Principal
Beginnings and endings are both a moment in time, but also part of a process. Next week we host occasions that mark both.
One of our landmark moments in our preparations for next year is our Orientation Day for new students for 2021. This important day is the beginning of an orientation process to a large school that takes several months. There are many staff members across all dimensions of school life who are involved in this occasion, which serves to welcome and inform all those who are new to the College. In proactively managing health and hygiene in this current COVID-19 era we have had to adjust the day’s program significantly. One of these adjustments is the restrictions on crowd sizes, which means that we cannot host the Welcome Assembly with more than 250 new students and include their parents. Therefore, this year there will be an online component for new parents. Following on from last year’s initiative, our new boarders will spend an evening in the Boarding Village across the weekend to aid their transition into the Boarding life of the College. The planning for the day has been extensive and I am grateful for the leadership, organisation and level of care provided by Director of Admissions Ms Susan Shakespear and her Admissions team, as well as by Director of Students Mr Sean Toovey and the Student Formation team.
By way of contrast, our Year 12s have their final day of classes on Tuesday and the Senior Farewell on Wednesday before they commence their external exams on Monday 26 October. Both days contain formal rituals as well as casual interactions, which mark another step towards the end of formal schooling. In considering the Year 12s of 2020, it is worth noting that this cohort of students, across the state, were the year level when Prep schooling became compulsory and the first cohort in which Year 7 became a part of secondary school. Importantly now, they will be the cohort that is leading the way in the new Queensland Certificate of Education (QCE) with the change to external exams at the conclusion of their school year. What was never envisaged was that these young people would have to contend with the interruption to their studies, and school life in general, provided by COVID-19 in Semester 1.
It is perhaps of interest to note that the majority of our Seniors attended their Orientation Days back in 2012, or 2014, while most of the boys who will attend next week’s Orientation Day will be members of either the Senior class of 2026 or 2028. Our Seniors as a body of students have been shaped and formed as Nudgee College men by all their interactions since their own Orientation Day, just as the young boys who arrive at Nudgee College next Monday will be shaped and formed as Nudgee College men of tomorrow by all that is ahead of them.
Another form of beginning and ending; on Tuesday evening I announced to our boarders and the Boarding community a significant change of the leadership of Boarding. The details of the announcement can be found here. In brief, Dean of Boarding Mr Christian Oneto has taken a promotional position at another school and he is to be replaced by Mr Sean Toovey, commencing in 2021. We congratulate both men on these appointments and we will farewell and thank Christian in the usual manner before the end of the year.
Finally, we wish our Junior and Senior Track and Field teams well for their respective GPS Championships over the coming two Fridays.
Mr Peter Fullagar
Principal