Principals Reflection

Herman Hesse, the nineteenth century German author and social commentator wrote many novels, the themes of which still have resonance for our contemporary times. Hesse is quoted as stating, ‘Everything becomes a little different when it is spoken aloud.’ Such a simple sentence that, upon reflection, has considerable applications – how often do our thoughts and actions change once the ‘unuttered word is spoken’; how often are school reports, school guidelines and policies require some reinterpretation regarding intent, upon being communicated. Student reports that will be issued to families next week are, ideally, communicated to families via a face-to-face meeting, allowing clarification and elaboration that support enhanced appreciation of this important aspect of school-home communication. Similarly, our school policies, and the expectations that reflect these policies, aim to provide all in our school community with sufficient guidance and support for our joint vision and purpose.

Although we communicate student learning engagement to families via the distribution of student workbooks, via online feedback samples, via the availability for 1:1 teacher-parent meetings throughout the year, and via diary notes, we all appreciate such communication provides a shallow appreciation of a ‘bigger picture’ of student learning. Similarly all our policies are available from our school website or from the school office, however, it is unrealistic to expect anyone to have a strong working knowledge of all these documents; just as Jesus summarised the 10 commandments into two (Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul and mind, and love your neighbour as yourself), all in our school community should take heart that much that is contained in the numerous policies is reflected in the simple principles inherent in two key behaviours or actions: Courtesy and Consideration - if communication through our words or actions are likely to counter these two qualities, then discernment is needed.

Communication of intentions has much in common with our school’s focus of striving to be ‘WEST’ people and endeavouring to uphold the Mercy values of offering Hospitality, being people who value Respect, Mercy and Compassion; consideration and courtesy are essentials in effective communication regardless of the generation. Our school diaries, Compass, Online Feedback initiative, school Facebook and school website all provide elements of an effective means of home-school communication. However, one of the benefits of a relatively small school community is the relative ease of communicating between home and school; our school usually has staff ‘on deck’ by 7:00am and rarely are ‘lights out’ before 6:00pm. I believe parents of St Patrick’s students are fortunate to have such immediacy with contacting their child’s school and I encourage parents to make use of this openness and accessibility to staff in the school setting.

Communication is at the heart of our school grievance policy. An important part of this policy is the need for considered responses – any conversation needs to have qualities of reflecting on any issue, trying to consider how best to ensure any ensuing discussions reflect what is right according to all involved in any communication, and to act after first contemplating all the facts. One of the misconceptions about teaching specifically, and education in general, is that it relies on talking to and with people to influence them. This is certainly an important tenet of teaching; however, effective communication is also about ‘hearing’ or appreciating what is not being said in a conversation. As we begin the final weeks of what has been a very busy term 2, we must not tire of communicating with each other and to be involved in listening to each other’s conversations perhaps a little more deeply than which we might have been accustomed to. We can’t expect to get every conversation ‘right’, or to walk away from every conversation assured our point was both appreciated or convincing, but we can engage with courtesy and consideration.

I find I must remind myself all too often to try to heed the example of the US Senator Margaret Chase Smith, who, at significant personal cost, in 1950 delivered her ‘Declaration of Conscience’ to the US Senate in opposition to the narrowing of debate and reason that was associated with the politics of fear espoused by another Senator, Joe McCarthy. Just as many of Herman Hesse’s themes provide us with wise counsel a century ago, Margaret Chase Smith’s following wise words certainly provides me with a constant reminder of the need to be attentive to discernment before action: “One of the basic causes for all the trouble in the world today is that people talk too much and think too little. They act impulsively without thinking. I always try to think before I talk.”

Thank you to all in our school community who contribute, in their own way, to help build respectful school communications.

Regards

Rod Linhart

(Principal)