International Service Learning Relaunches

On Friday morning, 25 students and staff from Calvin Christian School will be meeting at Hobart Airport ready to embark on an incredible learning journey.

For the first time since COVID, our students have the opportunity to travel overseas as we return to our International Service Learning Programs. The demand for this trip was high with a waiting list eventually introduced to cope with the strong response from our Year 11/12 parents and students.

The re-establishment of our International Service Learning trips takes our students to Indonesia across two weeks in June and July, experiencing life and faith in a country and culture quite unlike their own. The experience of students who have joined previous trips to Fiji and Vanuatu from Calvin has been transformational. What students discover is that the world is much broader and life is much more than we understand living in relative comfort in southern Tasmania.

“Spending time with local students and living in villages is an incredible way to understand the power of relationship and the value of contentment.”

Part of the richness of learning that I have had the privilege to observe travelling with students to developing countries has been the perspective that we invariably gain on our own lives. The realisation that we have a lot of ‘stuff’ and that actually, there are some things that are far more precious than the objects that we collect around us. Spending time with local students and living in villages is an incredible way to understand the power of relationship and the value of contentment. Many of our students will understand that our lives aren’t necessarily enriched by the headlong pursuit of more things, that wealth can shield us from some precious experiences of life.

Part of the strength of service-based learning is the changed perspective of students who embrace the opportunity to selflessly give of themselves. These students realise that in blessing others, they find something of real value. When confronted by a crowd who seemed intent on getting what they could from him, Jesus responded “do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life…” How much of our own life is spent chasing after things that won’t endure? Christian Education is much more than a pathway to employment and wealth, it a formational process that leads to a more certain hope.

Scott Ambrose - Principal

Virtue and Vengeance

Our Year 11 and 12 English Literature class has been studying William Shakespeare’s final play, The Tempest.

Set on a mythical island, the play explores the life of Prospero, a character who habours significant grudges against others and seeks cruel revenge for all who have wronged him.

At a pivotal point in the play Prospero is faced with a choice. His enemies are all at his mercy and he has the chance to punish them for their misdeeds. However, when Prospero is at the peak of his power, he chooses instead to forgive and show mercy. As Prospero decides to release and forgive his enemies, he reflects:

The rarer action is

In virtue than in vengeance (The Tempest, Act V, Scene 1, Line 27-28)

Prospero is a complicated character (just ask any of my English Literature students who sat an exam on him this week!). Like all of us, he wrestles with the big ideas of forgiveness, mercy, justice and freedom. He ultimately reaches the conclusion that while others have treated him poorly, he himself is not free from the blame and guilt that comes when relationships break down.

“The Lord is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and rich in love.”

In a Christian school, studying a text like The Tempest gives fantastic opportunities for students to reflect on their own perspective and values on the ideas of grace and forgiveness. It is amazing that as we read literature that was composed over 400 years ago, we encounter people who wrestled with the same profound ideas that we see in the world around us today.

But as we look even further back in time, it’s clear that the struggle to reconcile with others has its roots in the most ancient of stories. Whether it is Cain and Abel, Joseph and his brothers or David and King Saul, the Bible is filled with accounts of broken relationships, broken trust and the struggle between justice and mercy.

It is only through Jesus and His ultimate act of forgiveness on the cross that each of us can truly understand and accept grace. And it is only through Jesus that we, like Prospero, can extend grace, mercy and forgiveness to others.

Our work with students in the classroom is accompanied by daily moments where grace and forgiveness are needed. As our Primary Students engage in the PeaceWise program, they are learning to build healthy relationships with others, including how to seek and offer forgiveness. When relational difficulties arise in the Secondary School, students are guided through a series of reflections known as a restorative conversation. In each and every context, we seek to be guided and equipped by the example of Jesus and His call for us to do the very hard work of loving and forgiving each other.

One of my favourite Psalms is a beautiful reflection on the character of God. In Psalm 145, David writes The Lord is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and rich in love. I’m so thankful for the rich love and compassion of our Heavenly Father, and we pray daily that we might extend this same grace to each other in our community.

Stelle Carmichael - Head of Students

Reconciliation in action...

We are celebrating National Reconciliation Week at Calvin this week.

Started as the “Week of Prayer for Reconciliation” in 1993 and supported by Australia’s major faith communities, National Reconciliation Week has continued to grow across the nation. More than 30 years later, we celebrate by learning about our shared histories, cultures, and achievements, and exploring how each of us can contribute to achieving reconciliation within our Calvin community and beyond.

Our Food Technology students participated in ‘Bush Tucker’ sessions, identifying plants for medicinal culinary and domestic uses. Students have also prepared indigenous-inspired foods including mealworm pretzels, wattle seed cookies, wallaby and mountain pepper-berry meatballs, lemon- myrtle saltbush crackers and warrigal-green salsa-verde dip. Staff tasted some of these items at the official opening of the Calvin primary Bush Tucker Garden on Monday afternoon.

Year 4 students participated in a ‘knowledge sharing’ session with Janelle Smith, a palawa member of our Calvin staff team. In their library sessions this week, primary and Year 7 students have enjoyed books by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander authors and participated in a ‘yarning with yarn’ activity that will form an art installation in the Library. By the end of the week, our hope is that all of our Year 7 students will have learned more about the history and culture of the palawa people through a HASS excursion to TMAG.

Reconciliation and forgiveness are central to our identity as a transformational Christian learning community. We are reconciled and restored with God through Jesus. But it doesn’t end there, as we are then called to deliver the message of forgiveness, restoration and reconciliation to the world around us. Jesus gave us two inseparable commands – to love God, and love our neighbour as ourselves (Matthew 22:37).

At Calvin, we seek to understand what it means to “love our neighbour.” This sometimes requires soul searching. It often requires healing. It certainly requires us to engage with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories, cultures and experiences.

Bonny Moroni - Head of Secondary