Mac.Robertson Girls’ High School Principal Sue Harrap said the online learning practices developed in three months throughout the pandemic would normally take in a school five years to refine.
“The desire to learn and evolve and adapt has been just so strong. And the change in teaching and learning practice has happened so rapidly,” she said.
“We’ve found new technologies,we’ve found new ways of doing things and we’ve gotten ready for the next run. We were hoping moving into 2021,that we wouldn’t have to use them.
Mac.Robertson School Captain Alexa Kalathoor said the online learning in 2020,when she was in year 11,allowed her a “practice run” for the form her learning would take in her final year.
“As much as this year was unexpected,and we thought everything was going to go back to some sort of normalcy,I think we were a bit better prepared and learned a lot of resilience and grit and all those skills that will come in handy for the future,” she said.
Mac.Robertson students were able to fit in some in-person year 12 experiences between lockdowns,like the senior formal and a valedictory celebration.
“Those times where we were able to connect in person and have those things or that were a typical year 12 experience are really amazing,and things that we’re going to remember for a long time,” said Miss Kalathoor.
For Ms Harrap,she said she was proud and emotional looking back over an “extraordinary” year.
“I feel gutted that they’ve missed the oxygen of those final years but we hope that we have in some way created that for them in the best way that we possibly could,” she said.
Fighting back tears,Ms Harrap offered a heartfelt message to her students.
“You’re just an inspiration. You are the thing that keeps us ticking along,” she said.“They’ve made us keep striving to do better and better because that’s what they’ve been doing.”