Dear Parents and Families

It is a pleasure to welcome you back to Term 4 – at the same time, of course, that we have started the process of farewells that, in part, defines the final term.

To acknowledge and celebrate the contributions and achievements of our Year 12 students, we held our 2022 Awards Evening last week, followed by the whole school assembly earlier this week.  Both occasions were lovely tributes to the Year 12’s, and you can read more about each event below.  We wish each of our graduating students all the very best for their futures, and for the exams for those who have them coming up.

Congratulations…

To Mr Michael Bowden who this year has been appointed Chief Examiner for Victoria in Studio Arts.  This is a wonderful recognition of Michael’s knowledge and skills as a teacher, leader and VCE assessor in this field; and also of the esteem in which he is held by his colleagues across the state.

We are very fortunate to benefit from Michael’s expertise , and wish him well in this role.

Year 12 Graduation

This year were able to return to Moonee Valley Racecourse to celebrate the Graduation of the Class of 2022. It was a wonderful evening, full of music, joy and speeches. Our guest speaker, SASC alumna,  Christina Yakovlev, spoke about her time at SASC, and her journey to where she is now.

A special congratulations to the major award winners.

These were:

Year 12 Long Tan Award – Charlize Luang – Le

Y12 ADF STEM Innovators Award – Anthony Tran

Ampol All Rounder – Elizabeth Catania

VCAL Excellence Award – Vishal Gill

VCE Excellence Award (Dux) – Anthony Tran

 

The full list of subject awards can be found later in this newsletter.

We would like to congratulate all of the VCAL and VCE students of the Class of 2022, and wish them well in their future endeavours.

Congratulations to the Senior Sub School team for their organisation of the event, and to all those staff who volunteered their time to support the students.

VCE Exams

The external VCE written exams commence next Wednesday, starting with English. We would like to wish all of the students sitting the exams the very best for the next few weeks. We know that all of the hard work you have put into your studies this year will set you up to do the best that you can.

Whole School Assembly

Our whole of School Assemblies are an important part of our school calendar, and it was wonderful to be able to celebrate our Year 12 cohort and wish them well as a whole school community on their last day on Monday 17 October. This assembly provided a valuable opportunity to farewell the Year 12s as they make their way onto the next part of their journey.  It was also an opportunity to showcase our school values of Respect, Integrity, Leadership and Excellence. The assembly included rituals such as the passing on of the time capsules and the handing over to the next group of  school leaders. Both outgoing and incoming School Captains addressed the school community and it was clear that both sets of leaders felt a sense of pride in their school.

Jackie Chen and Olivia Nguyen from Year 7 responded to the leaders and thanked the Year 12 cohort on behalf of Year 7, whom those same leaders welcomed into the school during our whole school assembly at the start of this year.

During the award presentations, we heard from two alumni from the class of ’84.  Dr Jozica Kutin presented the $250 Psychology Award she inaugurated for a student who has shown commitment, potential, and is continuing their studies in Psychology into Year 12.  This award went to Lily Huang of 11B . Ms Helen Papadimitriou presented the $250 English Award she donated for a Year 10 student who shows outstanding growth and achievement in English.  This was awarded to Jessica Luong of 10E.

Also presented was the Roger Martin Science Award which is $120 donated by the Martin family in honour of their father who was a previous Science teacher and Vice Principal of the school. This is awarded to a student who shows outstanding achievement in Science and is continuing their Science studies into VCE. This year, the award went to Anh Thu Nguyen of 10C.

A new award will be presented for the next 5 years.  The Joseph and Clare Sheen Award for Community Service has been donated by Mr Greg Sheen, a recently retired teacher of the school,  who wanted to acknowledge those students who contribute to improving their community. This award is to be awarded to one or two students for voluntary and active tasks benefitting the community.  This year there were two recipients who will each receive $425.  The two students who received this award were Meera Mansukhani of 11C and My Hang Lam of 10F.

 

The Student Recognition Prizes are awarded at the end of each year to a student from each Sub School who exemplifies the school values of Respect, Integrity, Leadership and Excellence.  This includes having over 90% attendance, always behaving respectfully to other students and staff and in accordance with expectations including always being punctual.  The students who were drawn from the pool of those eligible for each Sub School are:

Junior Sub School – Alia El-Alo of 8B,

Middle Sub school – Anh Luong of 10E, and

Senior Sub School – Sophia Vo of 12F

 

There was a parade of the fashion items created by our Senior Fashion classes assisted by Mr Michael Bowden and Mr Nick D’Aglas; and the Crocker House Cup was awarded, by Mr Ian Crocker, to the winning House which, for 2022, was Buttrose.  Final House points for the year were:

Buttrose:               6499

Irwin:                     6265                      

Rosewall:              5983

Freeman:              5777

Well done to Buttrose House and all the students who received awards.  All were thoroughly deserved. We also thank and congratulate our Facilities and Music Teams who worked behind the scenes to ensure the effective set up and presentation of the event.  Well done to all involved. Thank you also to our special guests and all the student speakers and musicians.

Congratulations to our class of 2022.  We wish you all the best for your upcoming exams and placements and look forward to hearing about your accomplishments beyond school.  Each of you will forever be part of the St Albans Secondary College community and we hope to see many of you return as part of our Alumni Program.

Student Attitudes to School Survey

Every year all students complete the Student Attitude to School Survey. This year the College is pleased to announce that we have made significant growth across the College, in contrast to a downward trend across the state of Victoria. Our school was higher than the state average for all measures and in the top quartile (25%) of the state for 19 out of 22 measures. For 8 domains, we achieved our highest results to date.

Some of our strongest achievements were:

1. Attitudes to attendance: The extent of students’ attitude towards absenteeism – 93.2 percentile
2. Emotional awareness and regulation: The extent to which students can manage their emotions and maintain positive relationships – 85.6 percentile.
3. Respect for Diversity: Respect for diversity: The extent to which students perceive that people are treated fairly and diversity is respected – 83.6 percentile
4. Perseverance: The extent of students’ level of perseverance, their capacity to manage, recover and move on from challenging events – 82.6 percentile
5. Effective Classroom behaviour: The extent to which teachers manage behaviour effectively in the classroom – 81.6 percentile

This is a wonderful achievement and reinforces that hard work our students and staff have been doing to develop resilient mindsets and ensure everyone at our school feels Connected Protected and Respected. Well done, St Albans!