Boarding, Week 2

Dear Boarding Families,

As I send this newsletter out, I am overlooking the Yarra in South Bank Crown Casino Melbourne Vic about to be taken out for my 50^th Birthday by my beautiful wife of 25 years, Lisa. While in Melbourne I will be catching up with Tom and Justine Koutsoupias for dinner on Saturday night, can’t wait. Aaron, their son, is in Grade 12 boarding here at Grammar.

Like a lot of our boarders, I will celebrate without my whole family being around me. My Mum and Dad can’t give me the “we are so proud of you and what you have created with your life and your beautiful family” speech and my Mum will not be there to embarrass me with her stories of how “I was the perfect child” one that gets Lisa’s eyes rolling every time she is subjected to it. I can’t hug my son Josh or daughter Katie and tell them how special and proud of them I am and how they have made my life complete. Or even just catch up to discuss the moments that have led to 50 years of living in this wonderful world with my mates, but that’s OK because I truly feel I have over 80+ other students, parents and staff who comfortably support and make me feel part of a community where I feel valued, respected, cared for and supported and that makes me feel a sense of belonging.

Like most of us, we crave that feeling of belonging in our lives, although we may not express it or ask for it each day, deep down when having conversations with your child in boarding about how they are tracking during the day, they are keen to see my interest and engagement with them.  When I am distracted or not paying attention, I am equally reminded, which occurred at Bunnings last weekend with Maya Garwood and Mackenzie Grant when picking out paint for a room flip we are about to do. I went into the selective hearing, ‘Dad’ mode, focused on the task ahead and have paid the price for it all this week. Again, reminders that make me feel part of this wonderful boarding community and a sense of belonging.

Enjoy your fortnight.

Kind regards,

Ash

Ash Keatch
Head of Boarding

Please see the flyer for Ulverstone. Malcolm Dolman Head of Enrolments and I are looking forward to connecting with families in this area. Thanks Again to Ian and Wendy Heywood who will be hosting us, Niall, their son, is in Grade 7 boarding here at Grammar.

Term 2 Public Health Emergency Guidelines

In brief:

Where a person has contracted COVID-19 and has recovered they are not required to:

• get tested if they develop COVID, cold or flu-like symptoms; or

Please support Jenny, our nurse, who is acting on advice from Public Health. Our priority is your child and the boarding community who reside on-site at school. We are deemed a High-Risk setting, so it’s important to understand that unless you live on Flinders Island or are an Interstate/International boarder and can’t fly, with a positive result, then you will be required to collect your child from boarding and isolate at home.

Please see the latest Issue from ‘Lights Out’. This magazine is sent to us by ABSA and is distributed around both boarding houses. I liked the following articles:

• Negative Word of Mouth (what to do when it starts to go wrong)
• Sleep and Technology in Boarding Houses (relevant to our phone and laptop review)
• Mood Food is Helping Schools to Focus on Prevention for Mental Health
• The Power of One Trusted Adult (This aligns with all our staff recently doing the Australian Childhood Foundation certificate).
• Culture Thermostat or Thermometer

Please see the link below to access this magazine.

https://www.boarding.org.au/our-community/lights-out-journal-1

As mentioned in my last newsletter, I flew into Brisbane at the end of the last term to meet with the ABSA CEO and GM. We discussed the Australian Standards and the process required to meet them. The great news is that they have also provided some recommendations from previous visits to Grammar Boarding and I can confidently say we have met or have it as part of our goals for boarding.

Working with Standard Australia, writing of the boarding and subsequent development of self-assessment and the certification scheme has been a key part of ABSA’s work to ensure excellent practice in boarding schools. For us at Grammar, it ensures what we are doing in Tasmania meets the standard set across Australia for boarding.

I am due to meet with the schools’ Risk & Compliance Committee in July to present to them and explain how we are doing this and what the process involves for Grammar Boarding.

Some more great news is that ABSA is comfortable that we can achieve our goal of meeting Boarding Standards by the end of this year. This will provide Launceston Church Grammar Boarding with a Certificate of Accreditation.

This has been the topic of conversation in our newsletters and one on one conversations with parents and students who have genuine concerns about some of the food served in boarding. Boarders have been great at using our system of feedback.

In our current system if students/staff aren’t happy with a particular meal is that we need to give instant feedback. This can be in the form of:

• the comments book in the dining hall
• talking to catering staff in the kitchen for that shift
• boarding staff on hand each day and at each meal and finally
• the duty report which gets entered each night from the staff on duty in each house.

The boarding student leadership group met with all the boarders the other night and was asked to talk about positive and negative issues regarding the boarding food. Our Captain of Boarding will meet to discuss these results with me next week.

I will be meeting with the GM of Chartwells Australia over the phone and will then arrange a meeting with our acting Headmaster Nick Foster over the coming weeks to discuss what our concerns are around the connection between mental health and our food issues impact on our boarders. This is an area I am keen to find a solution in.

Please see our Recreational activities for this term. Thanks to Miss Vandervelde for putting this together. She met with our boarders this week to go through the events for this term. We have tried to find a balance between things that cost and things that are free to explore. It’s important to note we have indicated the approximate cost you will be charged for some events.

Boarding Term 2 Activities

I asked CET for our bus to be branded to help promote boarding as we have clocked over 30,000 km in and around Launceston. This is the result….

Yes, it is an eye-catcher!  All staff who drive this bus are now on display. I love the images! it really depicts our culture in Grammar Boarding.

Please see our revised phone and laptop guide. We are very satisfied all parties have had input into this and it is pleasing to see students doing this without fuss. I am waiting for Senior Executive to sign off on the policy then I can share this with you all via a letter later in the term. We felt it best to start so it doesn’t disrupt our boarding students who we all know love routine during the term.

New revised phone and laptop guide_2022

A boarding culture is not static. It will change and evolve over time as staff members, students and Heads of Boarding move on. The shift in culture can be slow or relatively quick, depending on what’s shaping it. When a boarding culture is good, it’s an indicator that the organisation is performing well with highly engaged staff, happy boarders and satisfied parents.

I was searching up Launceston Church Grammar School (Senior Campus) and found some very ordinary reviews from up to 4 years ago in regard to Boarding. I believe this is not a true reflection of our current boarding environment. I am looking to push these old comments down the list.  If you could assist me by adding a comment that you have experienced that reflects our current culture then hit the link below.

Launceston Church Grammar School – Senior Campus – Google Maps