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The True Meaning of Community
Guardians Alexander Unmack and Zoe Thomas at the School gate, welcoming students back in Term 4
While things have been and will continue to be tough for many during COVID, the broader Ballarat Grammar community has come together in true Grammar spirit to support and care for each other.
The School, the Ballarat Grammar Foundation, current families and the wider Grammar community have collectively contributed to the establishment of a range of initiatives to support families through the challenges of COVID. The Ballarat Grammar Community Fund was set up in response to a suggestion from parents, with current families invited to donate their fee reduction to be used to provide critical support to families in need. The Beckworth Trust was activated to offer financial support to families who have been heavily impacted by the pandemic. The Ballarat Grammar Business Directory is designed to support Ballarat Grammar family businesses by encouraging members of our wider community to search and find businesses when looking for any goods and services.
We acknowledge and sincerely thank our whole community for your generosity and care during this extraordinary time.
BALLARAT GRAMMAR COMMUNITY FUND
The response to this initiative has been humbling. 107 families and seven members of our wider Grammar community have donated to the Fund so far. The comments below express the overwhelming sense of generosity and care.
“We are appreciative of the opportunity to support the school community and are thankful for the leadership shown by the school at this time.” “The School’s commitment to providing the financial and emotional support to all families, to allow all students to continue their education uninterrupted for 2020, is incredibly inspirational. We feel very proud to call ourselves
‘Grammar parents’.”
”We are very supportive of the approach that the school is taking in the current circumstances.” “We are encouraged by the support and information
Ballarat Grammar are giving us in these unprecedented times.” “I am very impressed with this opportunity for parents to direct the fee reduction to another family.”
“We are fortunate enough to remain working. We greatly appreciate the efforts of the school in supporting those facing financial hardship.” “We are extremely proud of how the school has acted to look after each other. We are grateful for the financial assistance offered to families who need it and for the support Ballarat Grammar has offered our family in their online learning activities. We appreciate the effort you are all putting in as staff and sincerely thank you.”
THE IMPACT OF BEING PART OF A COMMUNITY THAT CARES
Tim Adams teaches English and Humanities and is Round Square Co-ordinator, International Exchange Co-ordinator and Coach of the Girls’ 1st Football Team. We asked Tim to reflect on what it has meant to him to be part of the Grammar community during COVID.
I feel very proud to be a teacher here. The leadership that is coming through from every level, from Board level and Adam Heath down, shows genuine care for every member of the School community.
Very early in COVID when we went into the first lockdown and were all feeling a bit shocked, the messaging from the School was very decisive, very quick and very natural. It was completely focused on getting families through and doing everything possible to not lose any families. Every student from VCE through to the youngest was clear on the challenges and how we would face them together. “I feel a strong sense from students that, while it’s a very difficult year, they feel genuinely valued and cared for.”
For families, while many are doing it tougher than ever, there has been a clear message that the School has their back no matter how bad things are.
Dempsey Wenn, Tom McCarthy, Tristan Maple, Tim Adams, Iona Cullenward, Charlotte Robson, Charlotte Campbell, and James O’Sullivan following a whitewater rafting afternoon on the Ganges near Rishikesh in September 2019 prior to the Round Square International Conference in Indore, India.
REDISCOVERING YOURSELF IN THE TIME OF COVID-19
The Japanese practise an ancient craft called kinsukuroi, or ‘golden repair’ in which something, usually a pot, that is broken is lovingly repaired with gold. The idea here is that the breakage is part of the history of an object, not something to disguise, in the end perhaps the most beautiful part of the object. Many of our students this year, especially our Year 12s, have felt robbed of so much to which they were looking forward – sporting competitions, camps, social activities, house events, a full stage performance, musical groups, a valedictory dinner, dance events and on and on the list goes. In some of the conversations I have had with Year 12s, these breaks or cracks in their experience of 2020 have lead to reflections on a new sense of who they really are. The conversations went something like this:
Cracked Pot - KINTSUKUROI - Broken Pottery (cracked pot) repaired with gold, with the understanding that it is ‘more beautiful for having been broken.’” by catherinetodd2 is licensed with CC BY-NC 2.0.
What did you miss most about this year? Did you miss the sporting competitions? That will be because you are a person who likes to compete, who likes to strive to be the best you can. Did you miss house and social activities? That will be because your friends are really important to you. Did you miss debating, the performance, outdoor education opportunities? That will be because advocating a view, or creating a performance or leadership are an important part of who you are. Maybe you missed musical rehearsals and performance, because team work, working together to make something beautiful is really important to you. Whatever feels cracked and broken about this year shows you exactly what’s important to you, what’s at the heart of you. Yes, it is disappointing that you couldn’t do that this year. But if you listen to your heart and learn where your cracks are, and hold on to them in whatever comes next for you after school, those things will become the gold that really shines in you, they will become the things that make you whole.” The class of 2020 has had the opportunity to get to know themselves better through the breakages than any year level before them. With God, nothing is wasted. Not even the bad times.
Senior Chaplain Revd Dr Tim Gaden with Prep students Edward Jeganathan and Anna Merrifield lighting the candle on Founders' Day in February this year
IN PURSUIT OF THE COMMON GOOD
The novelist John Gardner observed that there are only two plots in literature: “A stranger rides into town,” or “A man goes on a journey.” Over the past months, all of us have experienced both plots in this pivotal moment in history, confronting the strange new virus and its profound impact on our life journeys.
Dreams and plans have been disrupted; the sense of control over our lives has been replaced with uneasy uncertainty. Through this pandemic, we have become acutely aware of our fragility, our interdependence, and a realisation that the relentless pursuit of individualism may leave us lonely, unravelling the social bonds that hold societies together. Our neighbours’ suffering will directly or indirectly affect us. Living in a binary world of winners and losers falls short of how we are meant to live.
How then, as a school community, should we respond to this crisis?
The answer is embedded in values that we seek to uphold at Grammar.
First, we can remember the value of the Common Good. Our Anglican prayerbook exhorts us to “share with justice the resources of the earth, work together in trust, and to seek the common good.” Oxford economists Paul Collier and John Kay “see no inherent tension between community and market (or competitive self-interest); markets can function effectively only when embedded in a network of social relations.” Simply put, in helping others, we help ourselves. In altruism, we find joy.
Second, we can acknowledge the debt to those who came before us, the communities that shaped us and who continue to make our daily lives possible, drawing inspiration from Saint Luke’s Gospel: “To whom much is given, much will be required.” During this time of lockdown and restrictions, we find a deeper appreciation of “essential workers” – healthcare workers, people who work to stack shelves at supermarkets, farmers who produce the food we eat, cleaners, childcare workers, truck drivers, and many more.
At Grammar, we find a deeper respect for our staff, particularly our teachers led by Adam Heath, whose unity of purpose and capacity for agility and teamwork have facilitated the shift to a quality Learning-At-Home programme. Board and Management together continue to work tirelessly to keep our families informed, prepared, and supported.
Third, we can ourselves continue to serve. Service underpins what we do at Grammar, building character and faith in humanity, working towards the Common Good and shaping a kinder world to live in.
“Our Village” on our website is an extension of our community of mutual care, including programmes such as the Grammar Gurus mentoring for our Years 12s, Grammar Community Fund, the Business Directory, wellbeing support and details for accessing financial support. Our students have continued to add leaves to the service tree in the Kinsman foyer, finding new ways to help others throughout this period.
Psychologist Andrew Fuller urges us to connect, protect and respect, saying, “Kindness and love are our best protective mechanisms. Add to this hope and connectedness, and we have the four most potent ingredients of healing. When we develop these in families and communities, we enrich lives.”
For all its challenges, this crisis has crystalised an opportunity for our school to respond with solidarity. As a school community, we are writing our story with kindness, love, hope, and connectedness, by seeking the Common Good that will make us stronger – together.
