In & around the school

Hums is humming along!

Baimbridge College: Keeping it real with the Humanities!

The Humanities are off to a great start at Baimbridge College for 2021!  Here are a few highlights:

We are excited to be partnering with Glenelg Nature Trust on our 9-10 Environmental Geography unit, led by Mr Cameron McKelvie.  The subject is focussed on regeneration and management of Walker Swamp, near Dunkeld.  The work of Glenelg Nature Trust has garnered quite a bit of media attention lately, including internationally by the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) - check out their story here!  We are very excited to be able to offer learning opportunities with real-world and immediate relevance - a fundamental goal of the Humanities team. We hope that our geography students will continue to be advocates for Walker Swamp and the broader local environment long after their time at Baimbridge College.  Students are pictured learning about land contours using play dough, ahead of their fieldwork trip to Walker Swamp.

In other exciting news, we are also offering a Year 9-10 Accounting elective for the first time, led by Mr Cha Zhang, who was an accountant in a previous professional life.  Students are really enjoying this subject so far and are currently exploring the recent revelation in the media Crown Casino’s connections to money laundering.  Again, keeping the Humanities real and relevant for our students!  Students are also looking forward to budgeting and calculating taxes, highlighting that numeracy is important in all subjects. 

Ms Claire Kilmartin has redeveloped our 9-10 History subject by looking at our study of World War One through a local lens.  Students enrolled in this subject will visit the old cemetery, Clarke Street and our Avenue of Honour to gain a deeper understanding of the impact of the Great War on our community. Next term, we will also have a guest speaker come and talk to students about the fascinating story of the Lovett brothers - five local Indigenous brothers who voluntarily enlisted, but whose brave service not properly acknowledged upon their return. We are grateful to the Hamilton History Centre, Hamilton RSL, Merron Riddiford and former Baimbridge College Assistant Principal Dr Rosemary Morgan, for their assistance in creating this program. 

Another new initiative this year is offering Year 12 History (Revolutions) to students at Mortlake College and Murtoa College.  We now have two students from Murtoa College joining us via videoconference to participate in Ms Hazel Weir’s classes.  This is one of the positives to have come out of remote learning in 2020, where we now have the capabilities to harness the power of technology to reach students in a manner and quality that we couldn’t have conceptualised or fully realised previously.  We welcome Will and Lachie from Murtoa College to the Baimbridge College learning community!

We also take this opportunity to belatedly congratulate Ella Thomson (Year 11) for her success in being awarded a Spirit of ANZAC Prize in November 2020.  Ordinarily, the prize is in the form of a travel grant, but due uncertainty around travel with the current pandemic, this was changed to a $1,500 prize for educational purposes.  Ella wrote an incredibly well researched and presented piece about her Great Uncle’s experiences during World War One, focussing on the medical care given to soldiers at the time.  Due to restrictions related to COVD-19, Ella was awarded her scholarship in an online ceremony, but we are nonetheless very proud of Ella and the way she has represented not only Baimbridge College, but our returned service men and women. Congratulations, Ella!

Finally, we farewelled our VCE Business Management teacher, Ms Samanthi Senaviratne, who has taken up a position at Blackburn High School.  We thank Ms Sen for the two years of dedicated service to Baimbridge College and we know she will be fondly remembered by many students and staff.  We also welcome Ms Kareena Annett and Mary Anne Porter to the Humanities teaching team, who are already integral members of the Arts and Technology faculty here at Baimbridge College.

Year 7 Camp

Some quotes from the students who attended the Year 7 Camp:

"Camp was a wonderful experience because there was so much to do!"

"The food was amazing and we like particularly liked the spuds and lasagne."

"Year 7 Camp was engaging for all! It was fun to experience new and different things."

"There were so many activities to choose from: surfing, geocaching, rockpooling, sand duning, hiking, swimming, boating and caving!"

School Photos

School Photos have been taken for the 2021 academic groups. MSP from MtGambier again handled this well and thanks to those students and families for supporting the request for jumpers to be worn on such a humid day. 

The photo shown below is NOT how they will be presented, however it shows the students complying with the COVID-19 face mask requirements. It is 10D having some fun as they were the last group photo for the day. 

Sadly we weren’t able to have the normal catch up day, however Jill Robinson is working closely with MSP and any student missed will get a photo completed soon for  school purposes. 

BEST

The BESTies have begun the year making loop rugs for family, friends and a couple of soon to be new members of the Baimbridge Family.