Deputy Principal

Working Together

Community involves us working together and remembering that what builds a community is ensuring we think of everyone and not just ourselves. I know parents/carers get stressed and are trying to juggle a million things at once. Trying to keep all the balls in the air, organise a family and not forget anything is a challenge. However, as challenging as our lives become, we must always remember that we need to be polite and mindful of how our actions affect others. We must always try to put the collective ahead of ourselves. 

It is about this time each term that I must remind parents/carers and students about the impact they have on other member of our community by not being accountable for their own actions.

We constantly get feedback about Kiss and Ride in the morning. I try and get out there most mornings to ensure that the process runs smoothly except for when I cannot make it due to early morning meetings. On most mornings, things do run smoothly, and students get out of the car as soon as they turn into Fraser Street. 

However, while I was in a meeting at our new Scientia Building last week and was monitoring the line of cars from the window, I came to the realisation that if I am not actually outside on Fraser Street, there are a lot of students who do not get out of the car at the right time when they turn onto Fraser Street. I am sure your son may say "it is too far to walk" and "just to drive up closer to the top of the line". This slows down the line for everyone else and creates the added problem of cars pulling out around each other to pass which is extremely dangerous.

As parents/carers we must hold our children accountable. By allowing them to stay in the car, it means that we are teaching them that they are more important than others in the community. It is the same message that we are teaching them when you turn right from Shortland Avenue into Fraser Street. I find when I have a chat with parents, they are very apologetic. However, we must remind ourselves that we are the biggest influence on our children’s lives. If we do the wrong thing and put ourselves ahead of the community, we are teaching our children that it is okay to do that as well. 

I have also had feedback about the bus services for the College, particularly, buses in the afternoon being too crowded and buses in the mornings not stopping for students. I can assure you that we are in regular contact with NSW Transport about these issues. Most recently I had a parent contact me as the bus did not stop in the morning to pick up her sons. I contacted NSW Transport to investigate and was informed that the bus driver could not stop due to video surveillance on the bus indicating that the bus was full. NSW Transport also stated that according to their OPAL reader, there were only two students who had officially tapped onto the bus with their cards. In the afternoons staff are constantly asking students to use their cards to tap on. Staff cannot be at bus stops each morning to ensure this occurs. So, I ask all parents/carers to talk to their sons regarding tapping on when they get on the bus. We constantly remind the boys about integrity as I am sure you do at home. That is, doing the right thing when no-one else is watching. 

I also need to remind parents, carers, and students that the Mary MacKillop car park is for staff parking only. Please do not drive into the car park. We have also had to talk to some parents who have driven down the driveway of this car park to the Duffy Music Centre to drop off their son/s. This is a significant safety issue as there are a lot of pedestrians around these areas that we need to keep safe.

Sometimes to remind parents/carers about the issues that I have mentioned above, staff will stop you to remind you of the processes that we have put in place to ensure we keep the community safe. Please remember that they are only doing their job. If everyone does the right thing, the staff will simply smile and wave you goodbye. 

I thank the vast majority of parents, carers and students who do the right thing every day. Thank you for putting the wonderful SPC community first.

Adrian Byrne

Deputy Principal