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JUNIOR & SENIOR SCHOOL
Pastoral Care
Mr Baldino Vetrano - Director of Students
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This year the College came together in Week 7 to acknowledge Harmony Day 2022 and the National Day of Action against Bullying and Violence.
Harmony Day
The K-12 assembly highlighted the importance of multiculturalism and kindness.
This year’s theme for Harmony Day was Celebrating Harmony!
Harmony Week is observed for a week in March and includes 21 March, which is the United Nations International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. Harmony Day is intended to celebrate the cohesive and inclusive nature of Australia and promote a tolerant and culturally diverse society. Initially celebrated in 1999, Harmony Day coincides with the UN’s International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, which was established in 1966 with the aim of eradicating racism and racially-fuelled hate crime.
Harmony Day is represented by an orange ribbon, and participants are encouraged to wear orange due to connotations of social communication, freedom of ideas and encouragement of mutual respect. Australia prides itself on being a multi-cultural society, with figures showing that nearly half of all Australians were born overseas, with the country seeing a high volume of migration every year. On top of this, more than 70 Indigenous languages are spoken in Australia, and it has a very rich tribal heritage.
The continuing message of Harmony Day is ‘Everybody Belongs’ and its annual observance aims to encourage inclusiveness, respect and belonging for all Australians, regardless of cultural background, and celebrate core Australian values.
U-Turn the Wheel
On Wednesday 11 May, Year 11 participated in a driver safety program called ‘U-Turn the Wheel’. The aim of this program is to address the alarming number of young people in the Macarthur area who are involved in motor vehicle collisions of a serious or fatal nature, with the aim to reduce incidents of such accidents. The program was run by officers from Camden Police in conjunction with Campbelltown City Council, NRMA and the
Rotary Club of Campbelltown.
The students engaged in sessions throughout the day including; Sharing the Road with Trucks, Keeping your Ls and Ps, Low Risk Driving, Buying a Used Car, Celebrating Safely and NRMA - Getting Your Ls and Ps.
The Rite Journey - Year 9
The Calling and Departure Ceremony Year 9
In 2022 Year 9 embarked on a program called The Rite Journe (TRJ). The Rite Journey program in the words of its founder;
The Rite Journey is a unique educational programme designed to support the development of self-aware, vital, responsible and resilient adults. Given the current lack of Rites of Passage in the Western World, young people are left to invent their own, which are often unhealthy and unsafe. The Rite Journey reinvents the traditional process of a Rite of Passage to assist in transforming the adolescent from dependency to responsibility.
It takes a village to raise a child and as a St Greg’s Village, Year 9 came together on Thursday 24 February to embark on a shared journey to help raise Year 9 students to become fine young men.
The first part of the ceremony saw the boys walking up Badgally Hill. In this stage of the ceremony, we asked the boys to reflect on their childhood, what behaviours should they be letting go of and making their homeroom pledges. The formal part of the evening which was held in the Br Luke Hall, parents/carers and the boys sat together. This is ‘The Calling’ section of the ceremony. There were many tears shed during this part of the evening. The students show gratitude for their childhood and are called on their journey to adulthood.
The final part of the ceremony was ‘The Departure’ section of the ceremony. This is where parents, carers and mentors join the students for an opportunity to learn, reflect and look forward. In true St Greg’s fashion, as we stood in our new Wiritjiribin (Lyrebird) Garden, we collectively sung the hymn the boys love singing...the Sub Tuum.
Mr Michael Ivancic Year 9 Leader
The Rite Journey - Year 10
The Abyss Camp
The Rite Journey (TRJ) is a unique educational program designed to support the development of self-aware, vital, responsible and resilient adults. From 4 - 6 April, Year 10 students visited Cataract Scout Park, Appin to engage in one of the final stages of The Rite Journey (TRJ) Pastoral program – The Abyss. The 6 stages of TRJ are The Calling, The Departure, The Following, The Challenges, The Abyss, The Return and The Homecoming. The Abyss is the biggest challenge of the program and aims to take students out of their comfort zone to help them learn more about themselves.
After months of rain and a delayed camp, Year 10 were excited and fortunate to engage in such a special camp. In the lead up to camp the rain held off drying out the campgrounds and we experienced two rare days of sunshine, before some rain arrived late on Tuesday evening. The camp had two main elements - an activity component; including skirmish, challenge valley, waterslide, survivor team challenges, and, a solo camping component.
The Solo Camp Out
During the solo camping component, students were taught how to set up a tent (correctly), cook a meal (pasta on a trangia) and spend some time by themselves. Students were given a ration pack and a Rite Journey student booklet filled with reflection questions, activities and a piece of paper to write a letter to their Year 12 self.
Students were split into small groups, yet, spaced out at the Cataract site. Their challenge was to remain alone, uncommunicative and self-sufficient for 18 hours. The goal of the solo camp out is to allow students to disconnect from technology, learn some new skills and spend some time in nature reflecting on their own journey. It was great to see several students get out of their comfort zone and learn something about themselves. In discussion with students back at school, it was clear that the boys had a fantastic time and learnt a lot about themselves. A few quotes from morning briefing after the solo come to mind:
• “I learned that I rely on my phone too much and can live without it” • “I realised I rely on my parents for basically everything” • “I enjoy getting outdoors, nature and camping” • “I can cook! … and enjoyed putting up a tent” • “I learned that I can’t cook pasta …. Yet!” A special element to the solo camp included a letter written by families that were given to the young men as they woke from their night alone. Thank you to Ms Rachel Keith (Year 10 Assistant Year Leader), who printed letters and placed the letters in labelled envelopes for camp. I would like to personally thank the St Gregory’s College staff, who were exceptional in the lead up to The Abyss, as well as the Boomerang Adventure staff. The young men of Year 10 are privileged to have such a great caring and supportive group of staff guiding them through what was a unique and challenging experience.
The Homecoming
After 15 months of The Rite Journey (TRJ), our inaugural cohort completed the final stage of the program titled The Homecoming. The rain cleared, and the setting was beautiful for a special evening. Staff, students, parents and mentors gathered around the new Wiritjiribin (Lyrebird) Garden as Mr Craig Ashby, the Aboriginal & Torres
Strait Islander Liaison, opened the ceremony with a special Acknowledgement of Country. This set the scene for a beautiful evening. There were several special readings, prayers, intentions and opportunities for parents to share a moment with their son. The Homecoming ceremony certainly had a fun celebratory feel as Mr Laurence Malaesilia led an engaging drumming and listening activity. Our students also sang a favourite hymn, 10 000 reasons (Bless the Lord), and a lemon myrtle was planted in the Indigenous Garden to commemorate our first TRJ cohort.
As the weather cooled, parents, staff, mentors and students entered the Marian Centre where the celebrations continued. Parents formed a guard of honour for each homeroom group and there was an opportunity for staff and students to share testimonials and celebrate what we had achieved throughout the TRJ program. Students received a TRJ certificate of completion and a keyring, wonderfully crafted by Mr Andrew Profilio. In return, homeroom staff received a signed photo of the HR group and a small plant for their desk from the students to acknowledge the growth of each student throughout the program. We heard some powerful testimonials on the evening including: Lucas Ross, Hollins Eastgate, Kieran Foran, Anthony Zappia and Jayden Ashton with his Mentor, Ryan Costello (Class of 2004) - Old Boy, who together built a bed for Jayden’s two-year-old sibling. Mrs Sandra Hackett (10G) gave a brilliant speech from the heart and missed her basket weaving class to do so. The evening concluded with a video of the boys TRJ journey, and some final thanks as the Year 10 young men gave a resounding rendition of the Sub Tuum to close the celebrations.
Thank you to Mrs Cathie Clarke, Mrs Ally Buckley, Mrs Debra Monte, Ms Rachel Keith and the many staff members who helped to make the evening such a special one. The Homecoming Ceremony was certainly a highlight of my teaching career, and I look forward to seeing the young men of Year 10 continuing to grow over the coming years.
Mr Daniel Goodhew Year 10 Leader
Testimonials.
Jayden Ashton: On his Mentor Ryan Costello: Old Boy and College Captain (Class of 2004) “My mentor Ryan has been a close friend of ours for a long time. I felt it was best to ask Ryan to be my mentor not only because we have known him for a long time but also because he is an old boy of the College. Choosing Ryan also allowed him to come back to the college to see how the school has changed over the past 20 years.
For the Rite Journey Project, Ryan and I worked on building and painting a new bed for my 2-year-old brother. It has had its challenges along the way with constant disruptions due to Covid however Ryan consistently reminded me that we could get through it together, so we can reap what we sow. Whilst working on this project with my mentor it has taught me many new things. For example, there is more than one way to skin a cat, in other words, there is more than one way to achieve something. I found this saying very inspirational as it is very relative to life in general. Throughout the project I learnt how to use various tools, how to measure correctly, how to cut wood using various saws and how to prep and paint the frame to achieve the ultimate result. Overall, in my opinion I believe the thing I enjoyed most about this project was being able to spend time with my mentor and learning valuable life lessons along the way.”
Lucas Ross
Good evening Mr Goodhew, Parents, Carers and fellow students. 1 minute. 1 minute, was the prescribed time of this speech Mrs Clarke gave us in her office very few days ago, so I will attempt to keep this in the appropriate time though I wish to bring forward possibly some different insights into what my feelings, thoughts and actions were during the rite journey, not only my thoughts but thoughts of others not standing here today presenting to you. A little while back, sitting in Mr Vetrano’s Italian class before anybody knew of this program - The Rite Journey, uneasy feelings and thoughts were expressed as a class, towards Sir, when he told us about this program. Year 8 goes by, now Year 10 finishing this program, I then still had uneasy thoughts and feelings towards, these feelings were felt throughout my friendship groups and I’m sure others. Let me explain, I didn’t believe that a program could simply mature and make us young boys into mature men or discipline us into fine young men though I learned it can’t, it simply cannot do those things, you may ask yourself why we did it? And did it work?
The harsh truth is no it truly did not for everyone though it sparked the men who wanted to achieve and do better as young soon to be men to do these things, it acted as a somewhat aid to us as we were maturing during this time to young men as we are adolescents and in less than a year senior. This program did not work unless you allowed it to mature and work within yourself, the countless homeroom sessions, talks and being together as a grade not to leave out the camp these were the things that truly challenged us and helped as an aid in maturing into fine Greg’s boys. Only If you opened your heart and allowed yourself to.
Hollins Eastgate
The Rite Journey Program has provided me with the opportunity to form stronger relationships with each of my teachers. Through various physical and mental activities, I was able to identify my strengths and weaknesses, using that as a building block to connect and relate with each one of them. Numerous activities throughout, highlighted their personality and character traits inside and outside of the classroom. In particular, the archery tag and challenge valley course in the Abyss Camp. It was moments like these that allowed me to see the true nature of my teachers and aspire to follow their standards outside of school as a young man of St Gregory’s College and the world.
Kieran Foran
I am incredibly grateful for the discussions that we had throughout the year. It felt like the only time where the stresses of school were lifted, and we could just talk about different things. There was no judgement, no heckling. It was just boys listening and understanding what was being said. A lot of the activities were fun and entertaining, like juggling and singing around the campfire. There were other topics that were hard to talk about as well. We spoke about our fears, death, mental health and what makes us sad. Basically, the program has helped to teach us how to feel, and to remember that it is ok, not to be ok! I would like to commend every single boy in this room for taking it seriously. For being respectful to your peers when they were opening up about difficult situations or feelings. It has shown me that the young men of year 10 are men with strong minds and gentle hearts.
Sandra Hackett
My name is Sandra Hackett and I have been teaching Mathematics at St Greg’s since 2016. Prior to this, I taught at Hurlstone Agricultural High School for 12 years with five of these years spent in the role of Head Teacher Welfare and another four years as a Year Coordinator. My move to St Greg’s was motivated by wanting to be a part of the school that was providing such great experiences for my own two sons who were in Years 10 and 12 at the time and hoping that I could help provide that standard of schooling for other young men in the future. Since arriving at St Greg’s, I have been a part of the Stage 5 Homeroom team working with Mr Hogan as Year Coordinator for the first four years and Mr Goodhew for the last two-and-a-bit years. When we were introduced to The Rite Journey program at our training in 2020, I was apprehensive, wondering if this was going to be some well-being fad that would be good for a few years, but then fade away. However, looking around me, at the others who had been chosen to be a part of this, and hearing Deb Monte and Ally Buckley (both of whom I greatly respect) speak so enthusiastically about The Rite Journey, I quickly realised that this was a well-researched, evidencebased program that the school was investing in and that it was going to offer amazing experiences to the boys of St Greg’s on their journey to manhood. What I wasn’t really prepared for was the impact that it would have on me.
The content of The Rite Journey is very similar to what has always been presented to the boys in Years 9 and 10, but in this program it is done in a structured, organised and well-sequenced fashion, and it is very pro-active rather than reactive. Concepts are explored more deeply, in smaller groups, with time given to reflect and share experiences. Conversations generated within homerooms are things not normally covered in a classroom but definitely should be. The discussions we had about exploring relationships made me look closely at my own relationships. We considered the role that elders play in our lives, and as a result of this, I have made the effort to spend more time with my aging parents listening (really listening) to their stories even if I have heard them a hundred times before. Hopefully, some of our young men have also recognised the importance of our elders and how important it is to listen and learn from them while we still have the opportunity to do so. We spent time exploring the concept of “Masculinity” and challenging the perception of what makes a “man”. This got me to considering the roles the males in my life play – some of the boys were surprised to find out that my husband (who many of them know as a rugby coach and former player) does the cooking and ironing in our house. Staff and students shared conversations about how the responsibilities are shared in their
homes – things have definitely changed from the “traditional” roles that my parents held, and this provided plenty for our young men to consider as they develop relationships in the future. We spent time looking at popular male role models and ranked them in order of maturity, then explored what they did (or didn’t do) to place them where they were in the rankings. Every week, I learned something from my homeroom; they have an amazing knowledge of all things; a lot of knowledge about soccer, and many other things! From this came our exploration of character strengths – what strengths we each have and what would we like to work on. I completed the extensive character strength analysis as part of our training in 2020 and then again last week and there were significant changes in my results – changes that quite clearly reflect the values we have promoted throughout The Rite Journey. I was surprised by this – my top strengths changed from Honesty and Humour in 2020 to Curiosity, Love of Learning and Gratitude in 2022. I am a big believer in leading by example, and The Rite Journey has inspired me to look for new challenges and opportunities to learn new skills – I now own a full set of cake decorating piping nozzles and I am missing my TAFE basket weaving class to be here tonight, seriously, I’m learning basket weaving! My family are looking forward to baskets full of beautifully decorated cakes as Christmas presents this year! One of my favourite activities of The Rite Journey has been seeing the boys in my homeroom take on the challenge of learning to juggle. It makes me smile to imagine the scenario in the future when their children ask them if they can juggle and they reply with, “maybe, I did learn this in Year 9”, and they pick up a couple of oranges and give it a go as they remember our rice-filled balloons and hours of practice in Room 227. Other favourite moments for me were found on our camp. Seeing our young men working together on the challenges and really pushing themselves to complete physical and mental tasks and get out of their comfort zone was invaluable. What was supposed to be a team’s competition through the muddy assault course, changed into one big group working together to encourage each other and conquer the challenges and get as wet and muddy as possible in the process - with a few leeches to add to the excitement! Some coped better than others with the leeches, you know who you are! For me, camp was also an opportunity to meet young men in the year group that I had not previously interacted with. This included one of the most determined young men I have ever encountered, who, as the sun went down and it got colder and colder, and the rest of the group abandoned the water for the warmth of their towels, continued to run back to the top of the water slid,e over and over again, determined to set a new record for the fastest slide on camp. He was cheered on by the whole group who all shared in his success when he beat the previous record by 0.3 of a second! I made sure to chat to this previously unknown to me young man and make sure he realised the significance of what he had just done and that he understood that if he took that determination into other aspects of his life, he would be unstoppable! From a personal perspective, I can sum up my own Rite Journey experience by reflecting on an extra lesson that I had to supervise last week to cover for an absent colleague. On this day, I had taught my Extension 2 Maths class before school, and had just one period off that I had planned to use to mark Year 11 topic tests. I received an extra supervision in that one period, a year 10 PDHPE class, learning hip-hop dancing. Knowing from previous years that an external instructor comes in for these lessons, I thought, that’s not too bad, I might still get a few tests marked.
Then came the email - the instructor isn’t coming in today! Ok, there’s usually a few Year 10 classes on at the same time, there’ll be a PE teacher there to help. Then came the next email, all the other PDHPE teachers are on other classes, so here’s a copy of the music and a video of the routine… good luck…oh, and… the boys have only two more lessons until their dance assessment! Sigh… no marking getting done then! How much do I know about hip-hop dancing? Less than I know about basket weaving! I had a look at the roll for the class and there were a few boys from my homeroom. That’s good, and a few I’d met on camp, even better, hey, they’re a Year 10 class, we’re all on the same journey! This class welcomed me, and my very limited knowledge of dancing, and it really was a great opportunity to see these young men in another scenario… a few surprisingly good dancers… and a few… well… maybe they could try basket weaving! While we have had some challenges throughout the program due to COVID, I have really enjoyed the journey with my homeroom so far, and look forward to seeing these young men mature and develop over the coming years. The Rite Journey is the best student wellbeing program I have been a part of in my teaching career and it has been a privilege to be a part of this journey under the excellent leadership of Daniel Goodhew and to be a part of such a wonderful team!
