THE heading is a misquote from the Apollo 13 space mission and one that perhaps equates to the current situation Greater Shepparton now finds itself embroiled in.
The Greater Shepparton Secondary College has problems. The problems of the Apollo 13 flight caused the world to sit up and take notice, waiting for catastrophe and similarly, the school’s problems are being amplified to the point the rest of the country is now taking notice
The racial and economic divides evident have now been put into a common pot and the fissures between these divides have opened in the youth and are being reflected on social media by those who should know better but don’t.
But their attitudes, their perceived differences are a reflection of who we are, how we see each other and more pointedly, how we bring our children up and how to behave.
And the negative approaches to the amalgamation are not accepting the realities that existed prior to it.
The students of Shepparton were statistically behind the rest of the state due to any number of reasons, chiefly, that schools did not have adequate resources alone and amalgamation would be able to provide the solution.
- Prior to the amalgamation, the four secondary schools in Shepparton had:
Less than 1 in 10 (8 percent) Year 9 students achieving in the top two bands for Reading (compared to 20 percent across Victorian government schools) - Only 6 percent of Year 9 students achieving in the top two bands for Numeracy (compared to 24 percent across Victorian government schools)
- Consistently lower mean VCE scores ( 25.3 percent compared with 28.9 percent in 2018)
- Consistently lower VCE completion rates (95.7 percent compared to 97.2 percent)
The attention of the world, in this case an aggressive national media who is not going to solve the problems, nor will it provide lasting salve to those most aggrieved, it is temporary and their interest will wane as quickly as it arose and they have milked the situation enough to foment further problems.
Interviewing a parent whose child is facing pressures at school gave insight to some of the issues not being faced, in this case it is partly racial and partly a mix of other inputs.
The parent talked of the ‘Arabs’ bullying her child, a somewhat derogatory term towards Shepparton’s expanding Middle Eastern and south Asian community denoting a class or racial divide. Each group will undoubtedly have similar slurs towards the others. In this city there are any number of similar divides. Shepparton has people from some 90 different countries of origin, making this hard to avoid.
Accepting that type of speech is most likely at the heart of the problem, no matter what side of the divide a parent comes from. It is how some parents talk, it is how some kids talk.
The school is not going to change, the divisions are not going to change, the city is not going to change, the only thing that is apt to change is the attitudes of the people most aggrieved.
The fights and bullying that are now causing concern are not new. An analysis of incident reports from the secondary schools in Shepparton in the two years prior to the merger of the schools from the start of 2020 shows that police attended at least 31 times for incidents that included physical altercations.
In response to some student behaviour incidents during term 1 there are a number of additional staff at the school, including extra teachers, additional multicultural education aides, and a number of specialist support service staff, including psychologists, who have expertise in student wellbeing and who are making a positive difference.
The future of Greater Shepparton Secondary College is mostly in the hands of the parents of the children who go there, not the school and not the teachers. The children that go there reflect the values their parents espouse, not the schools.
To be sure, the school and the teachers play a very significant role but the solution to this begins at home and the types of conversations happening there.
As the meme says, “When you focus on problems, you will have more problems. When you focus on possibilities, you will have more opportunities.”
In ten years’, the children that go there now will have to contend with the knowledge that their school was either a basket case or a prize in the making. That reputation is firmly in the hands of the people who are most likely to cast an opinion. It can be either negative or positive, and that is the real problem. Let’s hope it is positive.
