St Columba is already planning to be even better next year.
Like most high performing organisations, St Columba recognises that standing still is not an option, if we are to offer the very best service to our community.
As we plan for next year, we take into account a range of issues in deciding what our goals will be.
As an independent school, our very existence depends on the support of parents who enrol their children, so we take into account their views.
The data shows that the following are key areas of parental concern when choosing a school:
- a school that offers a holistic educational experience for their children,
- a school that has the capacity and resources to deliver a great education,
- a school that has a committed and effective teaching staff,
- a safe working environment,
- a school where individual attention is given to students,
- parental confidence that staff will notice and take action should any problems arise.
As a school, we need to focus on the delivery of an exceptional educational program.
Our choice of Deep Learning as our educational base has shown that it not only provides a relevant and engaging educational experience for our students, but has the benefit of focussing on skills that enhance their future learning and career progress.
Educationally, our goal is to ensure that every day we will:
- ensure effective use of instructional time,
- use effective instructional practices,
- focus on developing foundational literacy and numeracy skills,
- access and use a variety of assessment tools to measure progress and inform areas of improvement,
- create a positive campus climate and environment,
- support ongoing and effective professional development of staff,
- have effective and sound educational structures and administrative practices that support learning.
We will ensure this happens through examination of our focus on:
- student-centred decision-making and creating a safe and secure learning environment,
- high quality instruction,
- focus on the wholistic development of each student,
- an effective approach to uncovering the curriculum and using valid educational data to make decisions about how we teach,
- focussing on post-school readiness,
- strategically using technology to enhance learning,
- using a variety of assessment tools to measure achievement and progress,
- supporting a range of co-curricular and extracurricular structures,
- cultivating leadership potential in students and staff,
- working with parents and providing effective modes of communication to report on their child’s progress.
All our efforts in planning and delivery are based on our Schools’ clearly stated vision and mission:
School Vision: At St Columba we will transform the lives of our students by offering the educational opportunities that will allow them to have lives of purpose, service and engagement.
School Mission: St Columba Anglican School is founded on faith. The Christian ethos is present in its caring philosophy and its concern to produce educated leadership. The School is a community school in the sense that its doors are open to all, so long as they are sympathetic to and support the School’s Christian foundation.
Our goal is to become the most outstanding school in New South Wales by:
- aligning all activities to this vision,
- reviewing progress to not only celebrate achievements but loom for any mis-stps stumbles or areas where we can do better,
- creating reachable and measurable goals and executing planning processes to achieve these.
Want to share your thoughts on this story, or do you have something you’d like to add? Email me at principal@scas.nsw.edu.au