Catholic Education Tasmania -North: September 2017

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Our school communities are far from perfect. Nor should they be! Nor should people within and part of our communities believe they are perfect!

Rather how motivated and willing are we to improve the things that need improving? Last week I was part of Validation panels for Star of the Sea, Larmenier and St. Finn Barr's Schools. This week we are part of visits to St. Joseph's Queenstown and Rosebery, Sacred Heart Ulverstone and Our Lady of Lourdes Devonport.

Often we become blind or unable to look at aspects within a school because we live with it day to day or become comfortable with the reality. There is no story without data and no data without a story. The challenge is to not ignore either in trying to improve from where you are at now.

Often it is only when someone new to your school or a visitor observes your school community and notices through ‘objective eyes’ can we really get a sense of what we actually do and provide.

We can create this huge list of ‘things’ that our schools do and offer. Only when we marry this up with how we go about this and how we go about reflection and review does the complete picture of our community begin to gain clarity.

While it has and is challenging to be present in each of these visits, they have been an important reminder to understand the context, the story and the journey to this point, to understand the leadership being lived out.

We must continue to move our school communities into the future, while also 'validating' where we have come from.