Principal's message

The Year 12 exams commenced last Wednesday with the English exam being the first cab off the rank (as the saying goes). I understand that the exams have been running smoothly thanks to the preparation and oversight of Sylvia Christopoulos, our Director of Senior School. The teachers have been making time to catch up with students ahead of their exams to go over any areas of they are unsure of.  There is a sense that the students are well prepared. This final stretch for the Year 12 students can be quite stressful so I hope that they are pacing themselves and minimising distractions.

The Public Speaking Program finished last week with the Year 9 students delivering some very well prepared and presented speeches. Public speaking is one of the ways in which our students gain confidence in speaking in front of their peers from within their class with the possibility of presenting to their cohort at large. The English teachers have been coaching their classes in this area and this is one of the ways in which we can build on the students’ self-efficacy. I thank Kattina Bowell, Janine Gollant, Samantha Sleep, Adam Howells, Jenny Connolly and Anne Gamble for being judges last week.

The French Tour information evening also took place last week. This is a unique opportunity for students to experience living in a homestay environment in France whilst attending a school. Language acquisition is such an important skill to have in our increasingly globalised world where communication across countries is valued. It is great to see so much interest from our students and parents in this trip. 

The fence around the running track has been removed and PE classes are now able to start taking advantage of this new facility. Whilst the grass in the centre isn’t ready to be used, we look forward to our first game taking place on it. Interestingly enough, I was watching the ABC's 7:30 Report on Tuesday evening and there was a segment on girls’ soccer teams having to play on a smaller ground than boys’ soccer teams. Parents and young girls from various teams campaigned for equality in this area and they are making headway. I am very pleased to be able to say that this facility will enable our students to have access to excellent sporting facilities and we look forward to sharing this with the community at large.

Best regards

Linda Brown

Principal

New Council member - Professor Emerita Helen Forgasz

I was delighted to be invited to join the MGSC School Council as a co-opted member in 2019. I have a long history of interest in girls’ education, particularly in mathematics and science.

My mother was a post World War II refugee immigrant to Australia. For her only child, me, she wanted the best education possible, something she had missed out on during the horrors of war-torn Europe. She asked an Australian born woman she had befriended for the name of the best school to send me. The very quick response was MLC (Kew), an independent girls’ school. My parents sacrificed much to send me there for my entire schooling from Grade 1 to Year 12.

I thrived at MLC, completing Year 12 as a very successful mathematics and science student. I was taught mathematics by women all the way through, but most of my teachers of science, physics, and chemistry were men. At MLC, it never crossed my mind that women couldn’t do mathematics or science as well as men. The world outside school, I later found out, believed otherwise.

From school I went to Monash University and completed a BSc, majoring in mathematics and computer science, with a minor in physics. It was during my second year that I learnt that many people believed that men were naturally better at science than women. During a physics laboratory session, I didn’t know how to operate a particular piece of equipment. I asked the demonstrator for assistance. He told me that if I didn’t know how to use that equipment then I didn’t belong. I was horrified. I didn’t attend any further laboratory sessions, but still managed to pass well – I found another way to submit the needed laboratory reports. I didn’t study physics in third year. After graduation I completed a DipEd and qualified as a teacher of mathematics, science, and physics.

With a break of three years, when my husband and I went to live in London, I taught mathematics, physics, general science, and computing at girls’ schools for ten years. I encouraged girls to persist with mathematics and science, and was determined to raise their awareness that women could participate in STEM disciplines, succeed in them, and that they were equal to men in all respects. I was also motivated to find out why gender-stereotyped beliefs about men’s superiority in mathematics and science persisted and how to address and change these beliefs. My curiosity led to the completion of a Masters of Education thesis on biased practices in assessing students’ work in science, and a PhD on classroom factors contributing to students’ gendered beliefs about themselves as learners of mathematics.

I made a career move to academia. I taught in teacher education programs and continued conducting research on gender issues from a range of different perspectives. Over the years I have examined grouping practices – mixed ability versus ability grouping for learning mathematics, single-sex versus co-educational school settings, and single-sex classes within co-educational schools. Attitudes and beliefs about mathematics and about oneself as a learner of mathematics, mathematics teaching approaches, students’ preferred learning styles, and explorations of large-scale testing regime results (e.g., NAPLAN) are among the other topics that I have worked on. The focus has always been on understanding how to overcome obstacles to women’s participation and achievement in mathematics, and how best to promote mathematics and STEM to women and girls. I have written books, scholarly and professional journal articles, and conference papers on these topics, and have shared my understandings with the general public through various popular media outlets.  

I bring my knowledge, skills, experience, and continued interest in girls and STEM education to the MGSC School Council.

Helen Forgasz