A team of SCEA leaders spent this week in Queensland, New South Wales, and South Australia visiting Christian schools to understand further the concept of educational support in schools and potential partnership opportunities with like-minded institutions across the country.
The first stop was Brisbane, with the team from Swan Christian College (SCC) of Dr Darnelle Pretorius (College Principal), Mr Lachlan Wilson (Director of Learning Enrichment) joining SCEA representatives Dr Graeme Cross (Chief Executive Officer) and Mr Nick Wood (Chief Operating Officer) to visit Josiah College in Queensland’s Gold Coast. This multi-denominational Christian school teaches students on the autism spectrum.
This special needs environment adds to the research around ‘educational support centres’ that form part of the aspirational goals in SCEA’s Strategic Plan (2025-2030).
Currently, state government funding for special needs provisioning in independent schools is not uniform. The goal is to encourage our state government to recognise the viability of these centres as learning environments that cater to the needs of these individuals.
Following the morning at Josiah College, the group then had the opportunity to cross the border into New South Wales to visit Pacific Hope Christian School in Tweed Heads to see the work they are doing in inclusive education.
The group then ventured down to Sydney and was joined by Mr Simon Bergin (Head of Swanonline), Mr Jordan Thyer and Mr Craig Clark (SCEA Board Members). The visit to Green Point Christian College (GPCC) allowed the team to see ‘Yattalunga Valley Christian College’, another educational support centre established within the grounds of GPCC, which SCEA representatives had previously visited on a research trip. This visit was more in-depth, with the team keen to get ‘under the bonnet’ and see how the staff provisioning works, how the government grants fund the centre and whether this could work in a SCEA context, here in Western Australia.
The final part of the northern Sydney visit allowed the team to visit Christian Educational Ministries (CEM) in Erina, New South Wales, which houses the Head Office of Australian Christian Colleges (ACC) and its online learning school, catering to more than 3,000 students across Australia. The relationship between CEM and SCEA continues to grow, and there is much to be learned from the nation’s largest Christian distance education provider for students.
Wednesday marked a visit to The Scots College, which is led by Principal Dr Ian Lambert, who spoke at the 2025 Celebration Day to SCEA staff.
The remainder of the day involved another engagement with ACC, this time at their Marsden Park campus, for further work on provisioning for distance learning and ‘asynchronous learning’ (pre-recorded lessons that allow individual students to watch classes on demand).
Finally, on Thursday, part of the group visited Tyndale Christian School in Adelaide, where Principal Mr Mike Potter has developed a comprehensive program for students with special education needs. This concluded the research into educational support units, and the task for the team upon their return to WA will be to ‘crunch the numbers’ and assess how this could benefit SCEA (and other Christian schools in WA) in the future through special education provisioning in our schools.