Our guest speaker at this week's meeting was Evelyn Sayers on the topic of Principles of Principals.
Evelyn has enjoyed a long career as an educator. She trained as a primary school teacher in the days when teachers were 'bonded' and if they didn't serve out their three year bond, women had to repay all monies especially when resigning to marry or have a baby.
Evelyn took on further study to gain a Bachelor of Education and a Graduate Diploma of Health Education. She wrote the Health curriculum for the State of Victoria [having taken leave to do so - no 'charity' in those days].
On two separate occasions Evelyn studied the Reggio Emilia philosophy in Italy. The educational rationale underpinning this philosophy is that children learn best through an opened experiential approach with emphasis on environmental interactions with other children and in which they have some direct control.
Evelyn spoke of her earlier career in the government school system, followed by 15 years teaching at Peninsula Grammar.
Later she was the Foundation Principal of two Independent Schools contemporaneously, at Casey and Balcombe Grammar Schools.
In preparation for Evelyn's talk, the Editor found that in 2001 she was awarded a Centenary Medal for her Services to Education and Children.
Evelyn is currently an Ambassador for Independent Schools Victoria (ISV) where she attends to the mentoring of new principals and related services.
ISV represents 223 independent schools in Victoria with some 13,000 plus teacher staff and over 145,000 students. Many of these schools have a religious affiliation with over 30 different religious groupings have faith based schools under their control.
Evelyn spoke about the very many challenges facing principals, especially younger persons newly appointed to the role. Principals have a multitude of challenges, including developing a vision for the school, determining the strategic direction of the institution, ensuring a structured curriculum, promoting a positive culture, oversight of the students' development, promoting teacher excellence, conducting teacher assessments and interacting with parents together with a plethora of personnel, administrative, budgetary and maintenance tasks.
Each year Evelyn organises four residential programs for principals and she assists individual principals on an 'as required' basis. She also works with Deloitte Consulting to provide a Courageous Leadership Program for Principals.
A principal must be a positive, courageous, dynamic person with outstanding listening skills who can engage with and develop strong relationships with students, teachers, parents and other stakeholders.
Evelyn addressed the questions as to what makes a good school and what makes a good teacher.
Evelyn's talk was extremely informative and interesting and she demonstrated how an excellent speaker can hold an audience even when people are not in the same room.
A series of questions from members of the Club was evidence as to how well Evelyn had been able to explain her topic and entertain everyone.
President Ross thanked Evelyn in person by walking into the next room and presenting her with a facsimile glass from the Rotary club of Mt Eliza.
Evelyn on the Zoom screen.