High Notes, Vol 24 No 15, May 26 2023
From the Principal
High Talent
Congratulations to Oscar Greville (12M) on his selection into the Combined High Schools Rugby
team and to Hikun Nguyen (12E) on his selection in Combined GPS First XI Football. Aiden McManus
(10R) and Dylan Dutt (10) were selected into the combined GPS U16 Football team. Well done, lads!
At the NSW Fencing Association U13 Men's Individual Sabre School Championships Aaron Li
(8S) won Silver, Minjoon Park (7F) and Kenzie Yuan (8S) won equal Bronze. At the NSW Schools
Fencing League U16 Individual Epee Championships hosted at Barker College, Tommy Xu (10E) won
Gold, Xavier Perry (10M) won Silver and Jamison Lai (10E) won equal Bronze. Well done on your
successes, boys! Congratulations to Kenton Liu (11R) on his successful completion of his Gold
Level in the Duke of Edinburgh Award Scheme. Special mention of High values of integrity and
compassion 鈥� to Sanjeev Gopal (9E) for handing in a gold necklace he found which was later
claimed by a very grateful and equally relieved owner.
Sorry Day
In December of 1992, Paul Keating鈥檚 Redfern Speech gave political recognition to the
genesis of the racial problem in Australia being non-aboriginal Australians who 鈥渢ook the
traditional lands and smashed the traditional way of life,鈥� essentially as a result of invasion.
Non-aboriginal Australians showed their ignorance and prejudice in their treatment of indigenous
people. As human beings we failed 鈥渢o imagine these things being done to us鈥�. By December 1993 a
Commonwealth Native Title Tribunal was established under the Native Title Act to confront
dispossession and find a way to return to indigenous people land that had always been theirs.
A social justice spin-off from this legislation was a public exposure of the policy of
assimilation and the forced removal of children from their families. The practice began in the
1800s and continued until the 1970s. The report of the subsequent judicial inquiry was handed
down in the 1997 鈥�Bringing Them Home Report鈥� accused white society of
gross violations of the human rights of indigenous people. The policy amounted to attempted
genocide in practice 鈥� communities and cultures were the targets. The report recommended an
apology to ATSI people and that reparations ought to be paid to survivors and their families.
A year after this report was tabled, May 26 1998, the first National Sorry Day was held. It has
been held annually ever since. Sorry Day is a precursor to Reconciliation Week and focuses on
remembrance of the damage caused by past policies to indigenous families as a result of the
forced removal of their children. On Sunday, 29 May 2000, 250,000 people participated in the
Corroboree Bridge Walk highlighting the lack of an official apology from the Australian
Government to indigenous Australians. Since 2005, the official title for Sorry Day has been a
National Day of Healing for All Australians. On February 13, 2008, Kevin Rudd delivered
the historical apology to ATSI people on behalf of the Australian Government for the 鈥減rofound
grief, suffering and loss鈥� inflicted upon them.鈥� For the pain, suffering and hurt of these Stolen
Generations, their descendants and for their families left behind, we say sorry鈥�. A shocking
statistic is that today ATSI children are 10.6 times more likely to be removed from their
parents鈥� household than non-indigenous children.
National Reconciliation Week May 27 鈥� June 3
Theme: Be a Voice for Generations
During this week as Australians, we need to focus on our awareness of our shared histories and
achievements alongside Aboriginal people and to explore how each of us can contribute to
achieving reconciliation in Australia. The week is bookmarked by the successful referendum of May
27, 1967 in which ATSI people were recognised in the census and June 3, 1992 when the historic
Mabo decision by the High Court overturned the 鈥榯erra nullius鈥� legal fiction. Native Title has
emerged since the decision, recognising ATSI people as the traditional owners and custodian of
lands. National Reconciliation Week started in 1993 as a week of Prayer for Reconciliation to
commensurate the International Year of the World鈥檚 Indigenous People. In 1996 the Council
for Aboriginal Reconciliation launched Reconciliation Week. In 2001 Reconciliation Australia was
established to provide national leadership on reconciliation. This year is a pivotal one for
reconciliation, given Australians have to vote in a referendum to recognise First Nations people
in the Constitution. To enshrine an Aboriginal voice in some form in the Constitution would be a
鈥榲oice for generations鈥� in its impact.
Interpreting Year 8 Reports Semester 1
All boys should now have their reports. Parents need to know that a few marks up or down near
cut-off scores for Distinctions or High Distinctions can make a big difference in their son鈥檚
points鈥� totals. Also, these grades are sometimes calculated from only one or two snapshot
assessment tasks, thus providing a narrow view of achievement. When moving from Year 7 into Year
8 students get their first-choice process 鈥� one language or two? As a consequence, some
boys do ten subjects in Year 7 and others, nine. To calculate the boys鈥� scores, their best 9
subject outcomes are counted (27 points at credit level). So, boys doing more subjects may have
an advantage. Conversely, they may be disadvantaged by having more subjects to master. Language
choice can affect ranking outcomes. For example, some boys chose Chinese Advanced. Some chose
Latin, others chose Latin and Classical Greek. These are demanding subjects. Getting Distinctions
in these subjects is harder 鈥� fewer students do them, too. Boys not doing two languages have to
have their PE results counted. Sometimes boys in Year 8 start to think about what electives they
might do in Year 9 and what compulsory subjects there are. These future choices might affect
their motivation to succeed in some of the compulsory subjects that they are doing currently.
Because of the semesterisation of history and geography, students who perform much better in one
of these disciplines more than the other can produce big swings in points earned at the half
yearly or yearly report. Quite a few boys who have done well in their Yearly Report take their
foot off the accelerator and coast through semester one, with effects on their ranking. Often,
they get back on track by the time of the Yearly Report again. In short, there are many reasons
for big swings in rank. I think that +/- 20% of the cohort (36+) positions of swing means that
something has altered. Their biggest issue usually is distraction, due to gaming, unrestricted
device use, social media immersion or other myriad teenage activities. Often, big positive or
negative fluctuations are due to changes in learning dispositions: boys listening in class,
acting on teacher feedback, being organised and managing their commitments, taking notes, doing
homework, accessing past papers and revising before assessment periods. Alternatively, if they
stop doing these things, their results may decline. Circumstances in their domestic life may
affect their learning concentration or motivation and result in big swings in the rank order
also. Despite the shortcomings identified, our stable statistical expectations over more than two
decades provide a fairly reliable overall academic profile for students and parents to consider.
Assessment and Reporting
Year 11 assessments commence in Week 6 from Monday May 29 to Friday June 2. Reports will be
finalised for students with completed Clearance Forms to discuss with the Principal from June 19.
Sentence Conscious Pedagogy: Expanding sentences using 'because', 'but', 'so'
Supply sentence stems for students to expand using the sequence because, but, so.
鈥�Because鈥� explains why something is true; 鈥�but鈥� indicates a change of direction
or qualification; 鈥�so鈥� explains a cause and its effect 鈥� what happens as a result of
something else happening. A stem sentence can be expanded three times using
conjunctions. Each expansion can be written initially as a separate sentence. The sentences can
then be reconfigured into one complex sentence. E.g. Our swimming carnival was a success (stem
sentence). Our swimming carnival was a success because the weather was fine and
many school records were broken, but several students tried to swim who couldn鈥檛
and then got into difficulties in the pool, so several teachers and some
students had mixed feelings about the events of the day.
Dr K A Jaggar
Principal
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