{"id":7728,"date":"2022-09-15T00:36:58","date_gmt":"2022-09-14T15:06:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/professors-nod-to-vertical-home-group-structure\/"},"modified":"2024-02-27T21:48:58","modified_gmt":"2024-02-27T11:18:58","slug":"professors-nod-to-vertical-home-group-structure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/professors-nod-to-vertical-home-group-structure\/","title":{"rendered":"Professor\u2019s nod to \u2018vertical\u2019 Home Group structure"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Blackfriars\u2019 late headmaster Father John Neill is credited with transforming the school over his long tenure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Among many building projects, he championed the creation of the gymnasium that, to this day, bears his name, and oversaw the development of the Hallinan Library, the Maher Building and the refurbishment of St Catherine\u2019s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But it is perhaps a less-lauded change, introduced by Fr Neill in 1986, that made, and continues to make, a huge impact at Blackfriars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fr Neill was responsible for introducing the school\u2019s \u201cvertical\u201d Home Group system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unlike in many other schools, Blackfriars students meet each morning in Home Groups made up of boys from Years 7-12 from within their House.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
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Headmaster Father John Neill was responsible for introducing ‘vertical’ Home Groups to Blackfriars in 1986.<\/sub><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Fr Neill recognised the benefits of senior students \u201cmingling\u201d with the younger students and, hopefully, acting as role models to them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Almost 40 years later, university studies have shown that Fr Neill\u2019s pioneering move was the right one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Speaking at the recent National Catholic Education Conference, in Melbourne, Professor Donna Cross discussed the benefits of multi-year level home groups in schools.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhile mixed-age \u2018house\u2019 groups were traditionally used to engage students in co-curricular activities such as sport and music, their important contribution to students\u2019 pastoral care has also been more recently recognised,\u201d said Prof Cross, formerly the program head at the Telethon Kids Institute<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cVertical pastoral care delivery encourages and enables connectedness between students of different year levels and helps to build a strong sense of belonging and community for students.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

She said a Western Australian study found that, in the first year of Secondary school (Year 7), \u201cstudents in schools with vertical streaming pastoral care structures reported feeling significantly more connected to their school than students within schools reporting a horizontal (same-age) only structures\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA vertical pastoral care structure provides a structured opportunity for mixed-age mentoring or \u2018buddy\u2019 systems that foster leadership skills, service and responsibility for others in students,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
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One student from each year level (Y7-12) in Mr Capurso’s Jarrett House Home Group.<\/sub><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Blackfriars Deputy Principal Brett Knowles said Blackfriars\u2019 Home Group structure was a \u201csignificant point of difference we have compared with many other schools\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cVertical Home Groups, containing students from Years 7 to 12, are wonderful opportunities for students to connect, build belonging and develop social emotional intelligence skills,\u201d Mr Knowles said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBetter social skills amongst our students leads to better social interactions, including connecting and finding friends.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Blackfriars\u2019 late headmaster Father John Neill is credited with transforming the school over his long tenure.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":7729,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[],"taxonomy_info":{"category":[{"value":34,"label":"Secondary"}]},"featured_image_src_large":["https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/Screen-Shot-2022-09-14-at-10.32.58-am-1024x645-1.png",1024,645,false],"author_info":{"display_name":"Shannon Caton","author_link":"https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/author\/scaton\/"},"comment_info":0,"category_info":[{"term_id":34,"name":"Secondary","slug":"secondary","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":34,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":142,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":34,"category_count":142,"category_description":"","cat_name":"Secondary","category_nicename":"secondary","category_parent":0}],"tag_info":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7728"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7728"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7728\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11743,"href":"https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7728\/revisions\/11743"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7728"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7728"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackfriars.sa.edu.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7728"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}