Innovating Education: Impact Community ACADEMY

The Stronger Together podcast by IMPACT Community Services explores the evolving landscape of education. In this episode, host Tanya O’Shea discusses the development of Impact Community ACADEMY, an initiative supporting students who face challenges in traditional schooling. Recognising the increasing number of young people disengaging from mainstream education, the academy was created to provide an alternative learning environment tailored to their needs.

With a wellbeing-first approach, small class sizes, and personalised learning plans, the academy provides a supportive environment where students can grow academically and emotionally. Many students struggle with factors such as bullying, anxiety, and other social or family-related challenges, making it difficult to engage in traditional education settings. Impact Community ACADEMY seeks to address these challenges by fostering an inclusive and nurturing space where students can develop resilience, adaptability, and essential life skills.

Principal Jenna Auer shares her vision, shaped by years of experience in alternative education and working with disengaged youth. She discusses how community partnerships have played a crucial role in bringing this model to life, ensuring students receive the holistic support they need to succeed. The school prioritises social-emotional development, real-world learning experiences, and the integration of community support networks to create a comprehensive education model that goes beyond academics.

Unlike mainstream schools, Impact Community ACADEMY takes a project-based learning approach, allowing students to connect classroom lessons to practical, real-world applications. The curriculum is designed to be flexible and engaging, enabling students to work at their own pace and explore subjects that align with their interests and future goals. The academy also emphasises collaborative learning, problem-solving, and adaptability, key skills needed for personal and professional success.

This initiative represents a fresh approach to education, focusing on student engagement, mental health, and community-driven solutions. By fostering a culture of inclusion and support, Impact Community ACADEMY is creating new opportunities for young people in Bundaberg and beyond. As the academy continues to grow, its goal is to expand access to alternative education and further integrate work experience opportunities, vocational pathways, and resilience-building programs for students who need additional support.

Want to learn more? Listen to the full podcast episode and discover how education is being reimagined.

Visit IMPACT Community Services for updates and insights.

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Transcript

Welcome to Stronger Together, a powerful podcast series hosted by IMPACT Community Services.
I'm Tanya O'Shea, managing director of IMPACT, and I have the pleasure of front lining this little passion project of ours. In the podcast, we dig into some of the many social problems that people are facing within our communities and we chat with guests willing to have the hard conversations.
We want you to be kept informed and updated on the latest information. Yet are also aware that some of the topics address
sensitive issues. We acknowledge that this could be triggering or distressing for some listeners, and we encourage you to pause the episode and seek immediate support. Information on where to seek help will be provided at the end of each episode.
Before we begin. Together,
we move towards an inclusive future by acknowledging the unceded lands of the Butchulla,. Gureng Gureng, Wakka Wakka, Kabi Kabi, Wulli Wulli, Taribelang, Gurang and Byali peoples.
Now let's dive into this episode of Stronger Together.
Hi, everyone, and welcome to this edition of Stronger Together.
And a new Year. It's so good to be back in 2025. So thank you very much
for supporting us here at IMPACT Community Services and our beautiful conversation that we have
with all different members of the community. And we're continuing that conversation into this year. So today is all about education and impact.
Community services started I don't know, we started to look into education within our community way back in 2012, where we identified that we had some young people disengaging from education in our community. And at that point in time, it was very much around behavioural issues. So our young people were getting excluded from school because of different behaviours', and we started to explore what that might look like.
And if that was an opportunity for impact to create something in that space.
Anyway, back then we had a flood. There was a few other things that that happened, and we started to look at some other opportunities and we parked it. And then a few years ago, we started to get some feedback again within the community that there was an ongoing need or an emerging need for young people who were exiting from mainstream education.
And we thought, okay, this old chestnut wondering if it was the same issue. So from a behavioural perspective as well. But what we learned is we were going through doing the consultation with the community, talking to schools, talking to families was it actually wasn't about behaviour in the sense of when we were looking at it back in 2012.
Today it is more about young people who really want to go to school. However, for a whole range of reasons, they actually can't. So it could be bullying, it could be anxiety, it could be a whole range of other factors. Some family factors.
and it's coined
this particular cohort as the school refuser cohort. So we have done, a lot of we've had a lot of conversations in the community, obviously, before starting to commit energy and time and resource into this project.
And it's starting to get legs. It's actually starting to get off the ground. And and if you're familiar with the impacts, you will be you will know that we've actually got two buildings that we provide services out of,
building one we affectionately call them, and building two.
And building two used to be an old squash facility, the old mascot squash facility, which is now being converted into our offices.
And when we when we pitched this concept to the board that we wanted to look at, starting a school, we looked in, the community couldn't find anywhere to actually offer it. So we went to the board and said we'd like to offer it from one of our buildings and and then ask all of our staff to transition into building two.
So building one, as we're sitting here today, we're watching it transform into what is now known as the Impact Community ACADEMY So that's a lot of talking from a bit of history, but I wanted to just provide you with some context of kind of where we started from and where we've gotten to today.
Now, a school cannot run without an amazing leader.
So, we went to market for a leader, probably midway through last year,
and, started to advertise for principal, and we were lucky enough to find an exceptional, exceptional person, to be our inaugural principal of the Impact Community ACADEMY And I have her with me today. So welcome, Jenna Auer, thanks for joining me. Thanks for having me on.
So how exciting. So Impact Community ACADEMY It's your first principal gig. But before we get into all of that, who is Jenna Auer and where did she come from? Because she's not a Bundaberg local, No, So I've relocated up here for the job. I'm originally from Victoria Regional, Victoria. I’ve spent most of my life growing up in the Macedon Ranges, and then more recently made my way down to Gippsland
I have been, teaching or lead teaching in schools down in Victoria. starting in Primary School, for 6 or so years. And then I transitioned to alternative education, where I worked with disengaged youth at two different special assistant schools in Victoria. And so that's a bit about that part of me when it comes to who I am not working, I am someone who loves to travel.
And I've lived in,
different countries Austria, Canada and America. I've had multiple jobs while I was
studying, I started waitressing, and then I went over to America. I did, a summer camp where I was a Hollywood stunt instructor, which was from my gymnastics background. That's how I fell into that role. And then I did what every I call most.
Sorry, not even most Australians do. I went over and did a couple of ski seasons in Canada working just out of Vancouver. So that's the travel part of me. I'm super into fitness and adventure. As I said, I did the Hollywood stunts, but I also like to ride motorbikes both dirt bikes and road bikes. I've raced motorbikes. I have currently just signed up for a triathlon, so I'm about to do the Gold Coast Triathlon in April, so that's a new adventure for me.
Anything that's active and outdoors is where you'll find me.
I have to tell you, since she's moved to Queensland, she has acquired a very nice tan. So we look at her every day. I kind of, look at her. Yeah. She does spend a lot of time outdoors, so she's really enjoying the Queensland weather, I think. Living at the beach. Yes. out in Bargara, loving and loving being down there.
Every morning, I'll get up with my dog and we'll go and watch the sunrise. Beautiful, breathtaking out there. And I'm so fortunate to be able to do that. I've joined Park Run I've never been a park runner, but I've recently joined the Bargara Park run for something to do. At the gym every morning, you see me,
yeah, definitely making the most of the weather up here and being to be outdoors as much as I can.
Yeah. Beautiful. So, she fell into stunt. Stunt? What is it? Stunt acting. Stunt. Basically Hollywood Stunt work. Fell into it. I love that fell into it literally. Yeah, fell into it. And, when you talk about, you know, for something to do, it kind of sounds like you don't. You don't need any more to do it. Sounds like you've got a fairly full book and a fairly full calendar.
What is it about education when you think about that beautiful, rich experience that you had traveling overseas, working, in different countries and then going into education? What attracted you to education? What why that over all of these other things that you could have done? Interestingly enough, education was not my first choice as a teenager. So I when I was finishing high school, I wanted to be a flight attendant so I could be paid to fly around the world.
And I got to really go inter-school or ATAR as it’s now know. I thought, oh, what else could I do? And I thought back to when I was a kid, what was my dream job? And as a child, I always wanted to be a teacher because some of my best memories was from my primary school teachers that were just so fantastic and the way that they would do things.
So I went, I'll give it a try, you know, why not? And it was made for me, I love it. Just yeah, having that ability to support people to be educated or to. And it doesn't even have to be the students. It's it's the whole community. It's working with other staff. It's working with parents, families. It's just being able to educate and to support.
It's is where my passion. And you can hear how passionate you are when you talk about the work that you do. When we're talking about education and you use some of this language before around the types of schools that you've worked in. So when we're talking about independent schools, for our listeners, can you explain a little bit about why this school, that IMPACT has created?
Why is it different. How is that different to a mainstream school that many of our young people have been to in the past? I’ll make sure I don't take up a whole podcast. So being an independent special assistant school, we have the ability to approach schooling in a way that works for our cohort. And so before I took on the job, we we've got our wellbeing first model.
And so we are looking at a wraparound support that enables the young person to not just grow academically, but also that social emotional growth. And so the way that Impact ACADEMY is different to a mainstream school is it's the most obvious part of it is smaller class sises. So our school will be built around the concept of 18 students in one class with one teacher, and then also an educational support officer or teacher, depending on your background and the language that you would use.
And then we also have the ability to have a step up and then have a educational youth worker that can help support the young person outside the classroom as well. So we've got that flexibility our curriculum. Once my teacher start which is soon. We will be looking at a project and applied
model. So that means that instead of coming into the classroom and doing a math class or an English class, our classes will be connecting real world to their learning.
So they might. One of the first projects that I will have the students work on is designing a common room. And so in that design process, we'll use the elements of English through our research, doing a pitch, speaking about what they would like to do consulting. And then we'll use the numeracy aspect where we will research the budget the costings do the measurements, the numbers.
So just putting that into a real world context, and that's where we get that flexibility to really be able to play within our cohort because we're not bound by those timetables scheduling. We can schedule out or we don't need to connect with other teaching classes or sessions. We can really play with our time table, play with our curriculum, to best support that need for our co-hort.
So smaller classes are more individualised assistance for young people. And, and I guess the other thing that's really important is what I said earlier around, you know, these young people aren't coming to school now, how that why are they going to come to your school? Like, how are you going to start engaging them? What's the what's the secret to what we're going to do differently that no one else has been able to achieve to attract these young people?
So yeah, how are you going to make it happen Jenna So some of the, the supports that we can put in place around getting those young people to school is that we can meet them with each individual student is up and work with them, their families, any support networks that they have around them to build goals that are for that young person, and acknowledging that they're not all going to be working at the same level, working at the same pace and being able to support their level, their pace.
All the students upon starting will get an individual learning plan that they'll work through with their teacher. But it won't just be an academic learning plan, but it'll be around social emotional learning as well. And then adding to that, every student before they start will also have the opportunity to work with that educational youth worker to build a student support plan that allows them to be able to come in and out of the classroom and use those regulations, strategies give the teachers that idea of when a student is encountering what signs they might need to look for, what strategies might work for that young person.
And then we will review that as it's needed. But a minimum every term will be reviewing that. The other thing that we will be able to do to get those young people in is that the whole school is built around having that nurturing approach. So I have breakfast program that we're going to offer every day is built around social emotional development.
The expectation is that our staff, I’ll model, it like it'll be the first thing you'll see me do every morning is that I will sit down and I will join the
the students for their breakfast program. We'll sit there, we'll have conversations. Some of these young people might not be used to having conversations with technology these days or, you know, their home life, but they might not have that sit around and type of a conversation.
So those are going to be built into our curriculum to develop those skills. Our Break times will be,
you might have seen students sitting around playing, UNO, or Jenga or outside doing some sport activities with a youth worker. So it's around looking at what do they need outside the classroom as well as what they need inside the classroom.
it's such a, an important part of it is, when we think about the whole needs of the young person and when they're coming to us, that integration, that interaction with them, but also the wellbeing that sits at the heart of it. And I know this particular school, the concept, the model that's been built around that wellbeing first lens and
our vision was that
curriculum would be delivered through this wellbeing first lens as well.
So can you tell us a little bit about your model, your wellbeing model and how that's going to be integrated in to that every day for our young people? Yeah. So that's coming back to that meeting the students where they're at, acknowledging that we need to build and shift their mindset that sometimes
these students will have it in their heads, that they can't do things.
But it's more because in the past it's been unachievable. So we're going to really break down those steps into smaller steps. We're going to help them connect you to their learning, unpack what they're doing with them
to move towards their next steps. And we're really going to also connecting with community. So building that
connection between classroom learning, school going into the community, what their next path might be.
So what their next path might be, and how we can help them to be better citizens in the community, not just academically. Achieving in the classroom. Yeah. Beautiful.
because it is about a journey that's not limited to school. That's about how we then take them into their future. And the concept when we were playing
with it and trying to work out what do we really want our young people to look like?
We wanted them to become really adaptable young people. We wanted them to be able to understand that sometimes stuff happens and it's not always going to the dice isn't always going to roll our way. There's going to be things that we're going to have to navigate and deal with. However, it's giving them the tools and the skills to be able to work through things and adapt and flex and and have that confidence that they can get up and they can go again.
So do you think that's realistic? And
that
walking out of the school on their last day and going, okay, I have I have all the tools that I need now to be able to go out into the world and do what I need to do and know that I've got the confidence that I
can achieve what I want to achieve is, is it a realistic vision, do you think?
Yes, I think that's definitely something that can be delivered. Emotional literacy is becoming a thing within that work, not a thing. It's always been that it's becoming more
recognised and more brought into learning, and it's around those soft skills that you actually need in everyday life as well as work. So collaborate in the classroom, acknowledging that you can't always work with the people that you want to work with, and that problem solving is part of all aspects of life.
And it's not just a bad thing. When you have a problem, it's it's looking at the problem or the challenge. As I prefer to use and working out what strategies or tools that we can use to overcome those problems. And it might be a learning task that we’re looking at but they’re
relating those strategies and tools, back to what other real world problems.
They are. So what we are going to be doing is looking at building that resilience, building that adaptability through curriculum. And one of the programs that we’re implementing is called self from Connecting Growth. they've already written a program that we're going to visualise this year, but as the year goes on, we've going to review that program review that co-hort need.
And we're going to design our own in-house resilience and adaptability model that will teach and develop those skills, that team building and that overcoming challenges and work towards having them walk away with all those skills.
And I love how you mentioned before about the families. You know they're really important in this as well because you're dealing with the young person on a day to day basis and you're working with them and looking at their needs holistically.
however, have you mentioned families? So what is the role of families in in the school model that we've developed? Yes. So with the families, it's around every day. We want them to have just as much of a involvement in the young person's learning as the young person themselves. So, upon enrolment, they will sit down the young person, their families talk about the challenges, the barriers, the strategies that might work where they see themselves going, the young person educationally, academically, with the families of maybe working towards.
And then we will work not just with the young person, but alongside the young person and their family to support them to where they want to go. And we're so lucky to be able to connect with the IMPACT Community Services that, if we need those next steps, supports or to leverage, then we can connect
and not just wrap around the student, but then be able to wrap around the families with what support they might also need.
And what are at hearing from families when you're talking to families, when you're talking to communities,
people within the community, you're talking to young people, where is the real need? Who will be the young people who will be walking into our door and become our very first cohort? What can we expect these young people, are ones that they're wanting to be in school?
If I thought they wanted to come back to school. But then once the school pace started or the large crowds
started to gather, it just got too much for them and they were just overwhelmed. So it might some of them might be that they can't,
focus in the classroom. That's got a lot of noise or a lot of movement happening.
Or it might be that they find it difficult to sit still in that classroom space, and they need those outlets and opportunities to to move around or fidget or
what they might need is a strategy. It's students
through my discussions that keep up the pace of the work because the class are moving so quickly and they're not able to move with that pace.
So that's the sort of cohort and that's where we can really support them because we can slow the pace down. Being an independent school, we can do with a 13 year as some call it, if they need that extra time to complete those tasks that they need. So we can
make those adjustments according to the young person. And when we talk about independent schools,
for those who don't know a lot about them, every one of them is unique.
Every one of them is looking at their own modal. They're being very deliberate and looking at their community. So it's very place based. So they're looking at what the community needs and is asking for from them. What's the best outcomes for the young people? Why? What is different about ours when you when you compare other independent schools, is there a point of difference that we've created or that we're going to create within this school compared to others that you've seen either in the community or just through your own experience?
The biggest
point of difference is that we are looking to offer the QCE still. So having the ability for the students to come in and do applied learning subjects that meets QCE requirements, that doesn't send them off to complete a tafe course or an external course, because if they're finding school overwhelming, they're finding school challenging, sending them
to take or somewhere else to do.
Those courses kind of
can increase that anxiety
can increase the those challenges. So our point of difference is that we really want to support them in-house. And whether it be in-house in Academy, with all applied or potentially leveraging, again, what we might be able to offer at IMPACT Community Services, where we can have a youth worker, our teacher aid, being a part of that program to really support and nurture until they're ready to step out independently.
And I'm not saying that no student would be ready to go to tafe
but it's it's coming back to that. What is that young person needing at the time and for the year 11, they might not feel
confident in going out to a different area to
get some of their learning. But we can work for them.
We can immerse them in work experience days. We can immerse in small group activities and their resilience and confidence so that maybe in their following year and maybe 12, they might be ready to go and be independent. So it's not about being everything to them, but it's around nurturing them and growing them until they're ready to step into their next step.
Yeah. Beautiful. And I'm just thinking when you started with impact. So move towns move states not just towns. You move states. So packed up. Come up here with your dog your dog's name Dempster, very important. Dempster came along and
and, you know, getting used to the community. You had all of this, this new school. You're thinking, right, okay, here's all the things that I've got to do.
And not only do we give you all that, we also go, hey, you've also got to renovate the building over there and work out the design and what you want. So you've been working very closely
with our builder, and we're hoping for a start date in term to this year. So 22nd of April is our sort of is our, line in the sand that we're heading towards.
You've had this building that has been there. I think I can't even remember. Was it 1998? It's been there for a lot of years and it's served us really well as a community organisation. However, when you went in there, you kind of went, okay, we've got some work that we've got to do on here to create that school, that feeling of the school.
However, it doesn't feel like a mainstream school or what I've seen of it. It doesn't kind of have the same feeling that a mainstream school might do. So when you went in there and you given this project of, okay, go design your building and tell us what you need, what were the critical elements within that design that you went actually they’re
not Negotiables. This is what we need to think about. Outside of the classroom space, I wanted a wellbeing space that could allow the students to step into that space if they need to. A time and a space to regulate, a space to have a chat with their youth worker. So my non-negotiable was having my wellbeing space. And then within the wellbeing space, I have a regulation zone.
I've got to get a better name for it at the moment. That's how I describe it. But it's a little room that they can just close themselves away that is still visible for safety reasons. but can have some down time. I also have some consulting rooms, so that weekend, if young people are working with external that they can come in and use the consulting rooms to do meetings in-house, rather than putting that extra barrier of having to go to wherever those, external supports may be located.
And vice, this external look can come in and be located in that space. If they're wanting to start working with some of the young people, I wanted, common space for the young people, but one that they have ownership over. And so between that and the kitchen area, there's that home feel this, that their space within that space.
I'm hoping to get a pool table. If anyone's got one, feel free to donate. For the young people outdoors with my nice, big, clear space and the goal is to put some active equipment out there. So, you know, looking at maybe getting a half basketball court, I'd really like to get some swings because there's just they're really good for regulating.
And who doesn't enjoy swing. So yeah, that it was around. What do I want this not in the classroom, but more outside the classroom. And those are some of those key factors of putting in and then just opening the classrooms up too. So windows so they're nice and bright You can you can see in and out of the classrooms, you can walk through and see the learning.
I don't have lockers as such. So the classroom, the model so, so built on a primary school approach where you have that main core teacher and that one main, classroom. And so then within there they'll have tubs in the classroom just to alleviate some of that anxiety that young people might have of having to go to their locker and, who might who might be in my locker room, things like that.
So I've removed the option of having a locker space.
And that's the main things I can. And what about, uniforms?
Phones, like some of those things. Mainstream school. You know, that's just a requirement that you wear a uniform. It's, you know, there's certain rules around phones. What type of things, have you or will you or won't you be introducing into the school when it comes to some of those sort of mainstream system type things that that young people are usually, you know, they're usually used to having, you know, as part of a school.
Yeah. We do not have uniform. Our young people will work with them to be work ready. So we don't have uniforms, but we ask them to dress
respectfully. So there's still some requirements around how they might be dressing. So around safety, sun safety seat safety. But there is no uniforms as years goes on., I’m hoping the young people will work with me to design maybe a polo shirt or something.
That could be an option that they might be able to purchase. If they're wanting to have a uniform. We also have phone lockers in our classrooms. So the goal is to work with young people, to disconnect, to switch off, as phones can be such a challenge and an addiction in the modern world. So acknowledging that while saying you have kind of your phones taking off, straight away, that can heighten their anxiety, it can cause more stress, so we can work with them.
So the phone lockers are accessible just by the teacher, so we can put them in and out, and they still allow students listen to music so they can still have their AirPods in or headphones of some form and listen to music while working. They just don't have that instant hit of oh, what's my message coming up the phone, we supply all our technology, so removing those barriers as well so that students can come in, all they need to do basically is bring themselves there's no fees, there's no uniforms.
There is. We will supply all the learning materials, all the technology they need. We do a breakfast program. We will do a lunch program with our lunch program. We actually will have the students be part of that. So it's it's going to be the role of the students to organise the lunches for the students. And that giving back.
We also, sorry, I'm slightly gone off the question but im thinking of some other things that makes us different. it's very, very relevant. It's good. One of the things that we want to do into the curriculum, too, is that we want to give back to the community. So in such a modern world, it's so easy to to take or to get that that instant hit of, you know, looking up my phone, scrolling on my socials and just take, take, take that I want to build that give back.
So we want to look at doing fundraising for local charities, and the students work towards doing those fundraising, and that whatever they do at school isn't just for them and learning how we can give to others. So that's part of another part of where we have to have that difference in our curriculum, is that we're going to make sure we're also giving back.
They’re beautiful traits, aren't they, that you can take everywhere in your life, you know, around that giving back, that feeling that you that is associated with that.
And I guess that other trait around,
some of those practices around wellbeing and self nurturing and looking after ourselves,
you talked about wellbeing a little bit before about yourself. What does Will being mean to you?
If you could describe it, how are you going to describe it to your young people? What is wellbeing? What does that mean?
There's so much that you can say to what wellbeing means. To me, wellbeing is around feeling comfortable and confident in the person that you are and knowing that you have the strategies and skills
to be able to look at things
without being overwhelmed and closing down wellbeing is around.
Stop looking at the positives in all the time, because sometimes bad things can happen, but it's around looking at life through the eyes of opportunity, rather than looking at it through a negative lens and just finding
nothing to be happy about.
It's around wellbeing is around being able to feel all the emotions on the scale, not just always happy or sad. It's
it's gradual back and then there's that physical wellbeing to physically moving your body. And to me it's not. Although I like to do all these crazy sports and activities, my favourite
way for me to be moving my body and wellbeing is dancing.
Like just dancing. That's what I do of a morning I get up and I have a bit of a dance. So yeah, it's just looking at what does your body need, what does your mind need and how can you do that? It could be that we that you using journaling of a day in our practices, you know, gratitude that sort of aspect to me is what really shifts into that wellbeing and looking at that healthy side, beautiful.
And when we're talking about health movement, you mentioned about, you know, having that outdoor space as well where people, young people can go out if there needs to be some self-regulation or just getting outside enjoying some sunshine. If we're talking about the building over there, we used to have a big pool in the in the backyard. It's gone.
We've decommissioned the pool. It's gone. Which was probably a very exciting moment for many of us. And you're going to create this beautiful green space out there so that young people have a beautiful space that they can enjoy. And it's become quite a big space now that we take out a pool and a fence and lots of trees like they were, they were not good trees.
They were trees that had, hazards potentially that could come out of them. So we were able to remove that. So if you think about that green space, it's now got the potential to be created. And I thinking about wellbeing, what types of activities are you hoping to create out there with your young people? The first one is I would like my young people to design and build our own vegetable garden.
As probably a key part of wellbeing is nutrition, which I didn't mention before, but building their understanding of that nutritional value of getting in the garden, learning where things come from, the ownership of being able to grow their own food, taste what they’ve grow. That's a key part of what I like to put out in that space. And then it's around that physical movement opportunities as well.
So yeah, the other part of the space is certainly being around how they can be active. But that space, I would like the students to actually come up with some ideas. When we talk with the students about what they see, wellbeing as and what the students might see as needs that they have. I would like the teachers, myself and the students to all work together and design the space so that they have some ownership and it might be that we put a nice little yarning circle in at some point, because conversation is so much a part of wellbeing and connection and connecting with a peers or just having a space to sit around.
So yeah, it's really just it's an open opportunity. I definitely have my ideas of where I'd like to influence around that veggie garden time, maybe even some fruit trees so that they can just pick their own fruit down the track. But yeah, it's it's going to be up to the students at the end of the day to come up with some of those ideas of what they say the wellbeing is and how they would like the space to be used, and then, you know me, I'll build a project around it and I'll have the students have ownership of designing, developing and then hopefully building whatever that might be.
None of this would be possible without community. So what or how has community been supporting you in pulling this project together? Yeah, I have been very busy in connecting with community and,
being a part of basically the Bundaberg region and just going out talking with a whole range of different schools and organisations and different community groups, and just always said, let me know how I can help you with the school.
What can we do for you? And
that's what's been really.
humbling actually, to see is that there's so much support from community. And that if we're looking to get some technology, you know, that I can go and connect up with some of the local businesses and speak to them about what we need and how they might be able to help if we need to do some stuff for the garden.
Again, going to local businesses, talking about what we're doing, how we're doing, and see what they need to help. So there's a real strong community support as well as connecting with community services and what they might be able to
offer and support with some of their,
facilities. And so, yeah, community's been amazing. And, and we're incredibly grateful.
So it is a big shout out to the local Bundaberg community for all of the support that they've shown in pulling this project together. And I do want to give a shout out to our builder, Paul Finnis and all of the tradespeople who have come and helped us, because we've had a really tight deadline in relation to getting the renovations complete for the building to get the school,
up and running.
And we're not quite there yet. We're so close.
However, they have been incredible.
And, so a big shout out to them as well for all of the support that they have given us throughout this process and for making things much easier,
in being able to pull the project together. Now, we came with a vision
for this school.
We put the model together,
because we had to apply to become an independent school and we kind of went, okay, well, let's see if that gets over the line before we start getting a principal and putting all of the things into place. And then you came in, Jenner for you, how much of like what is your vision and is it changed much to when
you came in and saw what we'd put together originally?
Is it anything different that you kind of go, I've moved this a little bit. This is kind of my vision now for what I can see long term. And, and right now this is what we need to be doing. Short term. So what's your vision for for the school? My vision is still on par with what I've stepped into.
So seen is special assistant school for years ten, 11 and 12. However, the more I've sort of connected and spoken to the community, there's certainly scope to have a bit of a look at what other years might be advantageous around engagement and supporting
young people who just can't get to school or disengaging from school. So there's certainly some scope around how that can happen.
And then once we get the model up and running and we can start to see the impact, the other option would be around where else in the community might we need to
offer
a school campus, knowing that transport is always such a challenge within this area, and that there's some communities that, aren't as easily able to access
the Bundaberg campus as we would like.
So there's certainly those two spaces to do some further exploring and see how we can really connect with those that need it. There's certainly there's certainly lots of opportunity.
From that independent school model, what is possible within that
what is actually possible, but also it blows my mind.
The change that it's possible to create within a model like this, just to change the system a little bit to, to individualise and tailored to the needs of a special cohort. And when we talk about cohorts, you mentioned a class of 18. So who are we targeting this assistance to.
So who is it. Who is it currently that we're approved to provide assistance to. And how big is how big can we get within this one campus? What are we approved to? What numbers? Yes, we're approved to deliver years, ten, 11 and 12. And we're approved to do five classes. As to how that class, those five classes might look, it can be we over the years will explore to see whether we need more year ten or year 11, 2012, whether we blend some of those.
So it's basically we're capped at 90 at the campus we are and we're kept at year ten, 11 and 12. But within that model, we can be flexible as to how many we have of each of those students.
So from the feedback from the community. So currently we're doing year ten, 11 and 12. But what else are you hearing? Where are the other opportunities where people are going actually, you could start back here. There's a real need from this year onwards.
Through the community
I've heard that there's a real challenge between the transitioning from the primary school up to our high schools and one of the large barriers around that, from having conversations is that our primary schools are quite small and quite structured, and then we go into these really big high schools and it just gets very overwhelming.
So it would be looking at the transition between our primary schools to our high schools and how we might be able to support that would be definitely the next area to explore. Beautiful. You certainly not sitting still is getting this up and running I know is your priority. But it's lovely to hear that you're sort of thinking what else is possible into the future.
That's very exciting. And we think about future.
And we have an education summit coming up. So again new to the ground, just got all these other things going on. But when the Future of Education Summit is coming up, I really want to be part of that. You put in an application and we're successful, so you're going to be a speaker at an upcoming Future of Education summit.
Tell us about that. How exciting.
Yes, I certainly jumped in the deep end and I'm hitting the ground running. I have I've put in the application for the future of education Summit at the
CQ University, which is on the 28th of March, and I will be running a presentation that is called Preparing Tomorrow's School Cultivating Social Emotional Development.
versus academic ranking. Wow.
Why? Like, I'm just thinking, wow, what a big topic. So what are you going to focus on and why is this important to you? My focus is around acknowledging that
within the teaching industry
of late there's a lot of pressure around our teachers to do more than just teaching and it can become extremely overwhelming to try and dabble in all those spaces and knowing that the way that we're evolving as a society, as social media becomes such a big part of our young people that we need to look at why.
Why are students
refusing to go to school and what small changes could we potentially
put
in at our mainstream schools to try and support them? That bit further. One of my biggest passions is around working with the young people that have always been labelled the naughty ones, cause quite often they aren't the naughty ones that that's just where they're at with their ability to communicate on a social and emotional level when they're not coping.
And so my presentation is around, how can we look at those behaviours and ask ourselves the why as to what might be happening, and what small changes could teachers potentially make in their teaching practice to try and support those young people that don't have the skill set to articulate what the challenges for them, or they might not even know within them what their challenge is and
support them to stay engaged.
Support them to not be
behavioural challenges, because we're coming back to that social emotional development of looking at, well, let's not worry about schoolwork right now. What is that actually, that might be happening for you that I could potentially support. And then we'll get to that school work. And as a bit of that, you know, looking at that, Maslow's hierarchy of needs and if safety if food.
Those aspects are being met. Or it might just be a lot of the time it is around that safety and not physical safety, but emotional safety with their ability and their learning then then their not going to be able to even focus on the task that you’ve put in front of them.
I've heard you talk a lot about trauma, so we're talking about some of the challenges that young people face. Sometimes it's associated with trauma and you talk about trauma informed approach that you used within education. Can you tell me a little bit
more about what that means? Yes, so that's that's my bread and butter.
I love looking at education through a trauma lens.
Trauma informed approach for me is a brand that acknowledging that we all have bad days. Everyone has a day that we're not having success or that we might have said something we didn't want to say.
do something we didn’t want
want to do, but we don't hold it against people. So we acknowledge that the day's not been a success. When the student comes back the next day, it's a brand new day. We don't we don't come back in and be like, oh, well, yesterday you did this. So it's having that positive regard unconditional positive regard.
It's around acknowledging that sometimes a single quiet conversation might be over and as a means to help settle the mind and focus. So that trauma informed lens is knowing that we all come in the school or to work with some sort of the baggage, and it's around creating a safe environment where we feel we can put that back down at the door and step into where we are at the time and focus on where we are.
And for everyone that looks different
and and it's not just for the students that trauma informed practice and that unconditional positive regard is for the staff as well, acknowledging that
staff might be having a bad day, and we need to just give them that bit of grace, that bit of support, to just help them get through, and what they need or where they need.
So yeah, for me, that trauma lens is really looking at what might be happening and what we can do to make sure that we're not making it worse, and that we're being sensitive to where it's at at the time.
So,
with the future of education, some of that's coming up. Why do you think that summit is important for our region, for our school, but also for the broader education community?
The summit is giving the opportunity for teachers or educators, workers that are looking at that forward thinking model around what can we be doing in the future or what is a futuristic thing that we're currently doing or delivering in our classrooms that might help others? And so it's about coming and sharing what different people are doing, how we're doing it, and just building
the regional Queensland community connection.
So they actually run two summits, there is one down in Brisbane, and then this year is the first time that they're running one in Bundaberg, which is to support for regional teachers because the
regional teachers might have different challenges to that of the Brisbane area. So just allowing
us as a regional community to come together and show what we're doing and showcase, because there's some really great work happening in a lot of these schools.
And it's about sharing that so that we can all pick from each other and work together to educate our young. people. Because how do you do that? As, as educators? How do you get to collaborate and talk to others? Like how how are you making that happen within the local community, within within the broader, you know, state?
How do you get together and collaborate as educators? That's a very good question. Professional developments are always and a way to come together. Since moving up here, though, I've noticed that a lot of professional developments involve traveling down to Brisbane or to
bigger areas. So
that can be a barrier to that collaboration within the school networks.
Some of the schools connecting with each other, from what I've sort of learnt and worked together
and yeah, I'm still I'm still learning
up here how a lot of that sort of collaboration and connection is happening there is certainly the, education precinct that is looking at how they can support schools to connect a bit better,
and be more, strong as a team and sharing those challenges, sharing those solutions and working together.
So yeah, I think it's I feel there's probably some, some other ones that, that I'm still not yet aware of. But since I've been here, there's certainly a lot of community or school
groups that come together to talk about the needs of young people or the needs of the community and have all those different parties in the room. Great
yeah.
Regional areas of I always think we bat above our weight, in what we can achieve in the regions,
with the resources that we've got. However, a lot of the time it is about how we work together collaboratively to get the best outcomes for the residents in the community, in our case, the best outcomes for our students and our young people, in Bundaberg, which is very exciting.
So, Jenna, thank you so much for your time. You've been so gracious. And, and just so I don't know, she's just so authentic and easy to easy to talk to. So thank you so much. We really appreciate your time.
I know that you are incredibly busy at the moment. You've been doing lots of visiting, getting out and seeing people.
You've got a project over there you're trying to finish, a rebuild and a remodel of the space. So thank you. We really do appreciate your time. And thanks for sharing all of a bit about you, but also this amazing project that you're bringing to life. Yeah, it's incredibly exciting. So all the best with it. Thank you.
and thank you for letting me about the school and anything educational i’m alwyas up for that kind of conversation Great. Thank you and all the best for your presentation at the Future of Education Summit. That's incredibly exciting. Thanks! I hope it goes well. So as always we will post any resources
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