I love watching girls grow and flourish at SAC, and witnessing the power of education to transform lives. Moments from the orientation days for new students to the Year 12 Graduation make me aware of the privilege it is to lead this school community.

Saint Aloysius College educates young women who are confident, compassionate and willing to act for change. I am proud of the diversity of this community, both culturally and socio-economically. We support all students to achieve their personal best academically by providing a broad and rich curriculum delivered by excellent teachers.

Affordability is one of the key challenges we face at this time in South Australian Catholic schools. In order to maintain our diversity, we need to continue to attract students with excellent facilities and resources, whilst keeping fee increases to a minimum.

Affordability of Catholic education seems to be an issue nationally. Ensuring equitable funding between schools in all sectors from both state and federal governments is critical to enabling parents to choose the best school for their child.

Definitely the interaction with students, staff and parents. I enjoy supporting students to achieve their best.

• Mount Carmel College has a wonderful mix of so many different cultures. We have a great sense of community and involvement by everyone and we provide excellent options and pathways for students but as a low fee school.
• Our Mary MacKillop Unit provides wonderful support for students with disabilities and I am very proud of how the Unit is integrated into our College life.

• Some of our families are struggling financially yet parents make great sacrifices to send their son or daughter to our College.
• The move of Year 7 into the secondary College in SA Catholic schools from 2019 is an exciting challenge for us. We are currently preparing our building program to not only incorporate Year 7 but also to build a new senior secondary centre.

The level of funding to Catholic schools throughout Australia continues to be an issue for us and other schools.  We need to be  funded appropriately to ensure all students, especially those from poorer families, are  given equal opportunity  in education, as education is the key to their future.

Our strong commitment to all girls being provided with opportunities to access and engage in a rich and broad middle school curriculum and learning environment.

A terrific staff committed to the ethos of the College, the learning and wellbeing of our students and families.

Remaining financially accessible to all families and ensuring resourcing for our most vulnerable.

The ongoing challenges of affordability associated with funding issues.

Seeing students experience success and achieve to their capacity, seeing the whole school community growing and working together, and planning for our future.

• the community support of all,
• the breadth of opportunities provided to students, and
• the great commitment of a dedicated staff.

Continuing to provide a warmth of invitation in to spiritual development and faith formation for all students and families, for many of whom we will be their only experience of Church.

• Justice of funding and support from disparate State governments and an ever moving federal landscape, and
• the importance of providing a clear message about who we are as Catholic Education Australia, regardless of which of our schools you choose to connect your family in to.

I am most proud of our work in terms of contemplative prayer and it's efficacy on student engagement, Asia literacy and Edmund Rice Education beyond borders strategic plans and our research on early intervention and it's efficacy in raising educational outcomes in our Middle School.

I am also proud of our work in building a new junior school and also learning centres in senior campus which is drawing international acclaim for its focus on 21 Century leading school environments.

Challenges in SA is maintaining educational rigour, affordability and having highly aspirational teaching and learning outcomes with the lowest state funding in Australia, reluctance to move year 7 s into senior school for economic rather than educational reasons, an enterprise bargaining model, high levies and co responsibility fees being charged by CESa and EREA that is going to make Catholic schooling unaffordable.

Challenges of Catholic school is affordability ensuring our Catholic schools remain open to those most in need as well maintaining affordability. Ensuring our schools remain authentic, rigorous and contemporary in meeting the educational needs of our students in a global 21st century context.

Nationally we need a marketing campaign to re establish the values and aims of Catholic Education. I believe our voice has been lost as educational leaders in the national and international educational community

Mercedes commitment to ongoing school improvement and innovation is evident through our focus to:

• the International Student Programme and
• our involvement in the Council of International Schools (CIS) accreditation process.

Maintaining accessibility of a Catholic education in a fiscally tight environment.

Our ongoing funding issues confronting Catholic Schools particularly in SA.

Following from this ensuring our schools remain financially within reach of our Catholic community.

The strong focus on inclusion provided by the St Marys Unit which educates stduents with an intellectual disability.

More broadly the college provides a strong sense of connectedness for all students and a comprehensive range of educational opportunities.

The delivery as opposed to the promise of equitable funding for Catholic schools.

Making the transition to a R-6 then 7-12 structure like the rest of the country in the absence of any funding to support this.

...

SHC has a strong family spirit and high achieving students across a very broad curriculum.

Maintaining our Marist Catholic ethos and,

Financing adequate resourcing without putting the fees beyond the reach of our local parents.

Securing our identity as quality, Catholic Schools and,

Securing adequate resourcing whilst remaining affordable and accessible to our families.

We have a farm in the centre of our 80 hectares. It produces wine, cattle, wool and wheat. There is a piggery and the goats nearly always behave themselves.

There is a cohesion and confidence about our students. It comes from a Salesian sense of hospitality, fun, scholarship and trust. it's a good place.

The local Church is welcoming and robust and we have a wonderful Bishop (Greg O'Kelly).

We are a vulnerable to the vagaries of economics. It is all okay at the moment but the farmers keep watching the weather and the Lead Smelter remains the industrial barometer of community wealth.

I want the students to try as hard with their studies as they do on the sports field.

They are wonderful kids and our challenge is to build in their imaginations the great possibilities of the future.

Funding The weight of bureaucracy and the trends and whims of politicians. They should send their children to South Korea or Finland

Students who are highly committed to their studies and the broader life of the College

Staff who are exceptional in their work and our research in the area of Learning Environments

That Catholic schools continue to be accessible to all families living in our region

The provision of support services particularly in the area of special needs

Our ongoing funding (recurrent grants) systemically which allows each school to grow in its capacity to provided excellence in Catholic Education

Catholic Identity and the challenges in terms of our mission today and tomorrow as we bring the gospel to a multi-faith and multi-cultural community