VIGILENCE IN AN ONLINE WORLD

Last week Sonya Ryan from the Carly Ryan Foundation spoke at an evening function coordinated by Daniel Bloch Yr 11 and Ellen Frodsham Yr 11 PLC. Sonya's message was both heart wrenching and empowering as she talked about the new online world the youth of today live in. It is a world where people can form deep relationships without meeting face to face or speaking voice to voice. Sonya's 14 year old daughter was murdered after meeting up with the person she had developed an online relationship with who claimed to be another 14 year old.

At the centre of Sonya's talk was the necessity for parents to continually, at least annually, make the effort to understand how the online world works and set fair and reasonable parameters for their children to engage in it. Basic strategies such as knowing the privacy settings on your social media sites, the geo location attributes of the camera in your mobile phone and understanding the agreements you enter into when you sign up for a social networking site were the tip of the iceberg. Scotch College 1 Degree Staff are an easy and accessible point of contact if you have a question or need some advice in this area. We are here for both the students and the parents. Sonya has dedicated her life to the memory of her daughter and trying to prevent similar tragedies. It was a moving presentation and one I am glad to have attended.

Con Brio Strings Evening

Last Wednesday evening the Music Department hosted the annual Con Brio Evening of Strings with recitals from each stringed group in the College. Having watched many of these students over five years as they have arrived and passed through Middle School it is impressive and uplifting to see and listen to their development. My congratulations to the students and their teachers on a wonderful performance.

I look forward to seeing you at the Middle School Athletics Carnival on Thursday.

Richard Ledger

Head of Middle School