Navigating Assessments & Celebrating Achievements in the Senior School

From the Head of Senior School, Tristan Bevan

Welcome to the last few weeks of the year where there is plenty going on in the Senior School!

This week saw Year 7-10 examinations. These provide a snapshot of student academic growth in the style of assessment that they need preparation for when they undertake their HSC examinations in a few years’ time. The first HSC assessments for our new Year 12 have been sat and I look forward to marking those to provide feedback over the weekend. In our revision lessons we did focused practice on like questions with feedback in the form of both teacher & peer marking, but we also looked at how to manage the stress of impending assessments, sporting competitions and dramatic & musical performances.

This was in response to this data collected from the MMG survey that concerned me.

We discussed the structure of the HSC and how school assessment marks are not fixed until the final HSC examinations are set due to the process of moderation (as I covered in the Newsletter at the end of Term 3).

We focused on putting things in perspective and focusing on what you can control. At Oxley we talk about educating the whole child and this is something that I am passionate about. To me neither assessment marks, HSC marks or an ATAR will define an individual student. The character they have developed through involvement in sport, performing arts, word & outdoor education all help to build the resilience and character to overcome setbacks and learn from mistakes. If our students have a realistic, attainable goal and the strength of character to believe in themselves and work hard to succeed, then they are well placed to work through setbacks to reach that goal.

In 2025, we will be bringing study skills back into one timetabled class per cycle for students in Year 7-10. In Year 7 we call this ‘Learning to Learn’, where we will actively assist students in the academic and organisational transition into the Senior School. I will be taking some of these classes to get to know every student in the new cohort as they join the Senior School. The goal here is for the skills learned to help reduce some of the anxiety shown in the graphs above. I am hopeful that by the next time we do a whole school MMG survey, these graphs will have significantly larger green values and fewer students reporting in the red.

This week we welcomed our Year 7 2025 students to Oxley for Orientation Day. In line with our goal for ‘enlightened academic rigour’ we also started the day with a new initiative. We had all new Year 7 students undertake baseline testing so we can best meet their needs in the years to come. This data combined with external data will be used to inform our teaching for this cohort as the start in the Senior School. Hopefully, the challenges of a few hours of tests were quickly forgotten and replaced by the excitement of meeting their Heads of House and House Captains, and the type 2 fun of the scavenger hunt, including how to evade torrential rain. I look forward to seeing this cohort start in January next year and seeing them build connections over the first few weeks and the Year 7 Orientation Camp.

In the remaining weeks we can look forward to Mamma Mia & Speech Night along with more exciting rounds of ISA sport, including a bumper edition this weekend with Boys Basketball, Cricket & Boys & Girl Touch Football at Oxley. Please come along and support, remembering that the students are not playing for sheep stations and to respect the officials – one of them might be me!

Warm regards

Mr Tristan Bevan
Head of Senior School