The Delany community
“The future belongs to young people with an education and the imagination to create.” - Barak Obama
Teaching in a school can be a relentless job. A bell sounds and we go to class to teach, then return from class with marking, then prepare future lessons and learning, mark and provide feedback for student work, perhaps squeeze in some counselling, go home and answer emails, then hit the repeat button.
But in moments of reflection I trust all teachers (and ancillary staff at a school) see the future. I had the privilege to join students and staff for a discussion called “Fill your cup”, an initiative from our formation leaders. Fill your cup describes both the cup of hot milk/tea/coffee that is provided to participants, as well as the idea of filling one’s mind with challenging thought and widening knowledge.
The topic last Tuesday was “Is sexism alive in the twenty-first century?”. This generated some fascinating and insightful conversation. Perhaps it was a fluke, but on this morning we only had female students and staff attending the discussion (other than me). Another bright light was that we had students from years 7 through to 11, as well as our usual array of cultural representation. What was truly inspiring for me was the insight and strength of these young women able and willing to share their experiences and insights. These are our young people to whom the future belongs and the imagination to shape it. Thanks also to our year 11 male student who served drinks during this discussion and modelled that both male and females can serve each other with dignity and humility.
The academic community
It’s over!
The Class of 2020 have officially completed the HSC examinations… and what a relief. Now the celebrations, long delayed by COVID restrictions, can commence. On Friday 13 November we will host the graduation and awards ceremony for this HSC class. Due to on-going restrictions, we will hold this event in the school grounds, and unfortunately be required to limit invitations to just two guests per student. The event will also be streamed via zoom. Despite this, plans are now in place to ensure that we celebrate the achievements and contributions of these students with joy, thanks and hope, and share with parents and friends a memorable evening. The future certainly belongs to these students.
Last newsletter I introduced our driving question for 2021:
To what extent am I improving all students’ learning?
Given we have just concluded HSC exams, and our stage 5 students are in the middle of their own end of year exams, I will briefly write about assessment. In the education world we talk about assessment of, for and as learning. Here’s what this means:
assessment for learning describes assessment and feedback that forms learning; it is often informal feedback, suggestions and discussions that assist a student to take the next step in their learning
assessment of learning describes an end-of-unit task (often an exam or project submission); the task concludes or summarises recent work. One downside of this assessment is that the results and feedback arrive after the unit is finished, and therefore the student doesn’t have the opportunity to change their learning outcomes
assessment as learning occurs when students reflect on and monitor their progress to inform their future learning goals; this is often seen as the most powerful influence on learning outcomes because the student is monitoring their progress, strengths and weaknesses.
We refer to this last point as assessment capable learners, and is part of the strategy to improve all students’ learning.
The Patrician community
We have had a successful start to our fundraising for Vinnies, with $1000 already collected. This money will be used to make direct donations to Vinnies as well as purchase goods for our Christmas hampers. Each mentor class has also ‘adopted’ a family who we have been asked to support. We will continue to ask students to bring food and gifts for these families. By the conclusion of this appeal we will have made Christmas a joyful experience for over 20 families in our local community who don’t have much. There is no better outcome.
St Patrick, pray for us.
Mr Anthony Blomfield
Assistant Principal