issue 1 09 - APS Member Groups - Australian Psychological Society

Education support programme88acquiring funding to initially pilot theprogramme in 2004 and was refunded from2005 to 2008.The programme involved two fulltimepositions being funding, one male and onefemale employee, who were responsible forevery aspect of day to day operations. Eachof the 16 schools where allocated andmatched according to the gender of the twoemployees and schools. Hence, the maleemployee was responsible for providingsupport to the seven participating maleresidential schools and the female employeewas responsible for supporting the nineparticipating female residential schools. Itwas a contractual agreement imposed by thefederal department funding the programmethat an advisory committee was established tomonitor the programme’s progress.Committee members constitutedrepresentatives from participating schools,two parent representatives who had a childcurrently enrolled at any of the 16 residentialschools, the federal department funding theprogramme, representatives from tertiary andindustry sectors, and a representative of thenon-government education sector. A senioreducation consultant was allocated as anominal, part-time line manager for the twofulltime employees however, thedevelopment of key initiatives was left to begenerated and implemented by the twofulltime employees.At the beginning of 2008 over 120students across the 16 schools were accessingsome aspect of the support offered by thisprogramme. An important adjunct to note atthis point is that we also provided support toYear 12 students that had graduated with thetransition into post-school destinations. Forinstance, we would help former students withthe preparation and collation of applicationsfor tertiary institutions, as well as withgaining employment (e.g., resume andinterview preparation) and also with locatingsuitable accommodation (e.g., understandinglease agreements).When funding was reapproved after theinitial piloting period in 2004, only arudimentary programme framework and supportservice was in place and being offered tostudents, parents, and schools. It is from thispoint from which we return to and begin ourreflections.Mapping the landscape: Implementing asupport programme across multiple residentialschoolsAt the beginning we conducted a basicscoping and profiling exercise to gain a betterunderstanding of student numbers,demographics and geographic location fromwhich students were drawn across the 16schools. This involved creating a database thatidentified each student’s status as a residentialor day student and collating information such asgender, year group, scholarship/bursary or feepaying status, starting year and graduation year,as well as parent/guardian names, siblings inother residential schools, home address detailsand email accounts.This process significantly assisted us tobecome more familiar with the diversity ofstudents and of contexts from which studentsoriginated (e.g., location, family, clan andcountry). This amalgamated information wasalso useful in other ways as previously unseentrends across the 16 schools became visible. Forexample, the database anecdotally suggestedthat those students who started in Year 8 atresidential schools had a greater tendency tograduate in Year 12, in comparison to studentsthat entered into the residential schoolexperience in later years (e.g., Years 10 & 11).An important discovery from this processwas we found that a significant number of daystudents were actually from rural, regional andremote regions of WA but had relocated to staywith relatives, friends or in hostelaccommodation in Perth during the academicyear. In a number of instances the whole familyhad relocated and moved to Perth to supporttheir child’s educational needs. The decisionmaking process of whether to relocate childrenduring the academic year represented aThe Australian Community Psychologist Volume 21 No 1 June 2009