Greetings from St Bede’s

We have had a productive start to the first week of Term 2, which began with two Conference Days and finally with a belated ANZAC Service, which not only honours the 51 Bedeans who died in various wars over the last century, but also remembers those soldiers who returned from war with side-effects that changed their lives as well. Later in the newsletter there is a letter first published at the end of World War II, which we share for your interest as well.

At our recent conferences we had a 93% turnout from our parents over the two days. There were about 4,500 interviews, which I commented on at the Pockets Assembly on Wednesday (see below). We believe these well attended opportunities to discuss a boy's learning and development are far more effective than written reports.

Firstly, before we acknowledge the recipients of the pockets, could I commend you on the two good learning days to start the term. 4,500 interviews equates to that many bits of personalized learning. It is an opportunity to look back, to reassess, but then to look forward. To assess where we are academically, and also where you are at out of the classroom and as individual young men. Maybe you have discovered things about yourself that you aren’t proud of. Hopefully though, you have discovered things that may encourage and excite you as the term begins. Whether the news wasn’t so good or whether it was positive, let’s begin the term with hope and recommitment. As I intimated to you prior to the holidays, life is a mixture of ups and downs and your ability to work through these with the people round the wall (our staff) is the most important dynamic of this College.
We begin the term with the first of two assemblies where we present the Bedean Pockets of Honour.
Listen to the word….HONOUR. Whether you look up trusty Google or what you know already, HONOUR means to hold a person with great respect. We honour people with great respect, because of their achievements across many aspects of College life. For a minute I want to reflect upon this.
Deliberately, we have staged the awarding of the pockets to include all aspects of College life. Many single sex, well established schools have been branded ….e.g. a good sporting school, or a top academic school etc., etc., and quite often the reason is because that is where they put most of their resources, messaging and emphasis.
I would like St Bede's to be a College where the talents and achievements across the academic, sports, community and cultural spheres are equally promoted and therefore recognized.
Cast your minds back to your first interview where the discussion begins about what every individual brings to the table. In other words what are the God given talents of each student as they come into the College. Mention of Fr Cormac Hoban’s last speech to Bedeans 75 years ago, when he said “I want you to be the best possible version of the person God created you to be.”
What is also discussed is what are the other talents that could emerge in their journey here. In other words the process of finding out what God has in store for each individual.
Learning should be a discovery both in and out of the classroom but most importantly the quest to see what God wants of us. And here at St Bede’s I’d like to think there are so many opportunities to find that out, no matter in what area. Today we honour or give respect EQUALLY to academic, cultural, sporting, community, young farmers.
I wonder how many of those 100+ pockets we award today are in areas that those receiving them did not know they could even do so when they came to St Bede’s. In the past I can think of many examples where this was the case. 
About 20 years ago, the College introduced Drama as a subject, and to many of the boys who tried the subject and then carried it on in the senior school, they found they acquired skills that may not have taken them onto the stage in an acting career. However, they found that the skills they learned in that cultural arm of the College would advantage them in the future when they left school. Successful careers in law, broadcasting and in the media flourished from the foundation formed in the drama classroom at school.
I wonder if I talked with Mr McPhail whether the impressive achievements of those boys in the national young farmers competitions, was something they even thought about when they enrolled at St Bede’s. What I am saying is that our College is one where its students have the opportunity to explore what God has in mind for them……
While many of those who achieved pockets did so in activity they found here, my second point about the word ‘honour’ is this. Bedean honours pockets should be earned. Yes, it is about recognising talent or brains, but it is more about what a person does with that talent. The drama and music people I talked about before……they found they had a talent, but they only realized that talent by hours of practicing memorization, or by repetitive practice in their musical discipline. Likewise, our top sportsmen putting in the hours by themselves in a gym and doing the extra practice of skills, away from the eyes of the coach or the selector. Bedean honours pockets are earned.
Bedean honours are earned also in the classroom. Most of the boys who walk the stage to receive their academic honours pockets haven’t received them solely because of a superior IQ. Somewhere there must be a component centering on application, AND of how they responded to failure or getting it wrong initially.
The third aspect of the honours pocket in our College space is the aspect of giving back, of generous use of time and talent for the benefit of others in the community. In so doing they bring honour as well and also earn the honours pocket. A pleasing part of our community are the good number of boys who do give back in all spheres. A number of senior students give back to organisations like SERVO, or in coaching sports teams and in the cultural arm of the College. They are honouring those people they help in getting them to be the best version God made them to be and honouring the activity they are involved in. They in turn earn their honours pocket.
So, in summary the 100 or so who walk the stage and we honour today are not just the talented. More so, they are boys who have done something good with that talent and something meaningful for that activity to make a positive contribution to the community as a whole. And the Bedean honours pocket is something earned. It encapsulates what the icon Hoban stated, to be the best person of what God created you to be. "Fide et Opere".

Until next week,

J. G. Boyle