Sapphire Coast Anglican College Newsletter | Term 1 | week 2 | 2025

...'And in with the new!'

Writing this on the evening of 5th February, it seems unfashionably late to be wishing everyone in the Sapphire Coast Anglican College community a very Happy New Year. However, our first Newsletter of the 2025 academic year marks just over a month since a vast array of works began, supervised and undertaken by a cast of, at times well over a dozen expert and energetic staff and contractors. The vast majority of their labours had been meticulously planned, including a major Internet cabling project connecting the outer suburbs of Primary Art and Music in A Block to that most wonderful 20th century invention, the Internet; doing foundation excavations for two modular music practise ‘pods’ that arrived on the back of a truck from Melbourne and, perhaps most noticeably, imaginatively landscaping the steep and formerly scruffy bank between upper and main ovals.

In addition to those projects, the major redesign and remodelling of several PK-2 classrooms and creation of new office spaces made the summer holidays feel like anything but to so many, to whom we are extremely grateful.

What was totally unexpected and unwelcome was a major lightning strike on the building that we refer to as D Block, normally housing Year 3-6 students and staff, on the afternoon of Friday 10th January. While the accompanying deluge was exactly what was needed hereabouts, the total destruction of 24 of the College’s 50 wireless access points and a host of other sensitive electrical connections most certainly was not. A desperate call to the Diocesan IT specialists on the Monday morning revealed that (i) in 20 years of managing dozens of IT systems across schools, retirement homes and Anglicare offices, not to mention the odd church and cathedral, no more than one or two such points had ever been destroyed by a lightning strike before and therefore (ii) only the bare minimum of replacements were held in storage in Canberra.

Silicon Valley suppliers (yes, really) were soon engaged in our recovery mission and highly trained technicians of all sorts despatched from the ACT, appropriately enough often in Tesla automobiles (!) converging on the College with barely a fortnight before the return of our students. The fact that, to most, everything seemed virtually as normal by the re-start is amazing, and testament to the immediacy and sustained high level of the response. Not even the unavailability of the usual bus services prevented the first week of SCAC 2025 being a busy, bustling success.

In other news about newness, we are blessed to have recruited some wonderful new staff (about whom more will be revealed in the coming weeks) to help us accommodate our continued growth. Expanded middle and senior leadership teams have a steely focus on ensuring conditions are right to continue to improve our students’ achievements in classrooms, labs and workshops.

Oh, and I almost forgot to mention (such are the mists of time that shroud HSC results day, way back on 18th December 2024, in my easily distracted mind) that those results were extremely impressive. Of course, it is right, and wonderful to celebrate the second-highest ATAR result in the College’s 30-year history, and a host of Band 5s and 6s, but it was the uniformity of the Class of 2024’s academic progress, particularly in their final 12 months at the College that made more than a few of us rather emotional on that sunny, pre-Christmas morning.

It's a rather corny adage that, ‘teamwork makes the dream work’, but when so many youngsters stayed up/woke up to discover they had achieved more than they had dare hope for, the SCAC ‘Dream Team’ of student, family, teachers, counsellors, support staff and others, really had worked together beautifully.

So, we look forward to the year ahead with confidence and steadfast commitment to pursue improvement in every aspect of College life. Our sincere thanks for support past, present and yet to come.

SCAC is growing, but Primary class size is shrinking!

Due to significant growth across our College, we have made a strategic decision to significantly reduce class sizes in the Primary School. Rather than the average class being around 24 students in 2025, we are fortunate to have been able to split most classes to an average of just 16.

While the infamous John Hattie’s Visible Learning research suggests that larger classes do not necessarily impact overall learning outcomes positively, there is extensive educational research that consistently highlights many other benefits.

The Australian Education Research Organisation (AERO) and the NSW Centre for Education Statistics and Evaluation (CESE) ‘What Works Best’ (2020) states while high-quality teaching has the greatest impact on learning, it is recognised avoiding high numbers of students can bring many benefits when a school’s focus is on growth of the individual.

Fortunately for us here at SCAC, we now have both!

Growth is a positive challenge for a thriving school, and we are blessed the Diocese has provided the necessary support to ensure we can continue delivering a high-quality education.

The Diocese’s investment in reducing class sizes substantially, combined with our renewed focus on evidence-based teaching practices, allows us to create an environment where every student receives the attention and support they need - to grow academically, socially and emotionally in the following ways:

• Teachers will be providing more individualised instruction and differentiated support for struggling learners, whilst extending challenges for high achievers. They will be assessing, tracking and responding to each child’s progress more effectively. Discovery Maths support will be brought into Year 5 and 6 lessons specifically to extend and challenge students.
• Young Scientist and Creative Writing Discovery will be in addition to in-class learning and will now be provided as an extra-curricular opportunity at lunch times, ensuring opportunity for all.
• Student-Teacher relationships will build deeper connections fostering a sense of trust and security so ensuring a teacher better understands each student’s strengths, interests and challenges.
• Student engagement and participation opportunities will increase, ensuring all students have opportunities to contribute without being overshadowed, creating a more inclusive learning environment where quieter students feel comfortable engaging.
• Teachers will provide more timely and specific feedback to students on in-class work and in-class assessment (both formative and summative) leading to misconceptions being addressed in a timely manner, preventing gaps in understanding. Regular assessment will enable teachers to adjust teaching strategies accordingly.
• Avoiding very large class sizes will foster a classroom environment that is more cooperative and will focus on challenge for all in their learning.
• All of the above will lead to more meaningful discussions with parents about their child’s progress and strengthen the school-home partnership for student success in all its forms at SCAC.

This commitment ensures that as our school expands, we remain focused on maintaining excellence in learning and student well-being.

Mrs Millie Proudlove | Director of Teaching and Learning