Scotch College

From the Principal

Teachers key players in realising Scotch's vision

Scotch College's Annual Report endeavours to detail the school in all its fullness; its programmes, curricular and co-curricular, and the wider issues facing the College and its students.

Collecting data for the report is made difficult by the pace with which the school moves from one activity to the next. Assembly on the Monday following a season's final round typically announces teams' exploits, and then details practice sessions for the coming season. Obtaining records and reports of the season just completed is not easy in the excitement of preparing for the next.

As data for the 1998 report accumulates, a picture emerges of enormous activity. The summer programme included 11 different sports. Most come under the APS banner, but others, like squash, lawn bowls, orienteering and golf are organised on a wider basis of Melbourne schools.

Nine different sports involve over 1280 students in the winter season. Football, with 18 teams and over 380 players, is most popular, with soccer and hockey each involving over 200 boys. Basketball, with 18 teams and over 160 players is growing in popularity.

Enormous variety and complexity characterises the Services activities at Scotch. The Cadet Unit, with over 100% students from years 9 to 12 is the largest Service, followed by the Adventure programme with 230 boys from years 10 to 12. Social services sees 200 boys provide a regular service to the community at over 40 outside agencies. Pipes and Drums and the Military Band involve almost 80 boys, and a further 150 are in Scouts, Sea Scouts and St John Ambulance.

Sport and Services are part of the compulsory programme at Scotch, along with the academic curriculum and corporate activities, such as School Assemblies and Chapel Services. The extent of these programmes effectively gives all students of Scotch outstanding opportunities to develop into well rounded young men.

In addition to this required involvement, many take advantage of other co-curricular activities, such as performing or assisting with the drama productions, available at all levels of the Senior School. The Music School, with over 850 individual lessons each week and where over 20 different ensembles rehearse for a variety of performances each year, is another enormously busy and important aspect of Scotch.

One might wonder if too much is expected from our students these days given the tremendous competition that exists for tertiary places and employment opportunities. Year after year, however, we see a strong link between excellent VCE performance and active involvement in the co-curricular programme, compulsory and voluntary.

The quality and extent of Scotch's co-curricular activities are quite outstanding, and reflect enormous credit on the teaching staff, whose involvement is critical to the programme's success. In addition to their classroom teaching, Scotch teachers are expected to coach teams in two season and be involved in the Services programme.

Teachers, then, are key players in realising Scotch's vision of offering a programme that encourages the total development of all its students. The School is fortunate to have a team of teachers who are able in the classroom and committed to the ideals of education in its widest sense. Theirs is a tremendously demanding challenge, and it is a pleasure to observe how willingly they set about achieving this difficult but rewarding target.

The Annual Report also details additional optional activities that are available to Scotch boys. 1998 has seen tours to all parts of the globe. A Basketball tour to USA, a Cricket and Tennis Tour to the UK, a Waterpolo tour to Hawaii and New Zealand, the Canadian exchange programme at Year 8, the Junior School Music exchange with St Peter's Adelaide, and the annual Year 10 Outback trips make an impressive and exciting range of opportunities. The planned trip to Nepal and the Orchestra's tour to Singapore, both early in 1999, continue the tradition where staff of the school willingly undertake the significant task of organising and accompanying these tours, all of which are in addition to their normal responsibilities at the school.

The boys of Scotch are fortunate in many ways. Not least among these is the fact that they are being educated by a dedicated team of teachers, whose commitment to their profession is a proud feature of the College today.

Dr F G Donaldson