year, our aim is to continue to work together to manage the challenges of the coronavirus pandemic.

As always, the health and wellbeing of our students and staff are of paramount importance.

The Department of Education has published an updated Operation Guide for schools based on the latest advice from Victoria’s Chief Medical Officer.

The most important action that we can take as a school to reduce the risk of transmission, is to ensure that any unwell students and staff remain at home and get tested, even with the mildest of symptoms.

Stay home if unwell 

We ask that if your son or daughter is unwell that you do not send them to school and take them for a test.

Practicing good hand hygiene 

Your son or daughter should undertake regular hand hygiene and ensure that they use hand sanitiser before and after using any shared equipment, devices, sporting equipment and musical instruments. The College has hand sanitiser located throughout the school for student and staff use, including in every classroom and shared space. Students should not share food.

Density limits and physical distancing 

Students should practise physical distancing where possible. Maintaining a physical distance of 1.5 metres will not always be practical in the school environment. A face mask provides protection when physical distance cannot be maintained.

Face masks in schools

 As per the directions of the Victorian Chief Health Officer, the following actions are mandatory:

• Face masks to be worn by individuals over the age of 12 when on public transport and school buses – unless they have a lawful exemption.
• Individuals over the age of 12 must carry a face mask at all times.
• The same exemptions to the wearing of face masks apply in schools as when people are out in the community. This includes students who are over the age of 12 and are unable to wear a face mask due to the nature of their disability. This also includes students or staff who have a medical condition, such as problems with their breathing, a serious skin condition on the face, a disability or a mental health condition.
• Take mask breaks throughout the day when outdoors and physical distancing is possible.

The Department of Education advice states that face masks are recommended for use by staff and students when physical distancing of 1.5m cannot be maintained.

As such, students will be required to wear a face mask in classrooms, when lining up for the canteen, when in congested locker areas and at any other time when they cannot apply physical distancing. 

The College will update the community with any change to this advice as soon as we receive it from DET.

Updated advice on College activities and events

As of the moment, whilst we all recognise that circumstances may change very quickly and with a minimum of notice, Co-Curricular activities such as inter-school sport, the Performing Arts and other clubs are all able to resume.

Excursions can resume across Victoria for all schools. There is no limit on group sizes, but excursions must be conducted in line with any specific capacity limits on venues that are being used. External venues will maintain responsibility to ensure that appropriate health and safety, and cleaning measures are in place at the venue. School staff and students need to ensure they continue to practise appropriate safety measures while at external venues, such as wearing a face mask in line with health advice, practising physical distancing and performing regular hand hygiene.

School Camps can resume across Victoria for all schools. There are no restrictions on travel between metropolitan Melbourne and regional Victoria, but travel to and from any DHHS identified high risk locations (when community transmission is occurring in areas of Victoria) should be deferred.

Interschool activities including debating and outdoor sporting competitions can recommence.

Visitors to school premises All visitors to the College will be required to comply with distancing and face mask recommendations as outlined above, and practise good hand hygiene.While there is no requirement to limit the number or type of visitors to school premises, however the density limit of 1 person per 2 square metres should be applied to any spaces and activities being attended by parents and other visitors.To support contact tracing, the College will keep a record of all staff, students and visitors who attend on-site for more than 15 minutes.Please note that these guidelines are subject to change depending upon directions from the Victorian Chief Health Officer. We will keep you informed of any such changes

College Leadership

I am pleased to introduce our Leadership Team for 2021:

Principal Class

John Roberts – Principal

Karen Boyle – Assistant Principal (Teaching and Learning)

Cameron Campbell – Assistant Principal (Student Wellbeing and Engagement and Operations)

Jas Kaur – Assistant Principal (Staff Development and Internationalising Education)

Leading Teachers

Kate Leaumont – Senior School Coordinator

Justin Bond – Middle School Coordinator

Paola Malatesta – Curriculum Coordinator

Justin D’Andrea– Teaching and Learning – Pedagogy

Steve Hoffman – Timetable / Staffing

John Rainbow – Mathematics

Jarrod Sturnieks – English

Paul Williamson – Science/STEM

Angie Fusinato – Learning Performance

Brett Lamb – Learning Technologies

Kerryn Murray – Student Voice & Community Engagement

New and Returning Staff to EDSC

I am also very pleased to welcome the following teachers who are either returning from extended leave or starting with us for the first time in 2021:

John Creighton - Art

Emma Butler – Art

Eileen Nguyen – Maths/Science

Tram Nguyen– English/Hums

Jordan Negrin – PE/Health

Max Dawe- PE/Health

Leo Liu – Chinese

Yan Jiang – Chinese

Anna Hardenberg– English/Hums

Zachary Greenwood - English/Commerce

Sabeen Munawar – Tutor Program/Maths

Felicity Howie– Tutor Program/Maths

Lisa Eyles – Wellbeing Coordinator

Daniel Lincoln - English

School Performance 2020

Given the extreme circumstances of 2020, I can only describe our VCE results at the conclusion of the year as outstanding.

A sincere congratulations is extended to the ‘Class of 2020’ for their efforts and achievements and to our VCE teachers for their application and dedication in a year that held a multitude of significant challenges.

Four of our students achieved a perfect study score of 50 –  Jordan Lim and Melissa Wu in Business Management, Luke McManus in Further Maths and Paige Tang in Studio Arts.

Our mean VCE study score was 33.

47% of our students received an ATAR over 80. 

Indeed, 22 % of our students achieved an ATAR of 90 or higher – a really pleasing outcome.

Our Dux of the College in 2020 was Jayden Kok who gained an ATAR of 99.4. Jayden worked extremely well during the year and it was great to see that his effort, application and maturity towards his studies was so richly rewarded.

We are extremely proud of the achievements of our students and the effort and nurturing care of our teachers in supporting them throughout their time at East Doncaster.

It was certainly equally pleasing to see such success and progress in our Year 11 and 12 VCAL students. At the end of the year the following students were recognised in the atEAST VCAL Awards;

Recognition Award – Levi Mills

Achievement Awards – Adam Heward and Alex Xu

Outstanding Achievement Awards – Tania Monem and Ellie Dickfos

Such results, achieved within the tumultuous backdrop of a global pandemic, are naturally pleasing and strongly reinforces the direction we are taking to seek continual improvement in student learning outcomes at our College, and is a credit to students and teachers alike.

College Swimming Carnival

It was great to see our students supporting the first major whole- school event on our College calendar - our annual Swimming and Diving Carnival conducted on Wednesday. The tone of the day was impressively set by our senior students who arrived in various forms of imaginative free dress and in visible support with their house colours proudly on display. From this stage on, the carnival was a colourful, engaging, participative event for all of our students and was matched by the competitive nature of the events within the pool.

Congratulation to Bradman – the winning House team of the Carnival yet again this year in a very competitive final leaderboard.

A special mention is afforded to Farida Taha (Year 9), Logan Cox (Year 9) and Daniel Bray (Year 12) for breaking existing College record times in individual events. Logan, in particular performed to an outstanding level, breaking five such record times!

Michael James, our Sports Carnival Coordinator has published a report of the Carnival – to be found within this Newsletter. Could I finally acknowledge the superb organisational effort of Michael and his team of staff helpers for their considerable work both before and during the day and pay a special  tribute to our extended student leadership team for their efforts, enthusiasm and teamwork that made the day all the more rewarding. 

Student Leadership

It was very encouraging to see the role that our extended Student Leadership team played in the assemblies and activities during this past week. Yet again, our Student Leadership program has grown in 2021 and will this year be ably managed by Kerryn Murray and Michael James. I will include more information about the full team of Student leaders in future Newsletter articles but I felt it important to acknowledge the effort of our School Captains – Amrita Kohli and Elliot Fong and our Vice-Captains, Sulaymaan Hafeez and Vicki Cho for the roles they played this and last week. I am very excited by the opportunity to work closely with our student leaders and will watch with pride as they exert their considerable positive sphere of influence on our school community.

School Council Elections

Parents are invited to read the attached information about School Council Elections and consider whether they are able to make a tangible contribution to our College community by engaging in the overview and policy development of East Doncaster SC. Further information is on our website. Feel free to call me if you would like to discuss any matters related to our School Council.

School Council and 2021 Annual General Meeting - Open Meeting

We are extending an invitation to the College Community to attend the March School Council meeting and Annual General Meeting. This will be held at 7.30 p.m. on Wednesday 10 March. Interested parties are asked to please contact Lisa Bull at Lisa.Bull2@education.vic.gov.au  for further details and to register attendance. All attendees must be registered by 4.00pm Tuesday 9 March. 

Safety on the roads for our College community

At the commencement of the school year, it is yet again timely to remind all within our school community to be conscious of their responsibilities in ensuring the neighbouring streets are safe for our students and all drivers.

Can I urge all parents to please be alert to the road signage on all boundary roads surrounding the College, and remind you not to double park or cross the continuous white line in George Street – this is illegal and presents danger to others. 

In the Sports Centre Car Park parents should proceed towards the southern end of the car park before stopping for their children to alight the vehicle – stopping near the crossing presents a log jam behind you and a danger to our students; please pull to the side when stopping.

As a College with a large student population it is imperative that we all work together to ensure that we continue to be considerate of each other and our young people.

At all times, we must have the safety of our students as a clear priority.

John Roberts

Principal

School Council Elections 2021

One of the challenges of secondary schools is gaining involvement of parents. After significant time spent in school based activities in primary schools, it is not uncommon for parents to step back from similar activities at secondary school. In recent years parent involvement in our Parents and Friends Association and School Council has been very strong. We hope to continue this growth of engagement.

Today we are calling for nominations for our College School Council. 

Who is on the school council?

There are three possible categories of membership:

• A mandated elected parent category. More than one third of the total members must be from this category. Department of Education and Training (DET) employees can be parent members at their child’s school.
• A mandated elected DET employee category. Members of this category may make up no more than one third of the total membership of school council. The principal of the school is automatically one of these members.
• A mandated elected student category. In 2018 The Department of Education mandated changes to the formation of all secondary School Councils. As of mid-2018, all Victorian government Secondary School Councils with students in Year 7 and above must conduct a Student school council election process to elect two students for Council membership.
• An optional community member category. Its members are co-opted by a decision of the council because of their special skills, interests or experiences. DET employees are not eligible to be community members.

The term of office for members is two years. It is an expectation that School Council members are available for every scheduled meeting. Meetings commence at 7.30pm.

The dates for the 2021 School Council meetings are:

Wednesday 10 February

Wednesday 10 March – AGM and Public Meeting

Wednesday 12 May 

Wednesday 9 June

Wednesday 14 July

Wednesday 11 August

Wednesday 8 September

Wednesday 13 October

Wednesday 10 November

Wednesday 8 December

In the 2021 School Council Elections there are: 

• Four vacant parent category positions
• Two vacant DET positions
• Two student category positions

Parents on school councils provide important viewpoints and have valuable skills that can help shape the direction of the school.

Those parents who become active on a school council often find their involvement satisfying in itself and may also find that their children feel a greater sense of belonging.

Please find attached the Call for Nomination, timeline and nomination forms.

College Philosophy

At East Doncaster Secondary College we have a strong tradition of academic excellence and we aim to promote and sustain a reflective learning culture. We want students to experience a sense of achievement and growth in their academic, personal, social and emotional development. We have high expectations of our students’ commitment to being mutually supportive and striving for success as learners. We are proudly multicultural with a student population from 43 nationalities including a number of International Students. 68% of our students speak a language other than English at home.

A student’s life at school is full of opportunities, being rich and varied with a range of co-curricular activities in music, sport, productions, debating, clubs as well as camps and international experiences for the educational and personal development of students. Our students are vibrant, energetic, and talented young people. There are many student leadership opportunities and we aim to continue to increase student access to decision-making and self-determination as learners.

We endeavour to create a "Culture of Curiosity" with goals of ensuring learning improvement for every student – every student, every period, every day.

Our school’s purpose is to develop passionate learners who are critical thinkers with the confidence and capability to engage in the global community.

Care and Compassion, Curiosity, Excellence, Fairness, Resilience, Respect and Teamwork are the core values that underpin the culture of our school as we embrace the challenges of 21st Century learning.

We aim to sustain a learning culture that provides every student with a sense of achievement and of being their best in their academic, personal, social and emotional development.

Privacy and Data at East Doncaster Secondary College

East Doncaster Secondary College uses a number of digital platforms to support your child’s education, such as Compass, Google Drive and Office 365. 

The College has an Information Security Policy and complies with the Department of Education and Training Privacy Policy. The attached documents provide further information about these services, privacy and how data is managed.