From Director of Student Wellbeing, Matthew Porter
World’s Greatest Shave for the Leukemia Foundation
With heads still being shaved and donations still rolling in, it gives me great pleasure to report that our online total has exceeded the 2018 target of 15,000. Waverley College currently sits as the 30th placed school Nationwide for fundraising. With the cash donations collected last Thursday yet to be credited to our official total we will no doubt continue to climb the leaderboard.
Once again a huge thank you to all of our boys who “braved the shave” and especially to Thomas Carey for his courage and maturity in sharing his family’s story at the College Assembly last week. Our thoughts and prayers get out to all members of are College community who may have been touched by this terrible illness. No doubt the overwhelming generosity and kindness of spirit shown by everybody who supported this fantastic initiative will help support those currently fighting their own battles with Leukemia, Lymphoma and Myeloma.
National Day of Action Against Bullying
Parent Information Evening with Dr Michael Carr-Gregg
Last Thursday night approximately 250 parents from Waverley College, St Clare’s and St Charles attended a presentation from renowned Psychologist Dr Michael Carr-Gregg on the eve of the National Day of Action Against Bullying.
The presentation covered topics such as the definition of bullying, consequences of bullying, the role of the school in providing a safe and supportive environment for all students, what to do as a parent if your son is being bullied, what to do as a parent if your son is bullying others. A full copy of Michael’s presentation as well as the documents referred to can be found below.
- Bullying National Day of Action by Michael Carr-Gregg
- https://www.amf.org.au/media/1118/bullying-hurts_pageview.pdf
- https://docs.education.gov.au/system/files/doc/other/national_safe_schools_framework_resource_manual.pdf
- https://www.aracy.org.au/publications-resources/command/download_file/id/265/filename/A_Co
“Speak Through Action” Helping Hand
During Friday’s House Assemblies all boys from Year 5-12 were asked to take a stand together in recognition of the National day of Action Against Bullying and Violence. Each boy received a post-it-note and was asked to come up with their own promise on how they would “Speak Through Action” to make Waverley College a bullying free zone. Some examples from our School Captains and Year 12 Prefects were provided to get the boys thinking.
In total 1500 color coded post-it-notes, each containing a pledge from staff and students were strategically placed on to a blank canvas to create our “Helping Hand”. This formed a symbol that when it comes to Bullying and Violence Waverley College says “No Way”. A big thank you to the Art Faculty, Media Club, SRC and Student Leaders for making such a huge production run so seamlessly. The finished product will be displayed in the Student Wellbeing Centre.
A full copy of the Waverley College bullying policy can be found in the A-Z of Wellbeing in the Student Diary. We strongly urge all students to report incidents of bullying to their Head of House. This can be done in person, via email or online via the “Incident Report” facility on the Sentral Family Portal.
All students in Year 7-12 were emailed a copy of the 2018 Waverley College Bullying Survey. If your son has not yet completed this please remind him to do so. We encourage families to engage in a conversation with your son about bullying. The following conversation starters from the “Bullying No Way” website may prove useful.
Talk about what bullying is before it happens so children can recognise it and know what to do.
First, make sure you have a clear idea yourself by checking out the formal definition of bullying at What is bullying? You can also find ways to describe bullying that are suitable for children of various ages here.
Point out that bullying is not just when someone is mean to you once, but it happens over and over and makes you feel like you can’t stop it. If you want, you could use some of these questions:
- What do you think ‘bullying’ is?
- Have you seen bullying happening? What did you do? How did you feel?
- Why do you think some people bully other kids?
- Who are the adults you would talk to when it comes to things like bullying?
- Have you ever felt scared to go to school because you were afraid of someone bullying you?
- Has someone tried to bully you? What ways have you tried to change it?
- What do you think parents can do to help stop bullying?
- Have you or your friends left other kids out on purpose? Do you think that was bullying? Why or why not?
- Have you ever tried to help someone who is being bullied? What happened? What would you do if it happens again?
https://bullyingnoway.gov.au/TeachingAboutBullying/Pages/Talking-about-bullying.aspx#Anchor1
