Thursday, 14 November 2019
Parent/Carer Update
After the wonderful 2019 Celebration Evening at the College this week for the SLC students and their families, the Board would like to provide an update for our community about another successful year for Hillcrest students and staff.
The College continued to provide high quality education for our students and deliver outstanding educational and operational results. Hillcrest Christian College has achieved many wonderful things this year including:
- The release of the College Shield
- Incredible student leadership throughout the College including feedback from two independent surveys that suggested the emotional intelligence and relational ability of our students in the SLC are exceptional
- Record student interest in our mission programs
- Incredible performances in the Gold Coast Eisteddfod from all groups including choral, music and dance, and winning the Harley Meed Memorial trophy for the best choral group, the Bell Canto senior girls choir
- Winning the Senior Girls State Basketball Championships
- Winning many sections of the World Scholars Cup, finishing 52nd in the world out of approximately 12,000 teams
- Continued success in debating and other co-curricular programs
- The introduction of a new Sports program
- Development and implementation of an enhanced gifted and talented program
- Initial development of the Middle Learning Community from 2021
- Finalisation of the building works program for all areas of the College in 2019/2020.
Hillcrest finishes the year in a strong financial position and has consistently generated surpluses to re-invest in new facilities and programs for students. The College currently has a record level of student enrolments. Record enrolment applications were received in October for next year and the College has waiting lists in most year levels for 2020.
The year has not been without its challenges, and some families have been concerned about media coverage of the College. Hillcrest has been the subject of numerous Courier-Mail and associated media articles throughout the year. Many of these articles repeat incorrect or inaccurate claims that have been made anonymously. In the majority of cases, the College has not been approached for comment by the newspaper to ensure the reports are accurate and balanced. It is clear that the most recent articles published in the past few days have been timed to coincide with the end of the school year when Hillcrest students and families gather to celebrate their achievements.
We can only come to the conclusion that these reports are part of a concerted campaign by a small number of people, most of them formerly associated with the College and not company members, who are attempting to embarrass the Board into taking action against Mr Davis. To be absolutely clear, after two formal investigations conducted by independent experts, the Board has no legal basis to take any disciplinary action against Mr Davis. Based on feedback from teaching staff and families, Mr Davis and the leadership team have the support of the vast majority of the College community. At the recent information meeting of Hillcrest company members overwhelming support was shown for the Board.
We have addressed specific claims in updates to parents throughout the year. We would like to address criticism of our NAPLAN results by The Courier-Mail. NAPLAN results at Hillcrest have improved in a number of areas over the past five years, and we continue to seek improved learning outcomes for all students in NAPLAN and a range of other areas.
The Executive Team have developed a comprehensive action plan from the National School Improvement Audit that was conducted earlier this year. Some of the strategies to improve overall student performance include:
• An explicit improvement agenda
• Analysis and discussion of data
• A culture that promotes learning
• An expert teaching team
• Differentiated teaching and learning
• Effective pedagogical practices
• College wellbeing.
Our students and teachers deserve congratulations, not criticism for their efforts in the classroom throughout the year. This campaign of anonymous claims made to the media about Hillcrest is tantamount to bullying. We cannot and will not be bullied into any action that has no legal or moral basis. Hillcrest has an outstanding reputation based on our Christian values of ‘Excellence in Christ’ and our commitments to provide the best possible educational experience and build a supportive community. The actions of the small group of people who are damaging Hillcrest’s reputation to further their own agenda are unfair to our staff, students and families, and absolutely inconsistent with our values. We will not allow them to determine the direction of the College.
If you have any concerns, please make contact with the College leadership or Board members to discuss them or make use of the College’s formal Complaint Management process. If more claims are made about the College and our staff, we would also encourage members of our community to consider whether they are motivated by the best interests and values of Hillcrest.
As this week’s celebrations for SLC students and the range of other end of school year events demonstrate, Hillcrest is a wonderful school that is supported by an equally wonderful community. We are grateful for the continuing support of the vast majority of the Hillcrest community who want to see our students, staff and College succeed.
We wish all members of the Hillcrest College community a well-deserved break over the holidays and safe and happy Christmas and New Year. We look forward to seeing you all again in 2020 for another year of success and achievement for all of our students at Hillcrest Christian College.
Jame Lewis and Stewart Pieper (Co-Chairs)
Lynette Deacon, Steve Hardy, Kim Horne, David Moyes, Tony Woods (Directors)
Hillcrest Christian College Board of Directors
21 Bridgman Drive, Reedy Creek Q 4227 | PO Box 2503, Burleigh Waters Q 4220 | 07 5593 4226 | hillcrest.qld.edu.au | office@hillcrest.qld.edu.au ACN 010381334 ABN 68 947 459 366 CRICOS 01043C Hillcrest Christian College is an interdenominational ministry of Reedy Creek Baptist Church and is operated by Hillcrest Christian College Ltd.