Over the past few weeks in addition to a significant number of excursions, we’ve had many guest speakers. Just recently Ben O’Toole from the Pat Cronin Foundation, spoke to our Year 10 students about the consequences for the victim and perpetrator of a coward’s punch. This thought provoking and emotional presentation left a significant impression on our students, that we hope helps them consider their behaviour and better mitigate such situations.
Success Integrated also presented to our Year 10 students regarding the idea of ‘shaping your future!’ This presentation is part of a series of workshops that the school runs with our senior cohorts to inspire and help them think about their pathways as well as instilling a mindset and skills to help them achieve their goals. Last week Year 8 students had the pleasure of meeting Will Kostakis, a local Australian author who spoke to our students about his experience growing up and how he has become a famous writer. He has published many books and gave away a number of freebies to students during his presentation. Many of the Year 8 students stayed behind after the session to chat with Will and shared their passion for reading and writing. Will Kostakis will be back this month to present again to more of our students. I constantly promote the benefits of reading, and having such wonderful guest speakers fuels the enthusiasm in our children, is terrific to see. Currently I’m reading a book called, ‘A More Beautiful Question’. What book are you reading now?
On Monday 3rd May our literacy expert, Terri Campbell spent the day with us visiting classes and observing and working with teachers and students on ‘fine tuning our reading conferences’. She spends her time working in many schools across Australia. It was so pleasing to hear how impressed Terri was with our reading culture. She was super excited with our staff and students and was full of praise for the work we are doing in literacy at Rosehill Secondary College.
Last week was NAPLAN week for our Year 7 and 9 students. At Rosehill we take our teaching and learning very seriously and acknowledge that NAPLAN is just one measure of how well students are progressing. As a College we find the data very useful, as it helps us triangulate student progress with other measures throughout the year. Therefore, we encourage our students to take the assessment seriously, but not to panic or stress in the lead up. I can report that our students were very well organised, on time and attended their NAPLAN testing session each day in a sensible and mature manner. Well done! Thank you to all the parents/guardians who encouraged their children to sit the assessments this year.
It’s transition time for Grade 6 students, so we have been very busy running tours each week. Ms Snow has done a tremendous job with the tours and it has been nice to see the Grade 6 children point and identify their friends from Primary school when walking past classrooms. Choosing a secondary school is a significant milestone and we feel there is no better way to get a sense of a school than to see it live. Positive feedback from parents on the tours on how respectful, polite and well-mannered they find our children is great to hear. This is testament to the RIL values we live each day. RESPECT, INITIATIVE and LEARNING.
Thank you to all the parents who attended the workshop on consent. It’s a key theme in our society today and certainly having the skills and knowledge to have the conversation is vitally important. This program is currently delivered at Year 10 by Elephant ED and they run similar age appropriate programs for younger levels.
Interim Reports are now ready and available for parents to access and view the progress for this Term. Remember to look for positives in each report but also have a discussion around areas for improvement. If you have any concerns please contact the relevant teacher or year level coordinator.
I’d like to congratulate a young man called Nathan D’Souza in Year 7, who entered the final of our chess completion as the overwhelming underdog. After a gruelling week of chess elimination, the tournament came to a showdown of the best two, Nathan against Khoa, of Year 10. Khoa had eliminated every opponent in quick fire succession and was almost guaranteed the win, but using his methodical and systematic approach, Nathan was able to prevail. He was named winner of the Rosehill Chess Tournament. Well done Nathan and better luck next time Khoa!
Finally, I have more great news for the Rosehill community. I can report that we have been successful in our application for the State Government’s Inclusive School Fund. We applied to have the external area adjacent to the library converted into an indoor/outdoor covered reading space with access to the library. This grant of $192,000 will help make this space more inclusive, accessible and further promote reading for our students.
Arthur Soumalias
Principal
