'The victory is so much sweeter when you run your own race’, Madonna King, author of Ten-Ager.

We would all agree our ten-year-old girls don’t face the same challenges as their peers in other parts of the world. There is a complete lack of opportunity to attend school in many countries, or worse, imagine being a ten-year-old girl trying to go to school in Afghanistan. While they may not face these sorts of worries, that doesn’t mean our girls are cruising through their days without a care in the world.

On Monday night, we welcomed Madonna King as the second guest speaker in our SMC Parent Speaker Series for the year. Madonna is an award-winning journalist, author and leader of public debate. She has built special expertise on the issues confronting teenage girls, based on the research for her two best-selling books, Being 14 and Fathers and Daughters, and now Ten-ager. Her skill is to research and ask the right questions, listen carefully to the answers and help audiences (like parents and educators) understand what they need. Her credentials are further bolstered by being the mother of two teenage daughters.

With heightened pressure from what they see in the media, in movies and on TV, our girls are leaving childhood behind well before they hit their teens. What may have been the domain of teenagers just a decade ago, the world of our Junior School girls is now influenced by smartphones, social media, body image, anxiety and mental health. Not surprisingly, emotions can be heightened and relationships can be fraught. In her presentation, Madonna shared compelling insight into the issues our girls might not be talking about publicly and offered sage guidance for the audience on how experts believe we should deal with it.

It was heartening to hear examples of what works to assist girls through these tumultuous times already at the heart of St Margaret’s. As a school community, we encourage socialisation skills with a phone-free school day, develop and model a common language of friendship through our Junior School ‘Friendology’ curriculum, leverage the positive influence of big sisters in our school, especially as role models for diversity, and trust in the important shared values between home and school as the sphere of influence for our girls shifts from parents to friends.

Parenting is not an easy adventure to be on, especially in these modern times, so we hope your partnership with St Margaret’s College offers the support and encouragement needed to navigate any challenges along the way. He waka eke noa, we are all in this together.

We are able to share the video recording of Monday’s presentation for a limited time, so if you were unable to attend and would like to watch it, please contact the Community Relations team.