t e m o C The
An FCAC Magazine Issue 2,Spring, 2021
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Important Dates • • • • • • •
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Contents
03
Charting a new course: A new strategy for FCAC.
08
Where are they now? Class of 2013
09 12 13 15 17 18 19 20 21 22
Making a connection Zones of regulation Focus on well-being Staff profiles Opportunities Abound Aquatics Camp Infrastructure Upgrade Silence is golden Sport recovery Song for the ocean
Issue 2, Spring, 2021
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Charting a new course FCAC’s new strategy - 2020 -2025
The next stage of development for our College will be key for the ongoing development and growth of our community. Modern schools need to remain agile to meet the constant shifting of an evolving workforce and FCAC needs to continue to prepare our students to be successful in a rapidly changing world. The Strategic Plan 2020 – 2025 is the product of twelve months of consultation with parents, students and staff through various focus groups. Additionally, a comprehensive community wide survey undertaken in 2020 has provided us with valuable insight into the needs of our community and played a key role in shaping the priorities within the Strategic Plan. We feel that our community has given us a clear message about what they want to see in the College’s future. These strategic priorities have been classified into six focus areas: • • • • • •
Enriching Culture Engaging Teaching & Learning Empowered Students Connected Community Stimulating Physical Environment Effective Governance & Business Development
A matter of high priority for us has been to review and implement our strategic goals relating to student well-being. The pandemic has created an incalculable amount of anxiety and stress amongst the population and it is our children’s well-being that is most at risk. In the coming months and years, we will be announcing some key developments that will build upon the level of support available for our students. This Strategic Plan is designed to prepare us for growth in our region and to weather any unexpected adverse conditions. It will position our College and students for success in the coming decades and, above all, ensure that FCAC remains true to its Mission and Values. Joe Wright - Principal
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Strategic Goals
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The News
FCAC rated the best in the region
FCAC has been rated the best primary and secondary school of 2020 following an analysis of academic outcomes by an independent education group.
Edge+ in Brisbane
The Edge+ English and STEM students in Years 7, 8 and 9 spent two days in Brisbane at the end of Term 3 as the capstone experience of their program. The students visited Queensland Art Gallery, Gallery of Modern Art and QUT.
The College achieved a score of 93 out of 100 by the online Better Education community platform for its senior students results. Mr Wright said while the school consistently achieved strong academic outcomes, its focus was on developing students as people and growing their character, not just high achievement. Mr Wright said at FCAC there was as much recognition of those who consistently tried and made a big effort as there was for high achievers. Building good relationships between students and teachers was also a priority for the school, he said. “It is easier to do when you’re a small school,” he said. Mr Wright said a student didn’t have to be a top ATAR student to be successful post-school and at FCAC a lot of emphasis was placed on working hard and making an effort. (Article text from The Courier Mail) - Scan QR code for the full story
2021 Formal
The class of 2021 celebrated their formal on the last day of Term 3. It was a beautiful evening with arrivals on the Esplanade, red carpet interviews and then into the Beach House Hotel Hervey Bay for an evening of dancing and celebrating. Click on the QR code to see the arrivals and celebrations.
Have you downloaded the College app? You can download it from either the Apple or Google Play. Just search Fraser Coast Anglican College.
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In-motion photography Edge students had the privilege of learning photography skills and techniques from professional photographer, Karlie Holloway. They had a wonderful time and captured some fantastic shots, experimenting with angles, lighting, leading lines and much more. Karlie has been working with FCAC for some time and many of her gorgeous images are in our adverts and social media. Karlie took the photo that is on the cover of this edition of the Comet.
The News
NAPLAN Success
FCAC students have once again performed above the national and state averages in all test and from all year levels.
Creative Generation We had a number of artists selected to take part in the Creative Generation exhibition this year. This regional event was organised by Mrs O’Brien and Mrs Macready and supported by Mr Slater along with some of our prefects on the night. Special mention to Kaitlin Edmondstone for winning the vote for the People’s Choice Award and to Sienna and Mia for their musical talents.
Music in Brisbane
Our elective Music students had an amazing experience last week at JMC Academy recording their own compositions and learning about the post-school opportunities available for those keen to pursue a career in the Arts.
Shave for a cure & Crazy Hair Day Mr Humphreys and Year 12 students took part in ‘shave for a cure’ to raise money for the Leukaemia Foundation. Students bought raffle tickets to win the honour of doing the shave. It all happened live on our Facebook page. In the Primary School the teachers and students displayed a lot of creativity and colour with their hairstyles. Scan the QR code to see more.
New Maryborough Bus Scan the QR code to hear Kaitlin talking with Fraser Coast Mayor, George Seymour about her artwork. Page 7ww
The beginning of Term 4 has seen the reintroduction of a dedicated bus service from Maryborough to FCAC. We are grateful to partner with Wide Bay Transit who will soon be supplying a pristine, new bus with FCAC branding on each side. Not only will our Maryborough students travel in style with their FCAC peers, but current students have the added advantage of being picked up and dropped off directly at their front door and the feedback so far is positive.
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Sports News
Well done Dylan
Hockey Premiers!
Earlier this year Dylan was selected for the very successful QLD Triathlon Team based on his strong performance at the State Championships. With the Nationals cancelled for a second year running we had the honour of presenting him with his QLD swim cap - a special memento for members of the QLD Tri squad.
Congratulations to the Fraser Flames Women’s Hockey Team who won their final. The team includes Mrs Churchward, Mrs MacDonald, Mrs Hadfield as well as parents and current students.
Soccer Success!
Primary Netball Cup Our Primary Schools Cup Netball Cup teams had a great weekend competing against other QLD teams on the Gold Coast. They benefitted form the experience and represented FCAC well. Thank you to our sponsors Carsplus Mechanical and Specialist Mind Care.
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Maddi is off to Germany! After a successful week at the Joey’s World Cup, she was the only female Fraser Coast player selected in the touring team for 2022. In the same tournament, Ben Scanlan was selected as one of the top three umpires in recognition of his dedication and commitment.
Only twice during the 18 games this season did the Flames under 12s Football team look like they might not win. It took until the 13th game of the season against Sunbury, with the game tied up at 1-1. The tension was high, and then Aasish Bhattarai calmly scored his second goal to keep the team with a perfect record. The next time was the Grand Final on neutral ground in Maryborough. 0-0 with time against them and up steps Max Burghard to score, which was the winning goal. What a great season capped off by a highly exciting and somewhat stressful Grand Final. Bring on the 2022 season. Go Flames.
Where are they now?
Lessons learned in the FCAC Lifestyle, flexibility and Music Department. Forbes Magazine. Jake Bradford (Andromeda, 2013)
For Jake Bradford (Andromeda, 2013), the FCAC Music Department was an important part of his experience and taught him many important lessons. “In the moment, I probably didn’t realise, but looking back, music taught me to carefully manage time. Our music tutors/conductors always emphasised the importance of everyone attending rehearsals; otherwise, we wouldn’t play well together”. Since finishing at FCAC, Jake has moved on to become a researcher at QUT. Jake is working on a recently discovered technology named CRISPR, which is gene-editing technology. He said, “I knew this would be a cool/interesting/worthwhile opportunity to take on - so I did, and I am glad that I did. I have really enjoyed working in academia, mostly for research but also for the teaching/service aspect.” You can hear more about Jake’s time at FCAC and his postschool adventures by clicking on the QR code.
Joy Monkivitch (Capella, 2013)
It is all a matter of perspective for Joy Monkivitch (Capella, 2013) as she looks back on her journey since leaving FCAC. “I studied occupational therapy and worked with my brother on his e-commerce business”she said. Joy is now a partner in that business and together they run the fashion brand, Sincere Sally. Joy enjoyed the flexibility she had being a qualified Occupational Therapist and working on Sincere Sally while travelling in Europe. “I really enjoyed working when I wanted and where I wanted”. Fast forward a few years and Joy, along with her brother Bryce, were featured in Forbes Magazine. “When they reached out, we really didn’t believe it. It was a huge moment for my brother, for me and for Sincere Sally”. In 2019, Sincere Sally was recognized as one of the fastest growing online businesses in Australia. Joy said that their success and the article in Forbes are wonderful but at the centre of it all it is a family business. As an FCAC student, Joy said she was involved in lots of activities, she was involved in sport and was Chapel Captain in her final year. When asked for her advice for current senior students she said “Don’t put so much pressure on yourself, take it easy, enjoy your time at school because the craziness of adulthood will come very soon”.
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Click on the QR code to hear the full interview.
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Making a connection One of the cornerstones for psychological and physical wellbeing is the need for healthy social connections. This has never been more crucial than in these times of uncertainty, where mental health has been thrust to the forefront of many lives. You only need to read the news or engage in social media to hear of how many people, particularly youth, are struggling. Healthy connections are a protective factor for those times when we suffer trauma or adversity and are a characteristic of those who demonstrate high levels of resilience. Although our adolescents live in a digital world where building relationships may look very different to their parents’ generation, the need to connect has not diminished, just changed. Building connections and relationships across the College in a variety of ways has remained at the forefront of our pastoral program, which has adapted and developed to address the needs of our individual students. There has been a specific focus on building new connections and strengthening existing connections. Opportunities for students to engage have included sharing popcorn and a friendly smile for R U Ok Day, students organising Australia’s Greatest Morning Tea, embarking on Personal Challenges in Year 9, Year 11 students buddying up with Year 6 students, the Positivity Project where Year 8 students are working on making a positive difference for others at the College and the Year 10 Make a Difference project. As well as making connections, students are constructing an understanding of what it means to be part of a community.
“Alone we can do so little, together we can do so much.” – Helen Keller.
Building a sense of belonging and connecting with different Year levels during Vertical Tutor sessions has strengthened house spirit and forged some new rivalries. This rivalry has carried onto the sporting field with Netball and Touch inter-house competitions. House Chapels were introduced in Term Three with Father Jeff embedding the key values of the College and each House into his services, further emphasising the links between Body, Mind and Spirit and the importance of teams. In Term Four, Year 7 and 8 students will be given the opportunity to see the world through a different lens when they connect with Japanese email pals. Covid may have interrupted our International Program, but the value of the experience has not diminished, if anything it is even more important now. Year 8 students will use their Positivity Project learnings by being positive role models and giving the Japanese students the opportunity to practice their English. In the words of Mother Teresa, “I alone cannot change the world, but I can cast a stone across the waters to create many ripples.”
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By Mrs Danielle Ryan Director of Middle Years
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Zones Of Regulation Have you ever had a moment, big or small, when you have become overwhelmed by your emotions, happy or sad, and found it difficult to work through this moment? We all experience moments at various stages in our lives, whether we are adults, teenagers or young children. There are times in our lives where our emotions take over, and we find ourselves needing to manage our thoughts and feelings to move forward.
Learning to recognize the different emotions you can have and how these emotions affect your body and your mindset is the first step to regulating your emotions.
When we ‘co-regulate’ with students using this program, we journey together, taking the steps along ‘the road to regulation’. Step 1 is to see how we feel and notice our body signals and level of energy. Step 2 is to figure out what zone we are in. Step 3, we ask if we need to regulate ourselves. Do you need to STOP/PAUSE, use CAUTION/SLOW DOWN, GO, or REST/ ENERGISE? Once the students have recognized some of the situations where they may have moved between the zones and need to regulate, we explore a myriad of strategies they may use to regulate themselves and be more comfortable and have more control within the zone they are in. The students develop their own ‘toolkit’ of strategies for each zone. The ‘Zones of Regulation’ is just one program that helps us with the emotional development of our students.
As adults, we have had life experiences to look back on to assist us in regulating our own emotions or know where to go to seek help. However, children and teens need others to support them and work with them to ‘co-regulate’ and help them recognize their different emotions and find the tools they need to help them manage their different feelings. The Learning Enrichment Department explores a variety of resources to help support the individual needs of all our students. One of these resources is a program called “The Zones of Regulation”, written and created By Occupational Therapist Leah M. Kuyers. Our department has been working with some staff and students to familiarize themselves with this program and implement some of the components to assist our students in navigating their emotions and developing their own ‘road to regulation’. The program highlights for students the different emotions they can have and outlines four zones to fit these emotions. The Blue Zone is our go-slow zone and where we may feel sad, sick, bored etc. The Green Zone is our good to go zone, which is the optimum zone for learning. We associate the Green Zone with feeling happy, calm, focused. The Yellow Zone is associated with feelings such as frustration, worry, and silliness. Here is where we may start to lose some control. The final zone is the Red Zone. It is important to note that having emotions related to the red zone is not a bad thing; they are just heightened emotions that mean that we have lost control and can’t function properly within this state. Such emotions are ones like elation, anger, being terrified, Page 13ww yelling etc.
By Mrs Hilary Harvey Director of Learning Enrichment Resources: The Zones of Regulation – A curriculum designed to foster self-regulation and emotional control Leah M. Kuypers, 2011 The Road to Regulation, Leah Kuypers and Elizabeth Sautter, 2021 The Regulation Station, Leah Kuypers and Elizabeth Sautter, 2021
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Focus on Well-being
Back in Term 1, we held a webinar on how we address well-being in the Primary School to support our students in their learning. The concept of well-being for adults, teenagers and children has gained momentum over the past few years and society as a whole is starting to understand the broad scope that well-being covers. In tandem with well-being, the importance of mental health has also gained more attention and at times the terminology of mental health can be used instead of well-being and vice versa. It is important to understand the difference between the two concepts in that mental health is an aspect of well-being. When searching well-being on the internet, there are a number of resources that discuss ‘dimensions’ or ‘aspects’ of well-being. In general, there seems to be some consensus with at least five dimensions of well-being: physical, mental (intellectual), emotional, social and environmental.
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In our webinar we discussed the You Can Do It Program as one strategy the teachers use to teach children about well-being. As a social/emotional development program, the attributes that are covered directly link to the mental, emotional and social aspects of well-being. In addition to this, our relatively new outdoor learning environments in the Primary School have assisted in the development of our environmental well-being. Children experience a sense of calm when they are given opportunities to learn in nature.
Stay in touch
As we work towards developing a well-being framework as part of our Strategic Plan, we aim to incorporate many aspects of wellbeing that are tailored specifically to life at FCAC. In addition, we want to create opportunities and experiences for our students to enhance their own understanding of the importance of wellbeing. If you would like to view our well-being webinar, please contact Leanne Towill in Primary Admin (primaryadmin@fcac.qld.edu. au) to receive a link to the recording.
“It is health that is real wealth and not pieces of gold and silver” Mahatma Gandhi
Referral Program
A reminder that FCAC operates a referral program for new students. If you refer a student to the College you will receive a $50 voucher to use at the Dilly Bag Retail Centre. FCAC currently has vacancies in Years 1,4,7,11 and 12.
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Meet Mrs Fenech
The new Director of Koala Kindy Mrs Cassandra Fenech rejoined FCAC after running a successful family daycare business. Upon her return to FCAC she has led the College’s after school and vacation care services. In September, Cassandra was appointed as the new Director of Koala Kindy. Despite being a very busy person, Cassandra took the time to answer some questions. When did you start working in early childhood education? My early childhood education journey started at Fraser Coast Anglican College in 2007. I commenced a traineeship for a certificate III in Childhood Education and Care, which I completed while working at ROOS Care OSHC. What do you love about working in Koala Kindy/early childhood education? I absolutely love the natural grounds of FCAC, it is such a calming environment. I also enjoy being able to see the children as they grow through their schooling years. That is very special to me. What is your vision for Koala Kindy in the next few years? My Vision for the Kindy is to continue to give opportunities to explore the amazing community around us. Bush Kindy is one of my favourite times to observe children feeling grounded amongst nature, exploring, creating and just being in the moment. Expanding the opportunities to more children before commencing Prep is something I look forward to achieving. How has the new playground changed the children’s outdoor time? The new playground is AMAZING! Lots of learning happens outside when you just observe children’s play and interactions. There are areas to meet and develop children’s milestones, risk-taking, exploration, dramatic play, creation, storytelling, sensory and places just to relax and look at the kangaroos, birds or our native beehive. What is your favourite part of working with the Koala Kindy students? My favourite part of working with the Koala Kindy students is that I also get to work alongside their parents and teachers to build a positive love for learning from a young age.
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Meet Mrs Jamieson
The new Head of Science at FCAC The new Head of Science, Mrs Lisa Jamieson, starts her new role next year but Lisa has been a teacher at FCAC since 2020. What led Lisa to the profession of teaching and, more specifically, FCAC is a fascinating story covering 45 countries, a few different jobs, and realising that she wanted the kind of life that only the Fraser Coast could provide. Lisa grew up in Glasgow and followed a traditional path during school and university that resulted in a degree in Zoology. Lisa says this path was in part down to an idealistic love of nature.
“I love David Attenborough,
and from a very young age, I wanted to be part of Greenpeace”
You might be surprised to hear that Lisa ended up working in financial planning and insurance from this background. An interest in assisting vulnerable communities led Lisa to consider teaching as a profession. A friend and fellow teacher allowed Lisa to follow her around to see if she enjoyed the school setting. She soon realised that teaching was what she wanted to do. Another common theme in Lisa’s life is a love of travelling. She and her husband spent 3 years travelling around Australia in a campervan, stopping to work when they needed to. One of those trips was to a remote indigenous community in Western Australia. What started as a 4-week contract led to a 9-month stay. As the incoming Head of Science, Lisa is keen to build on the fantastic department she inherits from the current Head of Science, Mrs Marissa Novak. Mrs Novak will be undertaking her honours in Psychology while continuing to work at FCAC. Lisa said that “It is a great department, and I look forward to carrying on the great work we are doing”.
Exciting news about our campus FCAC has some amazing news to share about our beautiful campus. Make sure to keep an eye on the FCAC social media channels for the annoucement. All will revealed at the Celebration of Achievement on November 18th. Page 17ww
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Opportunities Abound The new QCE system was introduced for students completing Year 12 in 2020. Instead of being awarded an OP for university entry, students now work towards an ATAR which is more in line with other states in Australia. This change has involved the rewriting of syllabuses for existing subjects and the introduction of some completely new subjects. At FCAC, we have used this opportunity to review our subject offerings in the Secondary School. Our current Year 11 students have embraced this change and have enrolled in new courses such as Design, Psychology, Aquatic Practices, Furnishing and Certificate II Engineering Studies. We have had positive feedback from both staff and students about these new courses and will continue to offer them in 2022. As part of our ongoing commitment to improve our student experience, we have some new subjects on offer in 2022. Year 9 and 10 students can now choose an additional elective offering, Sport and Exercise Science. This subject is designed to equip students to tackle the new P.E. syllabus in Years 11 and 12. An elective that has proved popular with Year 10 and 11 students for 2022 is the new Certificate III Aviation (Remote Pilot). We are also excited to offer Literature and Sport and Recreation for the first time in 2022. These additions to our subject offerings provide students with a wide variety of pathways in the Senior School. We have endeavoured to maintain our high standards of academic rigour while recognising the need for more hands-on opportunities for students who are not planning direct entry to university. The new QCE system enables students to use their vocational qualifications in their ATAR calculation, so the Certificate IV in Crime and Justice continues to be a popular choice. Page 18ww
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We now offer 37 different subjects and certificate courses for our Year 11 and 12 students to select from, in addition to externally sourced school-based apprenticeships and traineeships.
By Mrs Roz Nicholls Director of Teaching and Learning (7-12)
Aquatics Camp
Reflections on stepping out of the classroom and into the field. By Mr Greg Perkins
As a teacher, I love going on aquatics camp for those little lightbulb moments and listening to the students talk very excitedly about the things they have seen or done while on the island. This alone makes it all worthwhile. North West Island is a coral cay on the southern part of the Great Barrier Reef, 75 kilometres from Gladstone. It is the perfect environment for the students to undertake a series of tasks and experiments, including collecting longitudinal data on: • • • • •
water quality holothurian (Sea Cucumber) transect the impact of coral bleaching zooplankton and phytoplankton bird and flora observation
Other practical learning experiences include driving the boats and taking long walks around the island, looking at how it was formed and how it might continue to change. Students also use several techniques while in the water, including snorkelling, manta towing (being towed behind the boat to cover further distance and observing the reef as they go) and, for those who are qualified, scuba diving. What each of the students gets out of the camp can be very different from student to student. However, the clear standout ones would be manta towing, swimming through the blowhole, and scuba diving. It is an excellent opportunity to immerse themselves in the marine environment they have been studying. Beyond the formal and informal learning, I hope that the students make some great memories.
See photos and videos from aquatics camp by clicking on the QR code.
Fieldwork is an essential part of the Aquatics program. This is how the students develop their skills to record valuable data to track the health of the reef and marine environment. The main task when the students return is to look at the data and determine the effect a resort would have on the island and the surrounding marine ecosystem.
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Behind the scenes: FCAC infrastructure upgrade By Darryl Humphreys Dean of eLearning and Head of Technology
In early October, Facebook and its affiliated services such as WhatsApp and Instagram suffered an outage that left 3.6 billion users unable to get their daily fix of cat videos, catch up with the latest stories and pics from their influencer of choice or grab a bargain from Facebook marketplace. And what caused this issue? Faulty configuration on hardware that routes data between users and Facebook’s vast array of servers. Talking IT infrastructure rarely generates much excitement, except when things stop working, and users find themselves unable to access services that we all take for granted. Information technology plays a pivotal role in every facet of daily life of the College, and I would like to take this opportunity to provide readers with some of the projects that have been implemented by the College to not only keep our systems running more efficiently on a day-to-day basis, but to also future proof our infrastructure to meet increasing demand and growth. Over the course of last year, significant investment in the College’s core network has occurred to improve both availability and reliability. The addition of 36 new Cisco Meraki switches to our network provides a 10GBit connection to each classroom block to further facilitate teaching and learning. Paired with this increased internal bandwidth is the rollout of 110 new Cisco Meraki wireless access points to improve connectivity across the campus. A new Cisco firewall and content filtering solution is currently being installed and this will also be paired with an updated onboarding solution to streamline student connectivity as part of our BYOD program. The College’s connection to the outside world has been doubled, jumping from a 1GB connection to 2GB, while this has also been paired with a redundant link to provide a backup connection if required. To further support teaching and learning in the classroom, the last 12 months has seen the installation of over 30 ultra-short throw interactive projectors with further rollouts planned for 2022. The IT world never stands still however, and future major works planned for 2022 and beyond include replacing the fibre optic backbone that internally connects the College to allow for further increased bandwidth capacity and redundant links to all buildings. Finally, preliminary work is underway to migrate a number of the College’s core services to the cloud with projected improvements in security, redundancy and service up-time. While these projects are not cheap, this ongoing investment is integral to ensuring the College continues to provide staff and students with the opportunity to experience all that 21st century learning has to offer. Finally, I would like to finish by acknowledging the fantastic support provided by the College’s IT team. Led by the Director of IT, Mr David Hodges, Matt, Kapil and Jasper can be found working tirelessly behind the scenes keeping things running smoothly and Pagethe 20ww providing vital support to both College’s staff and students.
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Silence is golden By Father Jeff Jarvis College Chaplain
Heaven, absolute heaven! The last day of Term 3 came as a welcomed break. Time to rest and re-energise. So it was that Helen and I set out to leafy Mapleton as our base to utilise the walks and silence of Queensland’s Kondalilla National Park. As a young Police Officer, I found the solitude of “walking the beat” on night duty a time of enrichment and nourishment. The enforced silence of those days was real. House and pub lights would generally be extinguished by 11pm. Television stations would close until the next day. There were few night clubs. Communication was through landline phones and letters. All was still. Peace until the re-ignition of activities at 6am. Seven hours of “rhythmic, thoughtful, silence”. We all need “time out” to refuel. Today’s world is one in which silence is seen as a negative. There is a pressure to always be available through social media. Our children feel that an essential part of them is missing if they are not permitted to have this constant communication available. Silence equals time wasted. A time when we might be left out of the “loop of social gossip.” To start at the crack of dawn a three hour walk into isolated forest enables one to experience the beauty of unavailability and a silence only broken by the sound of rustling leaves, singing birds, and sometimes chattering water. My silence was interrupted by a sudden movement in the growth and the appearance of the long nose of a fox. We both paused, as we eyed each other for what seemed an eternity but could only have been a second before the mystery and joy of the moment was shattered by a loud voice calling out, “Workout paused.” Each morning at home I would normally have my Apple ear pods in enabling me to hear the sounds around me whilst being informed of my time and pace at each kilometre interval. However, this time, I’d left them at home. The voice rudely permeated the parks silence shattering the healing nature of silence again. By the time I looked back up, the fox was gone, as was the moment. Jesus would often go off to a deserted place to pray. Silence is critical, it helps us to heal; to communicate with our own inner voice. Silence allows us to unclutter and put things into perspective.
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Sport recovery: when to rest & when to work? By Adrian Elmes Acting Director of Sport
At FCAC, many students take part in our extra curricula sports. But, their training and competition are a hobby that ends when the season does. Of course, others know they will be back the following year. But, for the select few who see their future as professional athletes with aspirations of elite-level competition, managing their sporting performance is a delicate balancing act of training, recovery, and fatigue management. When students are in Primary School, sports injuries are often scrapes, bruises or a minor fracture, usually from an impact. As they get older and the body grows faster, growing related injuries can occur, leaving young players unable to participate for a prolonged period. However, this doesn’t mean that students should try and avoid sports at this time. On the contrary, sports during this time will help them develop in a variety of ways. When managing performance, we must also be mindful of development. For example, girls often have a growth spurt between ages 10 and 11 and reach about 95% of their adult height between ages 15 and 16. Boys experience a similar growth spurt, but it lasts until 17 or 18. During the growth spurt, the best practice is to monitor an individuals height. During the peak height velocity phase, options to manage this situation include reducing the intensity or the duration of the training or replacing standard training with core strength exercises with light stretching. In warmer months, replacing sessions with swimming is also a good idea due to the reduced impact. We need to educate young people to listen to their bodies. For example, rest and recovery are required when they suffer an injury like a muscle tear or ligament strain. We need to help students during this time, and this can be done by making sure that the intensity and duration of training don’t have a sudden increase. Instead, periods of injury can be refocused towards the correct technique as well as mental resilience. In essence, we want our junior athletes to return with a greater sense of mental preparation, a good balance between strength and mobility and, most notably, a readiness to step back into competition. At FCAC, we have elite athletes in a variety of sports. These students are highly dedicated and focused individuals who manage their training and competition. It is not uncommon for these students to have completed their training before they arrive at school in the morning. Therefore, it is worth taking a moment to marvel at their commitment to their sport as well as their productive use of time toward their studies.
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Song to the Ocean FCAC performing arts students were involved in an extraordinary project as part of the Hervey Bay Whale Festival. Song to the Ocean was an immersive, outdoor music installation where audiences were invited to enter a circle of awe-inspired light sculptures, stroll among the orchestra and experience music and nature sounds up-close. FCAC had 5 students involved in the project out of the 17 local performers invited to be part of the experience. The College hosted three after-school workshops/rehearsals to develop playing ability and expressive performance techniques facilitated by DeepBlue Orchestra. Greta Kelly, one of the performers and organisers, said that:
“we love to engage with young string players to show them that performance is not just sitting down and watching your music. It is all about reinventing your relationship with your instrument”. The workshop taught students how to express the music with their instruments and movement. These movements were specifically choreographed and informed with input from Aunty Karen Hall, a Butchulla elder. The students performed on two consecutive evenings following the workshops as part of this professional production at the Hervey Bay Whale Festival on Sea Front Oval. Large crowds visited each night and enjoyed the spectacle of light, music and sculpture. FCAC Director of Visual and Performing Arts, Mr Ian Slater, said ‘for students to take part in such an immersive and multi-arts project was both inspirational and opened minds. The students still talk about the experience, and I am sure it will be an event they will remember and reflect on all of their lives”. Scan the QR code to hear more about Song to the Ocean.
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Doolong South Road, Wondunna, Hervey Bay, QLD The Corporation of the Synod of the Diocese of Brisbane t/a Fraser Coast Anglican College CRICOS Provider Number 01592G Page 24ww
