Welcome to the first newsletter of the 2020 school year. It was great to welcome back our returning students and greet our new Year 7s, all 208 of them! As always, the first few weeks can be a challenge for our students, adjusting to a new routine, making new friends and finding their place. However, it has been pleasing to see how quickly they have adjusted and settled into high school life.

Firstly, a very warm welcome is extended to our new staff to Belridge SC: Scott Davies, Stuart Rutter and Madison Dimitroff - Mathematics, Andrew Blakeney - Science, Chloe Tsoulis - Visual Arts and Theresa Wilkes - Home Economics.  

Our Year 12 cohort from 2019 certainly did the College proud and achieved some great results. The WACE achievement rate was 98%, which is higher than both Like Schools and State Schools. Students who completed their ATAR resulted in a median ATAR of 66.4 which was lower than our like schools, however, all of our students who planned to progress to university gained entry into their chosen course. Our Strong OLNA results saw 99% of our eligible cohort achieve the minimum standard in both literacy and numeracy. We also had 34% of our students leave with two or more VET qualifications, placing our students in a strong position for competitive entry into the TAFE sector and employment.

On Tuesday 11 February it was a pleasure to host our first ATSI Afternoon Tea. We had a great turn out from our students, parents and staff and started to put some new plans in place to address the Aboriginal Cultural Standards Framework in more depth at the College.

We also held our BYOD parent’s seminar for our Year 7 families, which focused on supporting parents to assist their child in navigating their new machine and developing skills around the use of Microsoft 365 and the internet.

Week 3 and 4 saw the delivery of our Elevate sessions revision seminars for both our lower and senior school students. Getting good study habits in place early and forming a routine will really help our students develop the skills they will need to be successful in the future.

Following the release of the new Department of Education Strategic Plan “Every student, every classroom, everyday” and Focus 2020, our new business plan is ready to be released. It will be presented to the board during our next meeting in week 6 and then made available to the public.

Being new to Belridge SC family, I am amazed at the dedication and enthusiasm of the staff across the college. The level of care and support for the wellbeing of our students is second to none. It is an absolute pleasure to be here and I look forward to sharing the Colleges journey with you through this newsletter.

Sharon Lyon
Principal