A warm welcome to everyone and especially to our new parents and guardians.
As parents and guardians of our students, we would like to partner with you in this critical transition time, whether students are beginning, continuing or finalising their education at Damascus College. We will continue to work with you throughout this year to ensure that our students succeed in their academic goals. We acknowledge that a strong academic foundation and well-developed character strengths are necessary for success. These are interconnected, and one cannot be compromised for the other. These strengths are acquired through mindful practice.
As part of our commitment to working together, we ask students and parents to read through the College Agreements in the College Diary. Students have been asked to sign the diary with their parents and Teacher Advisor.
Learning and Teaching Focus:
In multiple studies and policy reports, the development of literacy and critical and creative thinking skills have been closely linked to success in social and emotional development, employability, further education and 21st-century skills.
Over the past few months, various groups within Damascus College have discussed how best to support students to improve their social, emotional and academic outcomes. With the recent support of our POL 4 leaders, Alysoun Smalley (Curriculum and Assessment), Hannah Keating (Wellbeing) and Matthew Hallowed (Student Growth and Engagement), we will be rolling initiatives/programs that focus on strengthening and stretching student growth in the classroom.
In 2023, The College Learning and Teaching programme will build on the deeper learning competencies through the engagement of the 5Es, and its relationship with the High Impact Teaching Strategies (HITS); see below.
5Es | HITS |
Engage 
Teachers know their students well and engage them in building supportive, inclusive and stimulating learning environments. Teachers motivate and empower students to manage their learning and development agency. 
  | - Setting Goals (Learning Intentions and Success Criteria)
- Structuring Lessons
|
Explore- Teachers present challenging tasks to support students in generating and investigating questions, gathering relevant information and developing ideas. They help students expand their perspectives and preconceptions, understand learning tasks and prepare to navigate their learning.  | - Explicit Teaching
- Worked Examples
|
Explain- Teachers explicitly teach relevant knowledge, concepts and skills in multiple ways to connect new and existing knowledge. They monitor student progress in learning and provide structured opportunities for practising new skills and developing agency. 
Teachers challenge students to move from surface to deep learning, building student ability to transfer and generalise their learning.    | - Collaborative Learning
- Multiple Exposures
|
Elaborate- students to be reflective, questioning and self-monitoring learners.  | - Questioning
- Feedback
|
Evaluate- Teachers use multiple forms of assessment and feedback to help students improve their learning and develop agency. They monitor student progress and analyse data to conclude the effectiveness of their teaching practices, identify areas for improvement and address students’ individual needs.  | - Metacognitive Strategies
- Differentiated Teaching
|
How will we get there?
Professional Learning Communities are proven ways for schools to increase student learning and outcomes by creating a culture focused on continuous improvement by linking the learning needs of students with explicit and anchored, high-impact strategies and practices. (Framework for Improving Student Outcomes: DET 2018).
Over the years, the College has invested time and resources into working with staff, students and families to enact the strategic priorities of the College, particularly in improving student outcomes. Over the course of Term 1, 2023, Sarah McKnight (Instructional Development Leader), Angela Crebbin (Literacy Lead), Rod Mathews (Leader of Data Analytics), Alysoun Smalley (Leader of curriculum and Assessment), Middle Leaders and teachers will work together in their respective areas to engage in strengthening three critical areas;
- Introducing and embedding Learning Intentions and Success Criteria for all Topics/Units
- Ensuring Tasks and Rubric focuses on engaging all learners using the 5Es/HITS approach and a rubric that differentiates skills (subject-specific and SEL) and knowledge
- Improving the Reading culture among our students, allowing them to confidently access information, make sense of it, express their thoughts and emotions, evaluate, and present ideas and opinions through interaction with others.
Our College Vision states the importance of inspiring and challenging our students to reach their potential. To encourage this, an intervention group will also be formed and meet regularly to support all our students to reach and exceed their potential. The support will involve using evidence-based, time-bound intervention strategies to engage our learners who need additional/alternative instruction or extension. The group is fluid and will apply initially to the Leader of Student Growth and Engagement, Principal and Assistant Principal L&T; fluid members may include a member of the Student Growth and Engagement team, Learning Area Leaders, House Leaders, Wellbeing Team or teaching staff.
Parent Access Module (PAM) and Procedures:
A PAM tutorial will be sent to parents over the week. PAM can track and monitor your child’s assessments, class work, reports, procedures and interviews and receive formative feedback through the Student Digest. Several College Academic procedures have been updated and can be accessed through PAM. These College procedures include the ‘Late Submission Procedure’, ‘Plagiarism Procedure’ and correspondence encouraging homestudy. I encourage Parents/Carers to read these procedures as it clarifies the Academic expectations.
Welcome again to our 2023 school year! Our College considers it a tremendous responsibility and an honour to be part of your student’s story. We look forward to working with you to meet the needs of our school and our multi-talented student body. Best wishes to all for a productive and successful school year. It is my hope that this will be your best year ever!