From the Head of Barker Phillip Heath AM

As the COVID-19 restrictions ease, we have been able to host more events at the School, bringing our community together again after what feels like a long absence. You will sense some of the joy of reuniting from the pages that follow.

Creating a school community requires the commitment of all, joining in the great cause of an education at Barker. The efforts of parents and students to make things possible is not taken for granted. We depend greatly on the support of the OBA, the BCPA and our various volunteer groups and clubs who enable us to reach our intentions for the Barker experience for all our students and families. During one such moment during an academic event in term one, I fell into a long conversation with a former Barker student, now a parent at the School. One of the privileges of my work is to meet alumni who reflect on their time at the School and its impact on their current lives. The person told me how much they enjoyed their years at Barker and wanted something similar for their own child. The conversation moved to comparing then and now – and how things have changed so much in schools. Yet, we both agreed, in essentials the Barker approach has remained recognisable and strong for the most part. Change is necessary. Few expect the School to be the same as past generations experienced. Life is dynamic, and change is one of the few constants that we can expect. Schools reflect the transformation being experienced in the world around us and it seems to be accelerating. New technologies open a window on the world for young learners, who carry in their pockets devices believed to be a million times faster and more potent than the navigation system on the Apollo 11 space craft in 1969. Harnessing that breathtaking access to information requires a different approach to classroom learning, a different mode of teaching and certainly a different kind of architecture. The challenge is to determine our preferred future. The School Council spends time in almost every meeting considering this question. As new buildings are conceived, as new programs imagined, and as appointments of new staff are considered we return to the question of what will make us authentically Barker whilst we engage with the contemporary and future world. The Founder, the Rev Henry Plume, sought to establish an Anglican school that would prepare students for a pathway to higher education. He tutored some of the earliest female entrants to Sydney University and maintained close connections with the University of Sydney during the early years of that institution. From 1890 successive Headmasters and Councils encouraged us to look beyond our own location and educate our children to make a strong contribution to the world. Mr Carter and Mr Leslie (the 2nd and 4th Headmasters of the School) knew that looking beyond the North Shore of Sydney might take our graduates to the fields of conflict in Europe, the Middle East or in the Pacific. Our School has scores of memorials to the enormous sacrifice made by that generation.

Nura diya mirrung ngurang Dharug, Darkinjung, Wonnarua yuu Yolŋu yura, barangay yagu yuu burani The lands on which our School stands always were and always will be the belonging place of the Dharug, Darkinjung, Wonnarua and Yolŋu peoples.

Students always have been encouraged to look beyond the “Mint Gates”. Drawing a conclusion from one his parables, Jesus said: “…From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.” (Luke 12:48b). The School cannot demand this of its students without seeking to demonstrate the same spirit in our work. The HSC rightly occupies a critical focus for work. However, we know that long after the utility of the HSC has departed from our students as they commence their studies or their careers what remains will be their character, formed in part by the experiences provided at the School. A venture that will take us beyond the Mint Gates is the partnership recently established between the Yothu Yindi Foundation and Barker College to establish a primary school in North East Arnhem Land, to be called Dhupuma Barker. Dhupuma means ‘looking up to the future’, and this name was also given to a secondary boarding school which thrived in this part of remote Australia between 1972 – 1980, until it was suddenly closed by the NT Government, leaving its students desperately sad. The graduates of Dhupuma College later became leaders of their communities and some of them created the acclaimed 1990s rock band, Yothu Yindi, which introduced traditional words from Yolŋu language into rock songs that hit the charts throughout the world. The same spirit of creative enterprise some years later established the world renowned Garma Festival, which draws together people from around Australia and beyond who seek to develop a closer sense of reconciliation by understanding traditional culture and identity. The Yolŋu Elders yearn to see the concept behind Dhupuma College, and all it represented, rise again, forty years after it was closed, and they have reached out to Barker to make it happen. They want their own children and grandchildren to experience two-way learning, in language, on Country. We are humbled and thrilled that the Barker education under God continues to be both for self and for others. I look forward to sharing with you news of the progress of this vision in later editions.

Phillip Heath AM Head of Barker College