Under the new leadership of Principal Greg Sullivan, Coogee Primary School wanted to emulate its century old logo of a ‘lighthouse’,where the new school culture would be a beacon for educational aspirations and outcomes for all students, families and staff.
To achieve this goal CEO of Sports Challenge Australia (SCA), Dr Garry Tester, was enlisted to use his ‘world leading’ ‘Charter building and audit model’ to galvanise all Staff, the Parents & Citizens Council and the school Board, not only in developing a School Charter, but to make the developed behaviours accountable by all.
Over the past 12 years Dr Tester and his team from Australian Corporate Challenge (the corporate training arm of SCA) have built Exemplar Charters for iconic Corporate and Government Companies including: OZ Minerals, Audi Australia, British Telecom, Australian Navy, Singapore Airlines, Public & Private Schools and Aust & WA Government Agencies.
To this end all staff, representatives from the P&C and the School Board attended a one-day workshop at the end of 2020 to workshop the desired values and behaviours to take the school and its community forward into 2021 and beyond. After intensive small group discussions and a series of workshop activities, a wonderful aspirational Charter was developed ( see below) which was signed by all represented groups as the benchwork of values and acceptable behaviours to assist all students reaching their full potential, both academically and socially in their journey at Coogee PS.
The Charter was signed by all participants and will be distributed to all staff and families as well as displayed prominently around the school and on the school website.
It will be championed by all staff through the manner they deliver the educational curriculum and more importantly everyone will be held accountable for their actions and behaviours through a quality audit completed by Dr Tester and his team on a regular timeline. From the objective and narrative Charter audit feedback areas to work upon will be highlighted so staff can act upon to build a ‘lighthouse culture’ for all.
Everyone is excited about the prospects of the Charter and as one staff member said “ I now feel like I belong to a family culture which has tangible meaning and importantly it will be measured to give us valuable feedback to see how we are going and to see the effect upon our student’s outcomes”.
