Pastoral Care overview
St Patrick’s College aims to cultivate a culture where every boy thrives.
We achieve this using a strengths-based approach, nurturing an inclusive community that values respectful relationships.
We empower boys to develop self-awareness, empathy, and resilience, equipping and supporting them to navigate life’s challenges with confidence and compassion.
Our priorities
We prioritise Pastoral Care and Wellbeing, creating optimal learning environments for boys to flourish and foster a culture of positive behaviour. At St Patrick’s College good behaviour is the beginning of great learning. All children deserve classrooms that are calm, safe spaces where everyone is treated with dignity. Creating that space is one of the most important things an educator can do. (Tom Bennett)
Specific priorities in Pastoral Care and Wellbeing include:
- Fostering an environment in which all students and staff are accepted and feel safe, included, heard, valued, and respected.
- Effectively supporting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students academically, emotionally, and culturally through authentic engagement with our Reconciliation Action Plan.
- Ensuring all faculties of wellbeing within the College work together to ensure inclusive communities and equal access to programs for all students.
- Fostering a culture where boys are active participants in learning, community, pastoral care, and wellbeing programs.
- Developing and embedding a holistic pastoral program, based on positive education approaches and the respectful relationships program.
- Prioritising the role of student voice in all aspects of the College, including culture, decision making, teaching and learning, child safety, leadership, ritual and celebration.
- Creating a wellbeing program for staff that promotes and complements Professional Learning Communities and creates positive cultures.
- Developing diverse opportunities for students to develop and demonstrate authentic leadership.
Our programs
At our core, we believe that learning and wellbeing are inseparable, each vital to the development of the whole person. Our approach integrates academic and emotional growth, ensuring that students not only excel academically, but also develop the resilience, self-awareness, grit, and interpersonal skills necessary for lifelong success and fulfillment.
Pastoral Care and Wellbeing programs at St Patrick’s College are tailored to boys, with specialised programs for each year level, including, but not limited to:
Pastoral care lessons
At the core of our wellbeing education programs are timetabled lessons for students to explicitly learn social and emotional understanding of self. Lesson focus is placed on respectful relationships, positive education content, mental health understanding, and being safe online. Themes for each year level are then supported through various additional external and experiential providers.
Camps
Strategically placed camps through the school year provide an opportunity to have shared experiences, integrate into the St Patrick’s College community, and offer opportunities to step outside one’s comfort zone where growth occurs. The first camp offered is at the start of Year 7. This is to support the transition to secondary school and ensure students new to the school make strong connections with their peers.
Live4Life mental health program
St Patrick’s College is a proud partner with the City of Ballarat as a Live4Life member. Live4Life is the only mental health education and youth suicide prevention model designed specifically for rural and regional communities. Part of this program is to deliver to every Year 8 and 10 students each year a Teen Mental Health First Aid course.
Elevate study sessions
All Year 7 and 10 students participate in Elevate study sessions. Elevate study skills seminars are designed to achieve behavioural change amongst students. It isn’t enough that students simply understand what they need to do in their study. The challenge in any study skill program is getting students to use and apply the skills they learn. Elevate gets students using the skills from its seminars by using an integrated process that works.
Brainstorm productions
We welcome Brainstorm productions each year for our Year 7 and 8 students. They are one of Australia’s most experienced and respected educational theatre companies, reaching more than 260,000 students each year with themes of anti-bullying, cyber safety, and student wellbeing programs.
Elephant education seminars
Elephant Ed has been transforming the way consent, respectful relationships, and sex education is taught across Australia. These seminars for our Year 7 and 8 students see youthful, relatable, and highly trained facilitators deliver interactive, informative, and engaging workshops in classrooms here at St Patrick’s College.
Rite journey program
The Rite Journey is for our Year 9 students and is designed to acknowledge and celebrate each student’s shift into adulthood. This program is a year-long journey that fosters connections with positive adult role models, helps students identify their strengths, builds self-awareness, and develops responsible, resilient, and respectful teens.
Melbourne experience
This Year 9 experiential program sees students spend a week in Melbourne. A stepping stone on their way to being independent, students gain confidence in navigating transport in a city, problem solving with group work, conflict resolution, and are exposed to some iconic areas of Melbourne that align with curriculum studies.
University visits
As students get to our Senior School it is important to be future focused. While there are many different successful pathways for our boys, a visit to universities in Melbourne can educate and expose students to some unseen opportunities. Our Year 10 students attend seminars and explore university campuses to gain insight into what is on offer through further study.
Tomorrow man program
As educators of boys, it is important for our senior students to explore what it means to be a bloke today. Year 10 students are offered workshops that are highly engaging, relatable, and an immersive learning journey, training our young men to walk their own path, talk with gravity, and engage actively with purpose in all areas of their lives.
Men of honour program
The Men of Honour seminar provides an opportunity for our Year 11 students to explore their emotions and make good decisions. This seminar creates a safe and open environment where students can hear answers to the tough questions that all young men have on their minds, but are frequently unable to ask. Men of Honour highlights the power of an individual’s choice in the areas of exercise, nutrition, money, and positive relationships.
Our services
The wellbeing of students starts with their Homeroom teachers. They are then supported by Year Level Coordinators and Heads of School. There are times where students need more support for various reasons and St Patrick’s College is extremely well resourced in this space.
Further support can be found through our Student Support Services team with a range of expertise in different areas including:
Student reception
A team of staff are always available at Student Reception to support student needs, contact parents, or to provide information to students.
First aid
A trained first aid officer is located at student reception should students feel unwell or require first aid. A room just off of student reception is dedicated to supporting students and to assist staff on excursions by providing medical information and first aid packs for staff.
Enhanced Learning
We have a team of facilitators who support students with additional learning needs or who need adjustments as a result of disabilities. Our facilitators work with families to create specific Personal Learning Plans (PLPs) in line with our understanding of student needs. Students are further supported by Learning Support Officers (LSO’s) who attend many classes and assist students with learning in the classroom.
Counsellors
We are proud of the ratio of counsellors to students at St Patrick’s College. Our team work closely with families and our wellbeing leaders to support students for various reasons. It is important for students to have a space where they can feel heard and learn strategies of coping with the any challenges of adolescence.
Educational psychologist
St Patrick’s College has employed an Educational Psychologist to assist our counselling and enhanced learning team. It is a significant asset to our wellbeing team to have this expertise within the school. It also means we can internally do assessments for students, where required, speeding the process of offering the right supports for student learning.
Clontarf Academy
St Patrick’s College is a Clontarf Academy. This space in our College is staffed by full-time mentors for Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander students. Clontarf Academy rooms are welcoming, inclusive, and designed to foster positive learning and personal growth for the young men in our program. Staff support our indigenous students with a variety of programs, excursions and strong mentorship of our boys.
Indigenous educational officers
We have a number of staff dedicated to supporting the educational learning and pathways for our Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander students. One of our Enhance Learning facilitators is dedicated to this space to ensure cultural and personal learning plans are created to support our students. With a strong boarding presence there are also staff to facilitate students living away from home and provide continued communication with families across Australia.
Learning Support Hub
As a College we are blessed with an alternative learning hub where we can support specific students who require higher level interventions to re-engage with their learning. This could be because of low attendance, school refusal concerns, peer issues, mental health issues or family concerns. Our Learning Support Hub offers a high tier support measure of students with a significant Personal Learning Plan (PLP).
English as an additional language support
English as an Additional Language (EAL) support in schools is vital for students learning English and includes tailored lessons, language practice, and cultural integration to aid comprehension and participation. St Patrick’s College offers EAL programs to ensure students gain proficiency and confidence, enabling them to succeed academically and socially in an English-speaking environment.
