Academic Excellence

Dean's Message | Faculties

Dean's Message | Faculties

Message from Dean of Studies

Academic medals continue to be a prized possession by our students. Great enthusiasm and concern is evidenced on the announcement of medal winners. The support from families ranging from siblings to grandparents and aunts and uncles numbered well over two hundred. The continued support we receive from our parent body in so many ways allows us to bench-mark our goal in excellence in learning. At this assembly, we also recognise a student who has improved the most throughout the semester.

Reporting to parents has occurs four times during the year. Both Term Three and Term Four reports have data around students’ cumulative results. Electronic tracking of students’ results continues through our database. These trends in student outcomes have been very useful tools for staff mentoring to occur.

Staff tutoring beyond school hours remains as a hallmark at Terrace. The generosity and care of our students by our staff is most appreciated by all in the Terrace community. We are indeed very fortunate to have such dedicated teachers within our school.

This year the College purchased an on-line Study Skills program, accessible to both students and parents. This comprehensive program gives detailed information around many and varied skills that lead to maximising learning.

Organisation, often a challenge for many students, is just one of the topics addressed with details down to how to arrange a place of study.

As Waterford Place celebrates its first anniversary, Year Ten students will move back to their first year of Senior schooling. Waterford Place has produced some strong academic results with boys feeling greatly supported in this smaller environment. Technology has been extensively integrated into the curriculum, teachers have been able to facilitate team planning more easily and skills of higher order thinking have been incorporated. Immersion units for Year Ten and Exploration units for Year Nine continued to deliver diverse and exciting learning opportunities to our students.

Our Curriculum continues to evolve and develop with the embedding of the Dimensions of Learning frame-work. This structure allows for consistency and fluency across year levels. The Consultant in Residence program continues to support our curriculum. Our thanks to the committee for their on-going and unwavering support and confidence in our requests.

Our Careers Expo is always a highlight. Our students are made aware of possible course pathways and also of possible scholarships. The generosity of our community to speak on their profession or area of study is one for which we are most grateful.

Through all that we do and facilitate in the Studies Office, our driving goal is within our College mission statement “we seek excellence in teaching and learning with a commitment to curriculum, renewal, and academic challenge”.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank the many people who support and contribute to our goals. To our parents for their continued support, to the students for their energy, dedication and sense of fun and staff for their tireless efforts to give the best opportunities to our boys.

I look forward to sharing 2008 with the new and continuing families of our community.

Julie Quinn, Dean of Studies

Dean's Message | Faculties