Working Together to Provide The Best

As we all know years eleven and twelve are two very important years of schooling. Senior school study is the "last stop" before students embark on a new journey to work, TAFE, university or other tertiary education.

On Monday August 20, Clarson CHS invited two key people from the Education Department's Central Office to a seminar to assist us to develop ways for our senior school students to access top quality education.

Susanne Vaughan and Stan Koios are Principal Consultants in the Senior Schooling Academic Standards and Support Directorate (SSASS). In the morning, Susanne worked with humanities coordinator Madonna Valentine and applied sciences coordinator David Martin. Susanne provided some detailed information on how our senior school students were performing academically and snapshots comparing individual student progress to progress across the state.

This assisted the learning area coordinators to discuss strategies. Deputy Principal Angela Verevis was also able to share her ideas with Suzanne on the Year 12 seminar which was held a week later. Angela felt that this was an excellent way of supporting students and said she would share this information with the other schools she visits as part of her SSASS role.

The Year 12 VET students provided a lovely lunch and then in the afternoon Stan and Suzanne worked with the learning area coordinators to trial a new DET developed tools called Data Club Teacher Judgements. This tools allows educators to look at student progress in many different ways and can be shared with students and their parents. Clarkson CHS based Principal Consultant, Assessment for Improvement, Melanie Hindley, was also involved in the trial. The coordinators gave valuable feedback to the SSASS consultants that will help to improve this system tool even further.

The day was very productive, with staff gaining valuable information and the opportunity to trial a brand new tool that very few schools have seen to date. The Principal Consultants also gained some useful ideas in terms of improving strategies and some insight into how the Data Club Teacher Judgment system might be used in schools.

Picture: Back row from left to right - Melanie Hindley, Madonna Valentine, front row - Stan Koios, Susanne Vaughan, David Martin

Sailing Along

Earlier this year principals and teachers from several of the local primary schools attended a presentation by School Accountability for Improving Learning (SAIL) team from Clarkson Community High School. This presentation provided information on improving learning at Clarkson CHS, and on developing partnerships between ourselves and our primary school colleagues.

This resulted in the Department of Education and Training (DET) becoming committed to supporting the excellent work happening within Clarkson's local education community.

The extent of this commitment has lead to the creation of the position of Principal Consultant, Assessment for improvement based at CCHS, a first in the metropolitan area.

On July 3, CCHS again hosted a forum for our local primary schools. These included principals, deputies, Getting it Right (GIR) specialist teachers and other representatives from Clarkson, Merriwa, Mindarie, Quinns Beach and Quinns Rocks primary schools. Other invited guests included delegates from a range of sectors and departments including: Keith Newton A/Deputy Director of Schools, Rod Lowther District Director West Coast Education District, Sue Slavin Managing Director West Coast TAFE, Suzanne Collins A/Manager Assessment for Improvement, Renae Hill A/Principal Education Officer Assessment Literacy, Natalie Kidd Curriculum Consultant Bunbury District Education Office, and Melanie Lamont Principal Consultant Assessment for Improvement Australind.

After a thought-provoking keynote address from Keith Newton, Suzanne Collins provided an outline of the project explaining how DET and the schools could work together and support each other to achieve their goals.

CCHS Literacy Coordinator and SAIL team member Tessa Curtis then gave an overview of progress since the last forum and highlighted the successes.

Principal Consultant Melanie Hindley described her role and led a worksop that involved giving each primary school the opportunity to present their own achievements and plan ways of working collaboratively with CCHS to ensure the success of their students in the secondary setting. 

Attendees were also ale to see first hand the new tools being developed by DET to help educators to plan curriculum designed to meet the needs of all students.

A sumptuous lunch was prepared and served by Food Production and Hospitality students under the expert guidance of teacher Ms Peta Brown. District Director Rod Lowther could not complement the food enough!

All in all the second Forum was an even bigger success than the first. Melanie Hindley has already made plans to meet with several local primary schools to workshop ways to collaborate and provide the very best education possible. Through learning about and supporting each other a seamless education program for children from Kindergarten right through to Year 12 and beyond can be created.

 
Picture: Melanie Hindley, Suzanne Collins, Keith Newton and John Young