“What we will achieve … will be shaped far more by the collection of dispositions, habits and attitudes that make up our character than by our education and skills.”
The challenge for schools is always to provide environments where people, young and older, can build dispositions, habits and skills.
Visiting the art display in the library will bring you face-to-face with incredible levels of skill. While it is trite, the 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration rule is clearly evidenced. Colour, form, innovation, and style are as equally visible as tenacity, discipline, and practice. When considering the work, you encounter an artist.
At the award ceremony for the National History Challenge last week, I was struck by two things. The first was the amount of additional of work, over and above scheduled academic work, that students undertook and successfully completed. The second was that these young folk had captured the essence of studying history — they were historians.
Influenced by an artist who is a teacher, and a historian who is a teacher, the students engaged in these two activities were supported into discovering so much more about their own capabilities, dispositions, habits, attitudes and skills.
“It is also appropriate to remind all students that awards do not denigrate those who do not win”
More than one student became a scholar. More than one student became an artist.
Children uncover and forge their identity in a collection of continuous instalments. The nature of the lesson in each instalment is influenced by the different circumstances they encounter.
Gifted by God, nurtured by parents, nourished by teachers and refined by challenges, students steadily assemble the understanding of their capabilities. Rightfully, their sense of capacity is constantly stretched and their resilience grown through the challenges they face.
It is timely to remind our Year 12 students that their substance is not reflected by an academic score.
The examinations measure some elements of their academic progress. This is valuable, but not holistic or definitive. There is much more that creates the person that they are. As they leave school and enter the larger world, it is important for them to know and remember this.
It is also appropriate to remind all students that awards do not denigrate those who do not win.
“the point of reference we desire determines our response, happiness, and often our emotional health”
The reference point upon which we focus in life, as well as in specific endeavours, is of vital importance to both our perspective and our well-being.
I commend everyone to a podcast entitled ‘The Happiness Lab’, from the series entitled Revisionist History by Malcolm Gladwell. Dr Laurie Santos is Professor of Psychology and Cognitive Science at Yale University, and she delivers the most popular course in the history of that university, The Happiness Lab. In this podcast she explores the various responses of Olympic silver medallists to not winning the gold medal. She suggests that our minds do not always frame us for health and happiness.
For these athletes, being second best in the world may have been a disappointment. It turns out that the point of reference we desire determines our response, happiness, and often our emotional health.
The core of our work as a school is powered by our motto, ‘Set your mind on Christ’. Even the Yale University course affirms the deep virtue of that focus.
In both our spiritual and earthly lives, we are advantaged by focussing on our own character development. Our core business is on the improvement of our own dispositions, habits, attitudes, education and skills.
Iain Belôt - Principal