Great schools regularly evaluate their progress. They pause to reflect, undertaking a thorough analysis of the available data to look back on how well the human, financial, physical and information resources of the school have been deployed to achieve the goals and priorities in the school’s strategic plan.

As mentioned in last week’s newsletter, following the accountability cycle set for Victorian government schools, Mordialloc College is up for external review this year. The current strategic plan is for 2013-2016, thus the focus of the review is to reflect on the past three – four years’ data and performance in relation to the goals and targets set in the three broad student outcome areas of Student Learning (Achievement), Student Engagement (including pathways and transitions) and Student Wellbeing; and then work with an external reviewer and peer reviewers to assist us in forming the priorities for the development of our next strategic plan.

Thorough self-evaluation is an essential first step in a broader cycle of performance monitoring and review. As such, the self-evaluation should not be expected to do everything – review and strategic planning will complement it to collectively support the school in drawing on the experience of the past to guide future plans for action.

The self-evaluation is a significant opportunity for discussion, consultation and feedback across the whole College community, with an opportunity for active contribution and leadership from students, staff and parents.

During the period of self-evaluation we will undergo as a school we will be guided by the following questions:

• What did we set out to achieve?

• What outcomes did we achieve?

• What factors supported or inhibited our success?

• Where might we focus future efforts?

I will be running parent, student and staff forums to gather feedback from all stakeholders throughout the review process, with the

parent forum set for Thursday 10 March 7pm in D1. I will provide regular reminders of this in the lead up and I encourage you to attend.

Our school self-evaluation will provide an opportunity for the school community to reflect on our achievements, our strengths and areas where improvement is needed. The self-evaluation and the review process will provide a powerful information base from which we can develop our new strategic directions for the next four year school strategic plan (2017-2020).

Emergency Management Plan

I am sure most people are aware of the spate of hoax threatening phone calls to Victorian schools over the first few weeks of school. Our school has not received such a call but I wanted to inform you that, like all schools, we have an emergency management plan in place for situations like this, and we practise it throughout the year. Those schools which did receive a threatening call enacted their emergency management plans and they worked well. The safety and wellbeing of our students is always our top priority. We always hold a practice evacuation drill early on in Term 1 so all of our new students (especially in Year 7) and staff are made aware of the process to be followed. In light of the current climate we don’t want to cause unnecessary stress so I am informing the community that we will be holding a practice evacuation next week.

Ms. Michelle Roberts

Principal