As a College, it has been wonderful to have a renewed focus on our updated Mission and Vision. By way of reminder, our updated St Andrew’s Mission and Vision is:

Based on our Christian foundation, in the Anglican tradition, we build Personal Capacity to enable our students to find purpose and move confidently into their futures.

You may remember being taught to use a compass. When in Year 8, I completed my Bronze Duke of Edinburgh Award and as part of this experience, I undertook two hiking expeditions in the Blue Mountains in NSW. On the first, our group of 6 was accompanied by experienced teachers who taught us all we needed to know. They demonstrated how to use Trangia’s, cook our food, set up shelters, purify water, read maps, and navigate our way through the mountainous terrain with a compass.

It was a great experience; however, the true test was still to come. Shortly afterwards, our small group repeated the exercise in a different part of the Blue Mountains, however this time minus our teachers. We made numerous mistakes. On one occasion we even failed to correctly read our compass at a river junction and finished up about half a day’s walk from where we should have been. The learning we took from that experience was significant, we all had a much greater appreciation for our compass!

Just as a compass directs explorers, so too our College’s Mission and Vision drives our community toward a united purpose and like a compass, we need to check in on it regularly.

It is assuring to know that our foundation as a College is firmly based on the Christian faith. God not only gives us our ultimate purpose, but we all find purpose in many other areas. This term in our Primary and Secondary Chapels we are digging deeper into what this means, and how each of us can apply it for ourselves. One analogy our team has used in Chapels over the past weeks is that of the compass.

Our St Andrew’s Mission and Vision ensures that we are all on the same page and striving towards the same goal just like a compass guides us back onto the right path. As part of our Mission and Vision, our College focuses on six values that guide and motivate our behaviours and interactions. It is these values we strive to help students carry into their futures, building their own Personal Capacity:

Respect
Christ-like compassion
Curiosity
Courage
Engagement (or having a go)
Commitment.

Each of these has a rich biblical foundation and contributes to making us uniquely St Andrew’s. When we use the term Diamond Strong, it is these values that we are living out. As a community, students, staff, parents, and carers, we will continue to focus on these values and encourage them in one another. And when we see them demonstrated, as we so often do, we ought to celebrate them.

It is my hope for each of us, that in your thoughts and prayers, you will uphold our College community as we strive to make these values part of our DNA. If you would like to join a group of parents for a short time of prayer every Friday morning from 7.45am to 8.00am during school term, please join us in the Illawong Room, above the Aquatic Centre. I hope to see you there so that together we can uphold our College and its Mission and Vision before God.