Mark Richards | Director of Learning and Innovation

My son has just turned one and, because we never seem to be able to do things normally in our family, he has had four first birthday parties.  The first one when we were on holiday in Salzburg in Austria, another in London with my friends and family, a third in Brisbane with Australian friends and family and a fourth in Warwick with local friends.  It was good to reflect on where the last year has disappeared to, but also to realise that first birthdays are for the adults, not the children.

I continue to wonder what his life will be like in the future.  At such a young age his life is full of potential, exciting things to experience, careers to establish and a life to lead.  As a community, unleashing this potential in our students, both inside and outside the classroom, is reflected in our vision to inspire students to be their best.

We are doing some very exciting things at The SCOTS PGC College for the realisation of human potential.  Concentrating on building quality relationships, individualising learning and setting high standards.  Instead of labelling students by ability, we endeavour to emphasise effort and commitment.  Our values of ‘Tenacity’ and ‘Authenticity’ encourage a never give up attitude and to be true to who we are.   As a College we encourage colleagues, students, and the wider SCOTS community to embrace the ideal of becoming our best, most authentic selves and serving others in unleashing their potential.  This sort of education doesn’t just happen in a classroom.  It happens in every moment where we are genuinely engaging in life and tapping our yearnings to matter and make a difference.  Education is a living process of facilitating the realisation of our potential – -as individuals, teams, organisations, communities, and as a society.  If we treat people as they are, we make them worse. If we treat people as they ought to be, we help them become what they are capable of becoming.  Excellence is a daily choice and our guiding principle for success.

When we apply this to education, we get the following insight.  If we educate simply to help people fit into the world as it is, we make them worse.  If we educate people to unleash their potential beyond their current circumstance, we help them become agents in creating their best selves and a better world.  This is what I would wish for my own child, and what I will strive for the students at SCOTS PGC College.

Further to this, we are improving and updating how we communicate and deliver our teaching and learning in the digital world.  As a consequence, we will be changing our learning management system from SEQTA to Schoolbox, to be rolled out for the beginning of Term 3.  Look out for further communication regarding these changes and for the parental training sessions we will be running in Terms 2 and 3.  Any questions, please do not hesitate to get in touch.