EXCEPTIONAL STAFF

Our purpose is to build young people of character and one of the ways in which we do this is to immerse our students in an environment where character is modelled for them. Our staff work to do exactly this and across our School we have continued to see many examples of our people living out our Ivanhoe Learner Attributes of Courageous, Innovative, Balanced, Collaborative, Ethical, Reflective and Compassionate.

In a year where our staff were able to return to working on site, the task of ensuring student learning remained undisrupted continued on as isolation due to COVID related illness led to significant staffing challenges in the first half of 2022. The work ethic of our staff across all campuses gave testimony to their resilience and commitment to our student’s learning and saw the School successfully navigate these challenges.

Through all of this, the journey of ensuring Ivanhoe attracts, retains and develops exceptional staff continued through what proved to be a very highly demanding and difficult time across the education marketplace. Our School continued to experience success in recruitment and was able to build on our existing exceptional staff cohort in a manner reflective of our People First Strategy and our considered approach to workforce planning.

Staff engaged in professional learning across a range of disciplines with Professional Development Days focusing on learning for Academic staff and the continuation of our coaching and mentoring model. Included in this was the ongoing training of all staff in the area of Child Safety which remains our highest priority in all facets of School operations and planning. We continued to provide professional development opportunities to our staff to drive our Reconciliation Action Plan. Our reconciliation vision is for an inclusive inter-cultural relationship between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and non-Indigenous Australians based on common respect and recognition of the enduring value of First Peoples’ knowledge and cultures. Tied to this was further work in finalising the First Nations Program and the continued work of our Diversity and Inclusion Committee in delivering on strategic initiatives.

Our team partnered with key stakeholders in developing and enabling appropriate staffing structures to better support student learning, particularly in the area of Individual Needs learning and also in our extensive Performing Arts, Sport and broader co-curricular program. On a practical level, the Human Resources team continued the implementation and review of its employment lifecycle processes and workflows, benefiting from the efficiencies of now embedded, onboarding software. This platform has enabled efficient and timely engagement with potential candidates for employment and has streamlined our induction processes allowing for a great deal of automation in supporting staff as they begin or continue their professional journeys at Ivanhoe. Of course, the personal touch and connection remains a high priority and key element of the successful transition into our School that our new staff experience.

Phil Tascone Head of Human Resources