Newsletter Term 3, Week 8 4 Sept 2020

Presently we are finalising the major elements of staffing for 2021 and I would like to provide you with some updates.

Dean of Students

Mrs Lucinda Thom has been appointed to the position of Dean of Students and she will oversee the care of students from Years 7 – 12. Additionally, she will work with staff from the Junior School to ensure that our Student Wellbeing Program is a clearly scoped and age-appropriate from Prep to Year 12 with a Strathcona approach. Mrs Thom has already been active in her oversight of students in her capacity as Head of Students Pastoral and Wellbeing, and as Head of Grenfell House; however, she will now join the Senior Leadership Team. Her philosophy is summed up in her own words “I am passionate about the holistic wellness of students in my care and see teaching as a vocation; it is a privilege where we educators share the learning and lives of young people.”

Mrs Thom, as many of you would know, is a very experienced English teacher and has achieved, through her work at the VCE level, outstanding results. Not only is she well known for her teaching at that level, but she is very vocal on the importance of excellence in teaching at the younger levels so that the building blocks are in place for critical thinking and analysis. For the past two decades, she has been appointed regularly as a VCAA Assessor of the English Examination. She has also been involved in the English VCAA Study Design and as a freelance writer of feature pieces published in The Age, the Herald Sun and Melbourne’s Child.

She has acted in numerous positions leading Student Pastoral Care both in this School and in others, including Deputy Head of Years 11 and 12 at Ivanhoe Grammar School. In 2017, I appointed Mrs Thom to the role of Research Lead of Student Wellbeing K – 12, which involved auditing the K – 12 Wellbeing Programs in the School, researching Pastoral Care and Wellbeing Programs nationally. For the work developed as a result of this research, the School was finalist in the Educator Awards 2019.

Head of Grenfell

Mrs Thom’s appointment meant that the Head of Grenfell position became available. Mrs Rhiannon Ward, who is presently our Year 7 Coordinator was successful in her application for this role. Mrs Ward is an English teacher too and she has extensive experience teaching English across year levels, including at the senior level at Yarra Valley Grammar and in UK schools. At Yarra Valley Grammar School, she was respectively a Year 7 and a Year 8 Year Level Coordinator. Mrs Ward holds a Master of Education and she has an interest both in school leadership and pedagogical practice. She is currently enrolled in the Graduate Certificate of Entrepreneurship in order to develop her skills “in an area that is the zeitgeist of modern learning environments: creativity and ingenuity.” Mrs Ward is a committed professional, dedicated to developing stimulating and purposeful learning centres, in which each student’s growth and wellbeing is valued. She has been invited to speak at numerous conferences, at both state and national levels, on both English teaching and student wellbeing.

Year 7 Coordinator

Ms Liesl Woods is known to most of our families for her work at Tay Creggan where she has been situated for a number of years assisting the Head of Tay Creggan in running that campus. She has been outstanding in her work with students, other staff, parents and programs across a range of areas, including Outdoor Education, Duke of Edinburgh Award, Humanities/International/ Environmental Studies and Health and Physical Education teaching and Envision. In fact, we have just heard that her work at TC contributed to the School being awarded the winning position in both the 2020 UpSchool Entrepreneur Educator of the Year competition and the 2020 UpSchool Pitch Competition. However, now it is time for a new challenge for Liesl and for her to be back on our Canterbury campus and we were delighted to accept her application for Year 7 Coordinator, for which she was successful.

Liesl has a very interesting, broad-ranging set of skills, experiences and interests. She came to Strathcona as Head of Outdoor Education and coordinated large scale camps, excursions and activities for all year levels. She has worked as a coach of Kayaking, Soccer, Netball, Softball, Waterpolo, AFL and Hockey. Between 2011-2020 Liesl has played and coached at the National Futsal Championships, in the National League, and represented Australia at the AMF World Cup in Barcelona. She has also been a VCE Outdoor and Environmental Studies Exam Assessor – VCAA and received the Dean’s Honour List and Scholarship Award at Monash University where she was Captain of Monash University Sport at the Australian University Games.

Not only is Liesl’s passion sport and the encouragement for young women to take up varying challenges to build resilience, leadership, teamwork and engagement, but she has a strong background in Service. She has worked as a Care Assistant in a residential home for adults in the UK with learning disabilities and as a Volunteer for Peace in the French Alps, restoring a village and assisting excursions for visiting schools and orphanages. This service passion has transferred to experiences she has helped facilitate at Strathcona, such as the World Challenge trip (2012) and support of local charities such as Servants Community Housing and For a Meal through convening activities at the TC campus. Liesl is also very capable in creating high quality AV material and the School has often drawn on these strong AV/IT skills. Liesl is also a strong arts supporter.

We are very fortunate at Strathcona to have such high quality staff who are deeply committed to the students and providing the best experience of school life that they can. This includes warm support and connection while also challenging them and supporting them to take safe risks so that they grow in capacity, self-agency and with a strong ethical framework.

This weekend we celebrate Father’s Day, recognising the care and profound influence Fathers have on all of our lives. For some of us our father is a treasured memory and this is a day of reflection and gratitude for the time spent with us. 

Current Victorian restrictions mean that many families will not be able to celebrate with their fathers or grandfathers as we traditionally do each year with a visit, a restaurant meal or store bought gift. Like everything else we are encouraged to think a little differently about how we honour our Fathers on Sunday. I wish families every happiness and blessing for this special day of recognition as you do so creatively and with much love.

Warm regards
Mrs Marise McConaghy, Principal

This challenge will run for the remainder of the term with the goal being to have each year level as a collective making it around the mainland of Australia – 14,972kms! There are House points up for grabs for the House that makes it the furthest, as well as individual prizes for the students who accumulate the most kms across the three weeks. 

Our Year 10 students have been completing this challenge in PE classes for the past two and a half weeks and have already made it to the famous Daly Waters in the NT having collectively walked almost 6000km! With a head start on the rest of the school, our Year 10s are well on track to make it the whole way around the mainland before the end of term. 

In addition to the students, we have over 80 staff who are also pounding the pavement and contributing to the challenge. Some healthy competition between departments is providing us all with a bit of motivation to stay active for the last three weeks of term.

Keep an eye out on MyStrathcona every Tuesday for weekly updates on our progress!

Ms Keira Willis, Head of Sport

In this week's edition, you will find the following information on:

• Dates to Diarise in Term 3
• News from Monash University
  • Important Notice for Domestic Medicine Applicants
  • 2020 Virtual International Student Experience Day
• RMIT Design Webinars: Advice from Selection Officers regarding Design Tasks
• OELLEN: Understanding Apprenticeships & Traineeships Webinar
• UniMelb Residential Colleges Virtual Open Day - 12 September
• Bachelor of Educational Studies at ACU
• Bachelor of Pre-Medicine, Science and Health at  University of Wollongong
• Snapshot of the University of Adelaide in 2020
• Law Undergraduate Degrees in Victoria in 2020
• Paralegal Degrees in Victoria in 2020

Please click here for this week's Career News. To visit the the Careers page or view previous versions of Careers News click here.

Today is Indigenous Literacy Day, a day to celebrate Indigenous stories, languages and culture. This day is organised by the Indigenous Literacy Foundation (ILF), who do great work fostering a love of reading and books with First Nations children in remote communities around Australia.

Why not visit our Wheelers ebook page to see some recent releases featuring First Nation voices.

The Library Team

In PE classes this week, Liesl Woods invited Miss Spartan, Michelle Smith, to do a HIIT Session – High Intensity Interval Training. Quite a number of the girls joined in on the personal training session which was good to see. As this week is Health and PE Week, we have been encouraging all students to make sure that they get at least 60 minutes of vigorous exercise a day, which is the recommended target under Australian guidelines. All of the Strathcona community, staff included have been logging their exercise hours for the ‘Walk Around (mainland) Australia Challenge’. It is wonderful to see the girls logging their active hours for their House.

Today we kicked off the Pop Up Day in our home kitchens with 'Cooking with Cameron' dressing up pancakes and smoothie bowls with unique style. Many girls enjoyed the opportunity to be creative in the kitchen – we enjoyed seeing what they produced. I hope your kitchen was left clean!

Bianca Chatfield also joined us today. Whilst Bianca is more recently known as a competitor on The Block 2018, she is a champion netballer playing for both Australia and the Mighty Vixens. Bianca works in media as a sports commentator and also as a keynote speaker, leadership coach and advocate for girls & women’s empowerment. She is Head netball coach at the Netball academy at Victoria University. Bianca’s highly engaging talk resonated with the girls as she talked about the frustrations of being tall, working in the media during COVID times when sport stopped and what it was like to be part of a team.

Amanda Walker, female entrepreneur and owner of Lord of the Fries joined us today as well. Amanda shared her personal journey and talked about her passion for business, being positive and being a vegetarian. She was very entertaining, and we enjoyed her optimism and fun!

Last Friday, as you would be aware, our Envision Marketplace Launched. Katie Harris – one of the Envision team, created an infographic to share our launch day statistics. Further Envision information, including the infographic created by Katie and details about our Envision wins in the Wade Institute Upschool competition Pitch and Educator competitions can be found under All School News.

Kind regards,
Mrs Karyn Murray, Head of Tay Creggan

Next week is R U OK Day. To me this is always a reminder of the importance of relationships and connections with people. Whilst recognising the challenges we have all faced it is important to try not to lose hope, because we can be grateful for what we have and can look forward to. Each week I am appreciative of your continued care, kindness and understanding. Rather than diminishing over time, my appreciation for all you are doing grows all the time.

Mrs Anna Miller and our Music leaders have put together some activities for Tuesday and Friday afternoon. I hope you have been enjoying these fun extra challenges each week, I certainly enjoy seeing all the photographs.

Mrs Lisa Miller, Head of Junior School

Discovering birds nesting in the hollow of a tree within our playground became the catalyst for further research, the children keen to learn more about these birds that live and watch over them. Together we shared what ‘we know and what we wondered’, which lead to researching the species of bird, its habitat and diet. A beautifully illustrated book of Australian birds has been read each day, with the children narrowing their choice based on the evidence presented. Further investigation regarding the birds’ diet lead to a provision of tasty treats, including worms from the compost, home-made ‘seed cookies’ and sweet cereal. Then it was a matter of settling in to observe the outcome! 

In the remote learning program, the children have also enjoyed our series of science projects. Their natural inquisitive minds keen to investigate and learn about seeds and growth, light and colour and more recently, the concept of water displacement. After experimenting with items that float and sink, the children were presented with a challenge. Using the plasticine and marble from their resource pack, could they find a way to make these items float? This tested their resilience, determination and problem-solving skills, but very rewarding when they succeeded!

Have a wonderful weekend and  hopefully a relaxing Fathers Day.

Mrs Jo Dowling, Director of ELC

Today is Indigenous Literacy Day, a day to celebrate Indigenous stories, languages and culture. 

Why not celebrate Indigenous Literacy day with picture story books written by Indigenous authors and read by Bernadine from the Melbourne Library.

Or go to StoryBox Library, log in using the school password, and search for “indigenous” in the search field to see all the stories available, many of which are read by Indigenous storytellers. 

The Indigenous Literacy Foundation (ILF) does amazing work to foster literacy in remote communities around Australia. 
This year, the ILF is celebrating Indigenous Literacy day with a national virtual Youtube Live event. ILF ambassador Jessica Mauboy, and long-time supporter Archie Roach will be joined by many others to share some delightful stories. The live event can be viewed on YouTube any time that suits you.                                                                                                                                                      

Junior School Library

Heavenly Father

We come to you with fatigued and afflicted hearts after many difficult months in the midst of COVID-19, with no clear end in sight. Help us to remember in these troubled times that you hold the world in the palm of your hand, and that your plan for the world good.

Father, we pray for all those individuals and families in our Strathcona community who are experiencing particularly acute and difficult suffering during this time. Be with them, and help each of us to embody your love as we care for them to the best of our ability. Help us to be generous and proactive in looking after each other, even at a distance. We thank you for the leaders of our school, who continue to diligently guide our community through this unprecedented situation. Grant them energy and strength needed for them to continue to lead.

We also pray that you would instil wisdom in the leaders of nations, both here and abroad. Let them be guided by you, and help them not to lose sight of their responsibility to your people as they shoulder the difficult burden of leadership. Although isolation and separation on an individual and global scale has been necessary due to the pandemic, we pray that you would allow this universal experience to ultimately bring all people together, with a new empathy and understanding of our likeness, made in your image.

Heavenly Father, help us to remember that although this year has been anything but ordinary, you are good. We thank you that you listen to our prayers. Help us to remain hopeful, and to continue to see the joys of your world as we persevere.

We ask all these things in the name of your son, Jesus Christ.

Amen

“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit” Romans 15:13

Hillary Halford, Faith Leader

Our Envision Marketplace launched with great success last Friday. We were overwhelmed by the support of our Strathcona family and friends and are busily making more products to fulfill orders. Click here to see our statistics since we launched and started selling online. The Marketplace is open to the Strathcona community to make a purchase. Click here to have a look at our products, when making a purchase you will need to include the password of: taycreggan.

We were also thrilled with the news earlier in the week of a further boost to Envision with one of our businesses - the Envision Marketplace, being awarded the title 'Wade Institute Pitch Winners 2020' and Liesl Woods and myself - representing the Envision Team, named 'Educators of the Year 2020'. The Wade Institute for Entrepreneurship at Melbourne University is one of Australia's pre-eminent schools for teaching entrepreneurship. The student team will now proceed to pitch their business along with Masters of Entrepreneurship students at their showcase night. Click here to watch the winning videos.

Mrs Karyn Murray, Head of Tay Creggan

StrathconaConnect is an online platform which will, for the first time, bring together our powerful network of Strathcona women across all graduation years, providing opportunities for professional development, mentoring, networking and volunteering. It is a place where you can find old friends and make new ones, create interest groups, post and attend events, seek help and offer it.

Built in is a space for you to post the details of your business if you have one, offer or take advantage of special deals for alumnae, advertise a job, or even apply for one. Everyone knows the calibre of a Strathcona woman. Here is your opportunity to be part of an incredibly special network full of intelligent, encouraging, nurturing and empowered women.

We know that now, more than ever, we all need a little more TLC, along with the support of a community to which we belong. Registering is a quick and simple, no-fuss exercise. So, jump online now, sign up and start connecting. Spread the word to your old Strathcona classmates and colleagues. The more women we reconnect, the more powerful our collective networks will be.

If you have any questions or difficulties registering, please email Eliza Goding egoding@strathcona.vic.edu.au

• We celebrated Early Childhood Educators Day with a post to say Thank You to our early childhood educators in the ELC.

• Our TC Envision Program won the 2020 UpSchool Entrepreneur Educator of the Year and the TC Marketplace website won the 2020 UpSchool Student Pitch Competition at the University of Melbourne Wade Institute.

• We announced that the Envision Marketplace is now open to the School community to purchase from.

• Highlights of Year 1, Year 5, Year 7, Year 11, Year 12 and more.

Plus more. Like us on Facebook, follow us on Instagram or look us up on LinkedIn.

Nicole was born and raised in New York and began her career as a makeup artist before moving into a career in B2B sales. She decided to move to Australia with her son looking for a sea change.

While shopping in David Jones to replace a beloved candle she purchased in New York City, Nicole couldn’t find what she was looking for and saw a clear gap in the market and, from a spark of imagination, Glasshouse Fragrances was born.

With the experience of setting up her own business, she will talk about what it required to set up a business and the challenges she faced while doing this.

We hope you can join us for this exciting seminar, register your details below.