At Whitefriars, we have built a vibrant culture of student leadership based on the following aims:

• To develop the leadership capabilities of students across all year levels so they can develop as servant leaders and active global citizens.
• To promote a culture of active student voice and involvement in matters affecting the school and to use student voice to enrich the school community.
• To enable students to advocate on behalf of their peers on issues relating to school life.
• To act as a role model for the rest of the school by upholding the mission and values of Whitefriars College.

Culture is built on many things, including rituals and traditions with significant meaning attached. One of the traditions with senior student leadership is the annual overnight Senior College Leadership Retreat for the Year 12 students of the following year. The purpose of this retreat is to foster a greater sense of understanding of what leadership entails at Whitefriars and to discern where they feel they fit in this program.

Seventy Year 11 students have put themselves forwarded to be considered for College leadership in 2025. This group of students, along with a number of staff, went to Amberley Edmund Rice Centre for the annual Leadership Retreat.  Students participated in a series of workshops lead by, Ms Laurissa Parastatidis, Ms Allemand, Mr Murphy, and me. These workshops focussed on organisation, collaboration, interview skills and what it means to be a Whitefriars leader. Mr Height also visited the camp and spoke to students about sport captain roles at the College. One of the highlights has always been a visit by some of the current Year 12 leaders who share their stories of triumph, failure, lessons learnt and advice about how to approach student leadership. A special thanks to Tom Petrowski (College Captain), Max Paten (College Vice-Captain), Jack Apostolopoulos (College Vice-Captain), James Palumbo & Jonathan Clark (Wellbeing Captains) and Lucas Mallios (Mathematics Captain). The themes which came through from these boys this year were:

• The importance of teamwork – you need to rely on and support each other.
• Start straight away – it is a short year!
• Love what you do.
• Make the role what you want to make it.
• Being a leader helps you develop a better understanding of how a school works and there is so much work being done at school behind the scenes.
• The importance of being organised and delegating.

Thank you to all the staff who attended the retreat – Claire Allemand, Kristan Height, Cath Spurritt, Tracey Phelan, Laurissa Parastatidis and Mark Murphy. A special thanks to Joshua Vujcich who led the retreat supported by Anna Nyariri.

We look forward to continuing to build a strong culture of student leadership at Whitefriars and provide opportunities for our students to be co-creators of our great school.

Mr Mick Lafferty

Deputy Principal – Students