Teacher Magazine (ACER‪)‬ Teacher Magazine (ACER)

Welcome to Episode 5 of the School Assembly podcast series. If you haven’t heard this one before, we explore what it takes to build a school from the ground up and in Series 2 we’re following Jo Camozzato and the team at Bemin Secondary College – that’s a dual campus site in Truganina, which is north of Melbourne in Victoria. The focus for this episode is the build itself. Now, the school is due to open first day of term next year, and the build is due for completion on December 20th. So, it’s a good time to catch up with Jo to find out how things are going, but also ask her about how much involvement she has in the build and the design, and everything from sort of landscaping to the internal features, the furniture choices, the colours, all that kind of thing.

Host: Jo Earp
Guest: Jo Camozzato
Sponsor: MacKillop Seasons

The PISA 2022 international results have just been announced. The Programme for International Student Assessment, to give it its full title, measures the knowledge and skills of 15-year-old students in reading, mathematical, and scientific literacy. Rather than how well they’ve learned a particular piece of content or part of the curriculum, it assesses their ability to apply their knowledge and skills to real-life problems and situations. Singapore once again topped the tables across the board, with its students performing significantly higher than their international counterparts across all 3 domains.

PISA 2022, which was delayed by a year because of the pandemic, involved nearly 700,000 students from 81 OECD member and partner economies. Here in Australia, 13,347 students from 743 schools participated. Each cycle of PISA has a nominated major domain – the latest one being mathematics. In this special episode I’m joined by Professor Geoff Masters, CEO of the Australian Council for Educational Research, to talk about Australia’s performance, what we could learn from top performer Singapore, and some of the education reforms taking place in other parts of the world.

Host: Jo Earp
Guest: Geoff Masters
Sponsor: MacKillop Seasons

Our annual reader survey just concluded for another year. This is now the ninth year we’ve asked you for your feedback in our survey, and it’s certainly a highlight for our team when we’re able to read through all your responses.
This year, quite a few of you let us know you’d like more content on the topic of AI. You also let us know more about your concerns around the teacher shortage and managing your own workload, your wellbeing and the wellbeing of your students. So, in this episode, I’m going to highlight a range of stories we’ve published recently, that you might find useful, based on these areas of interest.
And, like all episodes of Teacher Staffroom, I’ll be sharing some other highlights from content we’ve published during the month, and I’ll also be posing some questions throughout the podcast, so feel free to pause the audio as you go, gather some colleagues, and discuss together how these stories might be relevant to your school context.
Host: Dominique Russell
Sponsor: MacKillop Seasons

Thinking about your own school, would you say your team of staff is diverse and representative of the students you teach? We know that diversity in any community is a strength, and when it comes to schools, diversity and a culture of inclusion has a positive impact on student outcomes.
In today’s episode I’m joined by Associate Professor Suzanne Rice from the University of Melbourne, whose research interests centre around attracting and retaining teachers. She’s the lead author of a new report which looks at the current state of diversity in Australia’s schools and explores initiatives and strategies schools and policymakers can put in place to increase diversity.
Host: Dominique Russell
Guest: Suzanne Rice
Sponsor: MacKillop Seasons

Welcome to Episode 4 of the School Assembly podcast series. If you haven’t heard this series before it’s the podcast that explores what it’s like to build a school from the ground up and this year, Season 2, we’re following Jo Camozzato and her lovely team out there at Bemin Secondary College. The topic of today's episode will be putting together the school mission and vision and values.
Host: Jo Earp
Guest: Jo Camozzato
Sponsor: Monash University

We know from the research that highly effective schools apply their resources – such as staff and school time, expertise, and facilities – in a targeted manner to maximise outcomes for students. For instance, resources are prioritised towards evidence-informed strategies aimed at improving student outcomes; leaders are making the best possible use of available expertise to meet student needs; and a flexible approach is taken with resource deployment.
In this episode of School Improvement I’m joined by Belinda Norrie and Jacqueline Hampson. Belinda is the relieving Deputy Principal at Narrabeen North Public School, a primary school in north Narrabeen, which is a beachside suburb in northern Sydney. Jacqueline is Head Teacher Secondary Studies over at Narrabeen Sports High School. Both schools are members of the NEST collaboration, where NEST stands for Narrabeen Elanora Student and Teacher. NEST also includes two other local schools – Narrabeen Lakes Public School and Elanora Heights Public School.
For the past few years, staff and students in the 3 primary and one secondary school have been sharing facilities to enhance learning opportunities and fostering relationships between staff. In this episode, Belinda and Jacqueline share how the collaboration began, why it extends across K-12, and their advice for other school communities looking to collaborate in a similar way in the future.
Host: Dominique Russell
Guests: Belinda Norrie, Jacqueline Hampson
Sponsor: MacKillop Seasons