REFLECTION MY TIME AS PRINCIPAL AT GENAZZANO
My time as Principal at Genazzano FCJ College Karen Jebb | Principal As I come to the end of my five years as Principal of Genazzano FCJ College, many memories of my time at this College flood my thoughts and bring a warm sense of gratitude for the opportunity to lead this extraordinary learning community. It has indeed been an absolute privilege and delight; and the experience will remain in my heart forever. Catholic Education is my passion and I hope that my leadership of the mission of Genazzano FCJ College and the charism of the Faithful Companions of Jesus has given justice to its aspirations. My vision has been to continually ensure the College offers the best inclusive education possible whilst looking ahead to the future via an innovating curriculum that fosters a love of learning. I believe it is important to maximise the potential of all students, ensuring the community continues to believe in and foster the powerful impact that young women can have on our world and the hope they bring to the future. I also believe it is important to maximise the potential of all staff by offering evidence-based professional learning and an avenue for them to share their expertise and work collegially with each other. I am proud of the development of an FCJ Profile framework to articulate for the school community what is distinctive to all relationships and interactions in an FCJ school. The profile is based upon the Ignatian spirituality to see God in all things and the learning framework draws on the inspiration of the Ignatian Examen. The six key values of an FCJ school are explored in detail and describe how they are enacted/seen in the school on a daily basis. The development of this profile assisted me to articulate the distinctive nature of an FCJ school and to ensure that I led the implementation of the core values within all aspects of the College community. The profile creates a common language and ways of building positive and life-giving relationships with each other. It keeps our faith and FCJ traditions always at the forefront of our thinking, decision making and interactions. Over the past five years, I have encouraged a collegial approach and focus on the use of data to inform our understanding of each learner in our College. Our teaching approach needs to be purposeful and an indicator of our impact on student learning. This desire has driven our professional learning approach over the past five years. Our objective is to support all teachers to strategically and purposefully adjust their pedagogy to meet the learning needs of all students in all classes; and to utilise the learning data to track the overall improvement and impact. Together with the Director, we launched the Genazzano Institute of Learning & Brain Sciences and almost all teachers have completed at least three ‘Science of Learning’ modules. Each university level module includes a teacher chosen micro-project to test the effectiveness of the PEN (Psychology Education Neuroscience) Principles in the classroom. Our aim is to have our 6
teachers understand how the latest research about the brain can be translated to best practice pedagogy. The Institute supports teachers to be researchers in their own classroom, with coaching sessions to assist with the micro-projects. We have partnered with Dr Jared Cooney Horvath, Neuroscientist and Educator at the University of Melbourne, who is now a widely sought-after presenter. This ground-breaking professional learning program has been developed exclusively for Genazzano with an aim that our teachers are experts at implementing the Science of Learning understandings in the classroom. Our Professional Learning Program has been recognised nationally and internationally as innovative and cutting edge and Genazzano received The Educator’s Innovative Schools Award in recognition of our work in the area of learning and brain sciences. Our VCE results place Genazzano in the top 4% of schools in Victoria. Last year, most excitingly, 50% of students achieved an ATAR greater than 90, which is 14% higher than 2018 and an incredible 10% higher than any record at Genazzano since the introduction of ATAR. We also had 7% girls achieve an ATAR greater than 99. These results affirm the work we have been doing in the last five years in putting learning and teaching at the forefront of what we do at Genazzano. To support teacher, student and parent collaboration and effective communication and learning, we established an IT strategy plan in 2016 to implement an online Learning Management System and create a platform that provides easy communication avenues and innovative learning opportunities. This implemented ICT strategy led to a very smooth transition to learning at a distance during the COVID-19 pandemic; and feedback we have received from students, teachers and parents has demonstrated the success of our Learning Management System and IT support. I have enjoyed the implementation of the online presence of the College through social media platforms and the updating of our College website to incorporate online enrolment, video promotion and a cleaner style of information. It has been a critical communication medium this year. Our pastoral care and wellbeing programs at Genazzano are also leading the way. We have a team overseeing the wellbeing of students at the College. Our Deputy Principals, Performance Psychology Team, Head of Junior School, Head of Senior School, Team Leaders, and/or Curriculum Leaders, work together to support our students' learning and wellbeing. This approach has seen significant improvement in retaining students at the College and, in most cases, successfully responding to their needs and developing better learning and wellbeing outcomes for them. I am proud of the outstanding improvement of our Sports Program and the continued success of our Music and Co-curricular
