From the Assistant Principal - Learning and Teaching

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A warm welcome back to our SJC families and students.  A special welcome to our new Year 7 community.  It was wonderful to begin their learning journey at our College on Tuesday and having our Year 12 students present to celebrate this new chapter of their lives.  It is a special day beginning secondary school and we hope that all Year 7 students are adapting to their new learning environment.  We look forward to seeing the wonderful contributions all our students make over the next six years.  Also, to any new students joining other year levels, we look forward to journeying with you and your family and being part of your learning journey.

Last week and during this week teachers have/will be emailing families to introduce themselves and begin to develop strong family-school partnerships.  Strong partnerships are essential for students to achieve the fullness of life.  We encourage parents/carers to make contact with teachers at any stage of the learning journey if concerns arise. (Staff emails can also be found on the College website under Our College - Staff).

Our goal for our learners at SJC is for ‘All students achieve at least one year’s growth for one year’s learning (+1)’.  As a College we are continuing to reflect on our current practice and make shifts that allow for students to achieve +1.  To support students to achieve +1 each year a number of practical learning habits and dispositions need to continue to be developed in our learners.  One of our significant shifts is the addition of AWC (Academic and Wellbeing Care) for every student.  Each day, students will spend 24 minutes in AWC.  During this time, AWC teachers, two for each group of approximately 24 students, will work with students on:

  • Students creating individual learning goals to drive their learning further
  • Organisational skills (use of student diaries, balancing school life, work, extra curricular commitments)
  • Learning at Home (Homework) - supporting students to keep up-to-date with their learning and supporting students with completing any set work, assessments
  • Developing pride for their school uniform and personal presentation/appearance

Staff will work this year and into the future on developing literacy skills in our learners.  This will focus on fundamental elements of writing, sentence structure, paragraph development and communicating their learning in written form.  Over the next five years we aim to see significant learning gains in our students that are reflected in our Year 12 students HSC results.  We will be promoting students to ‘Strive for Excellence’ in all they do.  To support this learning, we ask parents/carers to regularly discuss with their child/children how their learning is progressing.  We also ask that you sign the student diary every week and review the information that has been included. 

Our goal, while some may say is ambitious, we strongly believe all students deserve this through their schooling and we look forward to sharing our progress with you throughout this year and into the future.  We hope to see you all soon when COVID restrictions continue to ease and we hope that you stay safe and healthy.

Mr Ryan Campbell
Assistant Principal - Learning and Teaching