Today as I write this, our secondary students are running the cross-country on a new course set up on our site.  It has been great to see a good number of students entered but I always find it disappointing that the percentage of those who enter such events is always so low.

Being part of a community means entering community events, even the ones we don’t shine at or particularly like, for the sake of engaging and belonging.  I hope that as we continue to work with our students at GPCC we will see increased participation in such events.

 On the other hand, the turnout for our Mothers’ Day breakfast event was wonderful. Thank you to all those who took time to turn up and join in. A great example to the children. We have another Fathering Project event coming up on 30 May and I encourage dads to make the time to come along and learn more about good fathering so that you can better fulfill your responsibility.

As a school we are looking at the area of wellbeing and engagement in classwork and have developed an approach to this that we will launch this term.  The research shows that wellbeing and engagement work together. If someone is in a good space, they will be more open to engaging and when a person engages in an activity, it tends to help their sense of wellbeing.  We have increasing numbers of students who suffer from anxiety and depression, and this often leads to school refusal and therefore lack of academic progress.

The reasons for young people feeling this way are complex and not readily resolved but at GPCC we are determined to do what we can to help. Being of school age should be a period of optimism and excitement. Too often now it is filled with anxiety, fear and sadness for many children. I encourage you as parents to look at what you are doing that might inadvertently be fuelling this.  Do you encourage times without social media use, do you have regular family dinners together to just talk and offer support, do you allow your child to take some risks to develop risk awareness and discernment, do you spend time doing things with your child and simply encouraging them when they fail at something.  There are many small things we can do to help our children grow up with a positive sense of themselves.

We all know that there are many aspects of modern society that are leading to the lack of wellbeing amongst young people but as parents and teachers, we have opportunity to counteract those and set a different example.  This is a great area to partner in so that at both home and school, children feel supported and encouraged.  Church is another place where children and young people can feel a sense of belonging and of being loved by older people.  Sunday schools and youth groups are great environments to help young people socialise and learn together in a safe and caring environment.

Remember that if you are struggling with parenting or are unsure what to do with a child or teenage who is not coping well, we are happy to walk alongside you and to offer our support and help.

Phillip Nash

Principal