SCAS News

“We’ve got five years, what a surprise
Five years, stuck on my eyes
We’ve got five years, my brain hurts a lot
Five years, that’s all we’ve got.”
David Jones a.k.a. David Bowie (deceased)

St Columba has recently gone through a school registration process.

If you have never worked in an independent school, you will not know about the process of school registration.

Despite what you may think, independent schools are reliant for funding etc on the government, and meeting the registration requirements of the NSW Education Department (NESA) is a condition of receiving funding.

All independent schools undertake this process.

The NSW Education Standards Authority (‘NESA’) is responsible for providing advice and making recommendations to the Minister for Education about the registration of non-government schools and for making decisions about the accreditation of non-government schools to present candidates for the Record of School Achievement and Higher School Certificate.

Registered and accredited non-government schools, and registration systems, must abide by the Education Act 1990.

This means that, like your car, our school has to meet government standards or it cannot receive funds to do its job.

In the past the registration process meant weeks of preparation, rooms set aside to display evidence that the school was able to, and was meeting, the requirements set by the government.

Over the years the system has changed and, instead of a week or two week visitation period, today’s visit from the officers who determine our future can be as short as half a day.

This does not mean that the process is any less rigorous. Before the visit of the “inspectors”, a team of school leaders worked with teaching and support staff to diligently check that we are compliant with every regulation, uploaded documents and lists and answered multiple telephone calls and emails from NESA.

The result of this process is that St Columba has been approved for a five year registration – the maximum possible!

I would like to thank all the staff who worked so hard to ensure the ongoing registration of our School.

Of particular note is the many hours spent by the Registration Team – Allan Guihot, Shannon Rosewood and Julie Drake – who ensured that every document, list and form was completed, checked, rechecked, submitted and logged so that registration would be granted.

Since I opened with a David Bowie quote, let me end with one that suits what we do next…

“Lord, I kneel and offer you
My word on a wing
And I’m trying hard to fit among
Your scheme of things..”
Word on a Wing – David Bowie.