Buckley Park College
| Buckley Park College | |
|---|---|
|
'Build Your Wings' | |
| Address | |
|
Cooper Street Essendon, Victoria, 3040 Australia  | |
| Coordinates | 37°44′50″S 144°53′50″E / 37.7471°S 144.8973°ECoordinates: 37°44′50″S 144°53′50″E / 37.7471°S 144.8973°E |
| Information | |
| Type | Secondary, Coeducation, Victorian Government State School |
| Principal | Nathan Chisholm |
| Website | www.buckleyparkco.vic.edu.au |
Buckley Park College is a medium-sized, public secondary school located in Essendon, Victoria, Australia. It has around 900 students from year 7 - 12.
Campus & Facilities
Buckley Park College used to be divided into five separate 'Blocks' or corridors which are parallel and are connected by a main hallway. Each Block is referred to by its assigned letter from the northern-most "A Block" through to southern-most "E Block". Now there are still blocks but the original main corridor is now one separate building. Each classroom is then referred to by its block and number, for example; C3 is room 3 in C Block. The main entry, at the front of the school, leads into the main hallway where the School Office is situated, directly at the front of B Block. Also located in B Block are the staff rooms, the Sick-bay and the Principal and Vice Principals offices. The canteen is situated opposite B block.
A Block is generally used to house the entirety of Year 7 and 8 Students' home rooms, the remaining rooms generally being used to house other miscellaneous classes. Year 7 and 8 lockers are in here. A Block is also the area commonly used for senior student examinations.
C Block houses the Year 9 students. Rooms of note in C Block are the IT Labs, the Textiles room, the Home Economics Room, and the VCE common room. The year 9, 11 and 12 lockers are here.
D Block houses the Year 10 students. Rooms of note are the four science labs and an art room. Year 10 lockers are here as well as the remainder of the year 12s.
E Block is mainly based around the arts, as it consists of six classrooms - a music room, two art rooms, a Computer Lab mainly used for art designing, the Systems Technology Room and a room used for wood production.
Parallel to E Block, but not connected by the main hallway is the Performing Arts Centre, usually referred to as the PAC. This is where drama classes and musical performances are held. It has a large room with a slightly raised stage (for performing). It also has an adjoining classroom with a wall which can be removed to allow space for an audience (this second classroom is usually referred to as PAC2).
To the north of A Block is a large gymnasium for sport and physical education. It consists of a large hall, two storerooms for sporting equipment, two changing-rooms (for male and female), an office to hold the belongings of students, and an upstairs mezzanine with table tennis tables and weightlifting equipment. West of A Block is the library. Along with its extensive book collection, it sports computers and newspaper archives used for games. The library is well equipped with computers, which are always available for use by students either before, during and after school.
To fit the rapidly growing school population, four portable classrooms have been added to the west of C and D Block. These portables are referred to as WP1 through to WP4. WP1 and WP2 are referred to as the LOTE rooms. Due to renovations, more portable classrooms have also been added to the far north of the school (near the gymnasium) referred to as NP1 through to NP4. The school also includes two basketball/netball courts, a hockey field, and three tennis courts. Students regularly choose to go to the large football field on the block north of the school during lunchtimes, named Buckley Park (which is where the school name originated) and are supervised by staff.
In between the Performing Arts Centre and E block, there is an amphitheatre with a 'stage' for outdoor performances.
The school has an exceptional amount of technology available to students; there are more than 10 computers per block, laptops are available to borrow from the library and teachers can borrow out class laptop sets. Almost all classrooms in A block and D block are equipped with overhead projectors.
LOTE (Languages other than English)
Buckley Park College currently offers either Japanese or German as LOTE subjects. Students are assigned a language to learn based on their form group in year seven. LOTE is compulsory until year ten, where students can either choose to study their language further, or pick from one of the other electives offered for their year level. There are currently 3 Japanese and 2 German teachers. Each student has approximately 3 periods (approx. 150 minutes) of LOTE per week.
Staff
There are roughly 80 staff members at Buckley Park College, including teachers, canteen volunteers, office members and the staff involved in running the school and caring for students. The current principal of the school is Nathan Chisholm. The current vice-principals of the school are Geoff Currie and Richard Jones. They and Chisholm have their own private offices to manage the school, situated in 'B Block'. The staff are mainly based around 'B Block', where each teacher has his or her private compartment in their staffroom. There are four staffrooms holding at least 15 teachers each along with a social staffroom where the teachers may gather at break times.
Annual events
Intraschool events are often performed between the different [House system|houses]. The students and teachers of Buckley Park are divided into four different houses, with their respective colours: - Croft House (Yellow) - Hoffman House (Red) - Graves House (Green) - Buckley House (Blue) Each house is named after a significant contributor to the school or area.
Throughout the school year, these four houses compete in different school events, including:
- Swimming Sports
- Students compete in different swimming events, gaining points for their house for each win and student participating.
- House Theatre Festival
- Here houses compete to create and perform a short play in front of parents and teachers. Students create a 10-minute play with 10 actors that they will perform for parents and teachers in the PAC. A panel of judges judge the best play, also awarding Best Set, Best Costume, Best Script, Best Actor and Actress, Best Supporting Actor and Actress.
- Athletics
- School Production
- The school production is open for all students who pass the auditions. It is a major production that is generally performed at the Clocktower Centre.
House events aside, there are also other events open to the entire school, including:
- Principal's Writing Competition
- The Principal's Writing Competition, inaugurated in 2013, is an annual event where students from all year levels enter a written piece revolving around a particular theme. There are two divisions: Junior (Year 7 to 9) and Senior (Year 10 to 12).
- Language Week
In one week of Term Three, the LOTE department organises various activities pertaining to the two languages offered at Buckley Park College (German and Japanese). Recently, these activities have been adapted to include a Brezeltag, in which the German department, in conjunction with the school's German Club, sells traditional German pretzels, and a Germany versus Japan soccer tournament takes place with students of German versus students of Japanese.
The school also participates in national and international academic competitions, such as the Australian Mathematics Competition and the Australian Geography Competition, of which many students perform exceptionally well in.
SEALP (Accelerated Program)
Buckley Park has an accelerated learning program in which students learn a year ahead of their year level (i.e.; year sevens in SEALP do year 8 level work in subjects such as Mathematics, Science & English. They also endure more challenging work in Humanities and are expected to have a higher work ethic in comparison to the mainstream classes). To be selected for the program students must first sit an ACER examination. After all the results have been finalised, the top will be shortlisted and asked to attend an interview. The top scoring students then have an interview with either the SEALP coordinator (currently Phillip Hallinan) or the Year 7 coordinator (currently Brendan Bailey). Students in the programme participate in the same events as other students in their year level (such as year level specific camps).