Respect Responsibility Resilience Initiative

Our times call for our students and our community to step up and live the principles that our College values, together. It is not by luck that our College has historically and continues to be, a relatively safe place. CCC is not idyllic or perfect but on any one day, its diversity far outweighs any disunity. We are not free from bullying, but we are determined to address it and that is a constant challenge which we pursue with rigour. Cultural disharmony is not typical of our interactions and our playground is a safe place for our students. Occasionally the events of the world, touch our local community, never more so than when those events are motivated by intolerance, fear and hate. But we are resilient and we and our children will overcome these influences, together. It is not only the tragedy of Christchurch that has impacted CCC at present, but that event has certainly focused our attention on the values that underpin who we are: respect, responsibility, resilience and initiative.
On January 1, 2020, Queensland will for the first time have a Human Rights Act which will enshrine 23 rights for every individual (https://www.adcq.qld.gov.au/human-rights/queensland-human-rights-act) living in our state. I would like to think that our community has already begun our students’ education in a key plank of this legislation – respect. As an International Baccalaureate World School we embrace the Learner Profile and all of its characteristics. As a community we teach our children to respect themselves and each other and to value these learner profile attributes in each other. But without modelling, our children will not understand how to enact those words. If we leave an empty space or a silence, questionable public role models who perhaps do not espouse our values will fill the gap. Those of us, parents and teachers, who are directly in front of our children and students, must demonstrate the attributes we want them to copy.
Let’s take the initiative and recognise that our children listen to us every day, they hear what we say, how we say it and what we do having said it. At this time in particular, let’s make sure that our children know how to show respect. At CCC, let’s make respect our highest priority and make that unconditional in our words and actions everyday. Let’s be caring, principled and balanced. Let’s be open-minded and on occasions when we aren’t, let’s be reflective and take responsibility for that and right, to the best of our ability, whatever wrong we might have done. Let’s model this for our children, so that they grow up in a better world. Let’s consciously show them how to behave with respect to ourselves and others. Let’s model how to take responsibility with courage not shame. Our community knows how to support each other and grow our resilience. Let’s all step up, step forward and take the initiative to make a difference for the betterment of all of our children. https://www.ibo.org/globalassets/publications/recognition/learnerprofile-en.pdf

Say NO to Bullying; R U OK?; Harmony Day

There is a familiar message here and it is – the importance of our community addressing issues that impact our children. Social media and its 24/7 continues to be an issue for us. Our students are jeopardising their learning time as staff endeavour to address the impact of social media on children’s health and wellbeing. We do not shy away for the need to support students through difficult times or address behaviours that are anti-social and inappropriate. But we need your help! Many of the issues causing our students pain and distress, sometimes leading to significant harm, anxiety and possibly depression are emanating from the lives they live on social media. These lives, and sometimes there are several, are lived predominantly through smartphones. Much of the angst that students experience and that comes to the surface during school hours has begun during the 18 hours that students are not within our supervision. That schools can supervise students’ use of mobile phone use is a challenge. As such, removing smartphones from the school environment would change the learning landscape, predominantly for the better. But that is almost impossible and is not going to happen beyond junior school. Junior School processes of leaving phones with teachers is effective and will continue. There would be issues with such action, for both parents and students, if we followed the same process in secondary school. So in the lieu of ‘banning the smartphone’, I am appealing to parents and carers to take a more active role in supervising your students’ smartphones. Where parents pay for smartphones and plans, there is some leverage.
Calamvale Community College’s stance is that students are only supposed to access their phones when a teacher gives permission.
They are not permitted to:
film other students
take photographs of other students
post any visual material including students in CCC uniform onto social media platforms

Students who breach these rules are given significant penalties and have been excluded in serious cases. Our College does not tolerate or condone bullying. In these times, bullying frequently relies on the above listed behaviours. We are currently reviewing our students’ use of mobile phones within the College grounds. This will not result in a ban, but it may result in some curtailed activity and students’ acceptance of responsibility for what emanates from their phone, no matter who is the user at the time of the communication.
Whatever you can do to support your student’s understanding of the impact of social media, posting visuals or opting into inappropriate conversations, please do. Devices collected at night and charged in a common family space is a great idea – most of the negative social media communication happens after dark when we think our children are asleep. Teenagers need on average nine hours sleep a night. There are some sites below which may support your efforts. We have a 24 hour turnaround time for complaints posted to our college email: admin@calamvalecc.eq.edu.au
And remember, you can ‘block them’, it’s not the ultimate solution but it’s a start.
https://www.qld.gov.au/education/schools/health/bullying

https://kidshelpline.com.au/teens/issues/bullying

Teens Talk: What Works to Stop Cyberbullying

Teens Talk: What Works to Stop Cyberbullying