Recognising teachers who deliver the highest quality education to their students and contribute to their professional communities.

 Leonie Atkinson, Wagga Wagga High School

Narelle Barker, Airds High School

Vicki Budden, Dubbo College Delroy Campus

Greg Bugden, Armidale High School

Rebecca Cameron, Fort Street High School

Natalie Cavaleri, Elderslie High School

Sharon Cloete, Mullion Creek Public School

Rachel Cody, Dubbo College Delroy Campus

Janelle Collins, Ulladulla High School

Joanna French, Campsie Public School

Jenny Noble, Merrylands East Public School

Karissa Pedron, Bondi Public School

Vasiti Ratusau, Sarah Redfern High School

Melissa Rees, Condobolin High School

Lori Saywell, Doonside Technology High School

Felicia Signoretti, Lansvale Public School

Kerrie Spencer, Carramar Public School

Rebecca Stark, Lucas Gardens School

Halah Anna Taleb, Sylvania High School

Louise Tate, Bass Hill Public School

Vicky Valensise, Chipping Norton Public School

Kathleen Vouros, Maroubra Bay Public School

Helen Webb, Bennett Road Public School

Roslyn Welling, Carramar Public School

Susan Yaghjian, Dubbo College South Campus

Fiona Zammit, Bossley Park Public School

 

 

RECIPIENT CITATIONS

Leonie Atkinson, Wagga Wagga High School

Leonie is an outstanding and innovative teacher who truly works to ensure the students in her classes achieve to the highest possible standard. As Head Teacher History/LOTE, with the responsibility for Aboriginal Education, she consistently sets high expectations for students and staff and has been an outstanding role model.  Leonie uses a range of techniques in her classroom to engage all students and celebrates the diversity of students at the school.  She continually evolves her teaching practices to implement initiatives to engage students in the classroom.  Leonie’s involvement with and engagement of the local Wiradjuri community is well known and has led to the improved visibility of Indigenous education at Wagga Wagga High School. The school is the first in the Riverina to offer Wiradjuri language as an elective and the Indigenous Leadership Group continues to grow under Leonie’s guidance. Leonie believes that all students should be extended; their talents fostered and must be encouraged to meet their personal and academic goals.

Narelle Barker, Airds High School

Narelle is an outstanding practitioner who has achieved exemplary improvements in student learning.  As Head Teacher English and Music she has driven improvements at the HSC level in Music with 100% of students achieving a Band 3 or 4.  In English, she has led a 25% reduction in Band 1 and a 20% increase in Band 4 English Standard.  In 2017, Narelle has implemented structures such as ALARM within the English KLA to drive further improvements. Preliminary data already shows significant growth in student writing, so further growth is anticipated this year. As Learning and Support Co-ordinator, Narelle has driven whole school improvements in literacy which are reflected in NAPLAN and has also been instrumental in implementing and advocating the need for personalised learning and support for all students.  Narelle is an exemplary teacher who has driven change within her KLA and on a whole school level.

Vicki Budden, Dubbo College Delroy Campus

Vicki Budden is a highly motivated, passionate, enthusiastic and professional educator. She believes in providing opportunities to meet the needs of all students in all aspects of education and wellbeing. Vicki is instrumental in developing, implementing and evaluating wellbeing for staff and students at both a campus and whole college level. Her rapport with staff, students, parent/carers and community is of the highest standard with the best intentions for all stakeholders. Her ability to support, motivate and develop staff and students is professional, thorough and consistent. Any task Vicki is asked to complete is done with precision, detail and without hesitation. Vicki has been instrumental in developing very in depth pro-formas for Health Care plans, Individual Learning and Support Plans and for the National Collection of Disability data, which she has professional shared with colleagues. Vicki is truly a team player with the highest of respect for all team members.

Greg Bugden, Armidale High School

As an experienced Head Teacher Greg’s knowledge of the curriculum and how to teach it is phenomenal. His range of teaching strategies, incorporation of ICT and connectedness to the ‘real’ world ensure that his classroom is characterised by high expectation and high engagement. This professional knowledge is equally applied to his Extension English classes and the Philosophy course, which Greg introduced to Armidale High School.  Greg has established protocols within his faculty to keep parents/caregivers up to date with what the students are learning and how they are being assessed. Through his use of innovative technologies e.g. Idoceo parents are provided with students work samples and snapshots in real time.

Rebecca Cameron, Fort Street High School

Rebecca Cameron is an enthusiastic, outstanding teacher who is passionate about the subjects she teaches and developing the children in her care. She models best practice in creative and critical thinking and her classroom centres around the notion that student choice assists in improving student engagement. Rebecca always finds new ways to engage students and to make the visual arts and photographic practice relate to the real world.  The quality of art making has significantly improved at the school under her tutelage resulting in one high achieving student receiving 99/10 and 6th place in the state. Rebecca’s influence as a teacher extends beyond the creative arts sphere as she shares her understanding of outstanding models of assessment and assists in managing complex staffing, student welfare, parent and curriculum matters.

Natalie Cavaleri, Elderslie High School

Natalie Cavaleri has an excellent understanding of syllabus content and consistently demonstrates expertise in translating this into meaningful lessons, resulting in outstanding student learning outcomes. She provides personalised learning opportunities for students with learning difficulties and utilises school holidays to provide additional support to students preparing for the HSC. She is sought out as a mentor for senior students and engenders deep respect from Legal Studies students through her classroom integration of authentic examples from her past experience as a practising solicitor. Natalie leads a broad team of HSIE teachers within and beyond the school, as demonstrated by her initiative in establishing a program writing network to support the National Curriculum across multiple School Education Groups. She team teaches with other staff to actively demonstrate her high expectations, resulting in the confident adoption of best practice strategies in many of her staff, especially in her early career teachers.

Sharon Cloete, Mullion Creek Public School

Sharon’s capacity to engage students in 21st learning has provided students with skills to work collaboratively, problem solve and think creatively.   Sharon has developed a whole-school approach to the implementation of robotics. School teams have achieved first place in state Robocup and dance and were national champions in 2015. Students’ art work have won international awards in Hong Kong, the Nagoya Art competition and have been exhibited in the top 50 of Operation Art.   Sharon continually challenges herself professionally to ensure the students have innovative, engaging and challenging learning experiences, engaging in professional learning, much at her own cost and in her own time, in programming EV3, Weedo, scratch junior, 3D printing, Matlab and Operation Art.   Sharon has provided professional learning to staff in the Orange and Deniliquin Networks leading to the implementation of robotics in many small schools. She is sought out by colleagues for support and has been asked to trial NESA programs in Environmental Sustainability – Greenhouses, collecting work samples and providing feedback.

Rachel Cody, Dubbo College Delroy Campus

Rachel Cody is passionate about ‘making a difference’. Her dedication to developing programs and lesson variety is without a doubt of the highest standard. She has developed creative activities that ensure students are learning in a real life manner with hands on experience and opportunities. Rachel has developed a very compassionate rapport with students who need that little bit extra assistance to meet their educational and wellbeing potential. Her professional dedication to ‘knowing her students’ is inspirational and appreciated by students, staff and parent/carers alike. Her willingness to try new things creates an interesting class atmosphere whilst still supporting all students at all times. Rachel has implemented ideas at a whole school level in addition to her classroom. Rachel’s professionalism is of the highest standard and is an example to all staff.  She is a teacher of the whole person.

Janelle Collins, Ulladulla High School

Janelle is an outstanding teacher who presently is undertaking Lead Accreditation. Janelle has developed Make A Plan (MAP) – a learning system that lifted and accelerated mathematics acquisition of knowledge.  Janelle’s impact has been immense in the improved Numeracy results for year 9 in NAPLAN 2015 and 2016. As the head teacher of Mathematics and substantively appointed to Head Teacher, Teacher and Learning Janelle has been instrumental in the implementation and the leadership of Assessment and reporting within the Mathematics Faculty.  As the MAP mentor within the school, Janelle has supported significant take up by the teachers at UHS of the MAP pedagogy within their classrooms reflecting improved HSC results in Mathematics and Mathematics General in 2016 HSC.  She has led workshops across the region and school networks which has been received with absolute enthusiasm by colleagues across the state.

Joanna French, Campsie Public School

For the last twelve years, Joanna French has been an active member of the former Sydney Region Primary Schools Public Speaking Competition and has chaired the Ultimo Operational Directorate Public Speaking Committee since 2013.  She has been pivotal in facilitating consistent high quality professional learning, creating links and building the capacity of early career, experienced teachers and leaders beyond their local networks. The strong focus at all times has been on pedagogical practice and authentic syllabus implementation (K-6).   Joanna has proven to be a leader prepared to take educational risks and be innovative to further engage students, staff and the community in learning at a local and systemic level. She has been instrumental in personalising and applying a differentiated model to lead and manage the development and performance of educators in the implementation of the NSW Syllabuses for the Australian Curriculum, with a focus on Speaking and Listening.

Jenny Noble, Merrylands East Public School

Mrs Jenny Noble has been an outstanding integral school leader at Merrylands East Public School and part of an effective transformative leadership team for the past 12 years. She has been involved in many of the major initiatives, including leadership in the implementation of the flexible school hours for increase in student engagement, being on steering committee for minor and major capital works, co-ordinating all aspects of student welfare developing inclusive learning environments and liaising with community organisations and paraprofessionals to ensure students receive needs based support.  In 2017, Mrs Noble has diversified her role to including being the Deputy Principal Instructional Leader (DPIL). She works alongside another school based DPIL and professionally supports and develops 10 new scheme teachers in Literacy and Numeracy skills using and critiquing evidence based data and current research.

Karissa Pedron, Bondi Public School

Miss Karissa Pedron’s passion for education can be seen in the way that she goes above and beyond to support all students to be the best they can be. She is committed to developing strong partnerships within the community and leading programs and teams that make a difference to all students. Some of these are the Kids Matter initiative, DanceSport, the coordinator of the International Competitions and Assessments for Schools and she is the leader of the Aboriginal Education Team. Miss Pedron is a hard worker and an inspiration to her colleagues. The time she spends, mentoring staff who are less experienced reflects her generous and caring nature as well as her leadership skills, dedication and love for the teaching role.  A parent of a student in Miss Pedron’s class sums up why she is a worthy candidate of this award, “In the short space of two terms she has turned a distracted and disengaged 10 year old boy into a student with a love of learning…”

Vasiti Ratusau, Sarah Redfern High School

Vasiti uses differentiated teaching strategies to support students’ developmental needs in every lesson.  She models and inculcates a culture of high expectations, setting challenging learning goals coupled with clear guidelines and expectations.  Her continuously modified programs offer a variety of teaching and learning activities (differentiated curriculum, collaborative learning, ICT, higher order thinking) for specific syllabus outcomes/objectives.  Vasiti is always sharing her resources and often supports colleagues with further information and strategies for students to develop an understanding and respect for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories, cultures and languages via the 8 ways of learning which she has embraced.

Melissa Rees, Condobolin High School

Melissa Rees has a strong commitment to students in rural and remote communities receiving access to vibrant educational provision. Melissa has played a pivotal role in the establishment of shared goals across the five schools involved with the Lachlan Access Program and has led the development of high-level teaching programs designed to engage students and strengthen teaching practice.  She strives to overcome geographical barriers and in 2016 Melissa initiated a program that enabled students and staff to interact with HSC markers via video conference. Melissa understands and values the critical role parents and community play in student success.  Her enthusiasm and collaborative approach has encouraged and strengthened parents’ participation in their children’s senior education.

Lori Saywell, Doonside Technology High School

Lori is an outstanding Visual Arts teacher and an asset to the Wellbeing Team at Doonside Technology High School. She is an amazing classroom teacher with exemplary programs that have been used to model best practice to other teachers across the school. She personalises her learning programs to suit the needs of our diverse student and ensures her teaching meets the individual needs of all her students. She is also a caring and effective Year Advisor. She works tirelessly to encourage, inform and support our current Year 11 students. In addition to the one-on-one support she provides her students, resulting in 99.4% of students successfully completing their ROSA last year, the highest rate in the past 5 years; the range of extracurricular programs she has organised include: GrainCorp Art Competition, GIRLS boot camp, KPMG Interview for Success, Young Women’s Leadership seminar, Mental Health and Healthy eating, Time management and study skills, Goal Setting and Resilience, and most recently connecting with known artists to create school murals and performances at lunch times.

Felicia Signoretti, Lansvale Public School

Felicia provides a high challenge, high support environment and differentiates her teaching. This year she supported the Stage 3 team to modify maths programs to ensure they planned differentiation on different levels to support and extend all students.  Felicia always maintains a challenging learning environment for her students and models this for others in the school. She sets clear learning intentions and constantly evaluates her teaching practice.  Across her career, Felicia has supported a vast number of students and developed a repertoire of strategies to ensure wellbeing is paramount for all students. Felicia is a leader around the analysis of data and providing feedback to students. She is currently leading a team (Curiosity and Powerful learning) around feedback that ensures teachers embed peer and self-assessment into their teaching to allow students to progress in their learning.

Kerrie Spencer, Carramar Public School

Kerrie has demonstrated the ability to build teacher capacity to identify the numeracy and literacy learning needs of students in the early years of schooling.  She leads local decision making regarding the choice of tiered intervention strategies based on student learning needs.  Kerrie works alongside teachers to both model and support teaching and assessment skills in mathematics.  Her success in working with staff is driven by her outstanding communication skills which contribute to building and strengthening a collaborative learning culture at Carramar Public School.

Rebecca Stark, Lucas Gardens School

Rebecca Stark is strongly committed to the provision of quality and equitable education for students with a disability.  On a daily basis she models and leads by example in ensuring learning environments are engaging, challenging and dynamic.  Rebecca led a whole-school initiative called MOVE (Mobility Opportunities via Education).  This program teaches students with physical disabilities to sit, stand, walk and transition within their daily routine.  She now trains other staff in Sydney and interstate in the MOVE program.  Rebecca has also taken a leadership role in establishing a professional network, supporting colleagues in improving student learning outcomes and building staff capacity in special education.

Halah Anna Taleb, Sylvania High School

Halah Taleb has facilitated the authentic integration of technology across all KLAs with the ‘Bring Your Own Device’ (BYOD) program. As a component of her Lead Teacher accreditation scholarship she has designed effective school based research and a review of key pieces of relevant literature to provide an evidence base for this initiative.  In Halah’s role as the leader of the professional learning team and early career teacher coordinator, she has led her colleagues in exemplary teacher practice, using the School Excellence Framework, as a scaffold for discussion on a range of teaching strategies that promote creative and critical thinking for students.

Halah has been highly active in a regional network of HSIE teachers in the preparation of colleagues for the implementation of the HSC from 2018-19.  This leadership role has required her to develop, model and implement best practice surrounding the new syllabuses in History for all high schools in the Woronora and Port Hacking networks.

Louise Tate, Bass Hill Public School

Louise Tate is an expert in utilising technology to deliver 21st century teaching and learning. Her expertise for adjusting and accommodating for students with specific needs, and catering for students from diverse cultural backgrounds, is exemplary. She is a sensitive insightful leader empowering and supporting staff and students to achieve their best. Louise is a 21st century teaching and learning leader mentoring teachers in best practice ‘Quality Teaching’ and ICT integration. She has engaged and empowered staff and brought a team approach to the management and engagement of and with ICT in the school.  Louise has an engaging and empowering way with colleagues. Her contributions to the school, our professional, innovative culture, research based pedagogy and practices are what we seek in our teachers and are award worthy.

Vicky Valensise, Chipping Norton Public School

Vicky Valensise is an extraordinary leader of teaching and learning across two primary schools – Casula Public School and now as the Assistant Principal of Chipping Norton Public School. She encourages, mentors and inspires young teachers and experienced staff around deep and explicit teaching of English textual concepts. Her reputation in the area of English teaching is exemplary and her expertise is sought after regularly by the Leader, Primary Curriculum. She is passionate about quality literature being promoted and encouraged with children and has high expectations of the type of teaching that should be employed in all classrooms for all students no matter their learning ability. Vicky’s classroom data indicates high levels of deep, intellectual thinking and reflection. Data this year indicates that over 90% of her students are achieving at or beyond syllabus expectations at the end of Semester 1.

Kathleen Vouros, Maroubra Bay Public School

Kathleen Vouros, as Kindergarten teacher, fully supported the health and wellbeing of a kindergarten enrolment who presented to the school with Leukaemia and life-threatening immunosuppression as a result of treatment.  Seeking professional advice, having regular meetings with family and staff and constantly adjusting timetables and lessons, she ensured that the student could engage with learning as much as possible. As a result, the family felt extremely supported and comfortable in leaving their child in Kathleen’s care, staff knew correct procedures around the education and health of the child and the child was happy that they could participate in regular classroom activities.  All of this happened as a direct result of Kathleen knowing her students and her extremely high level care and dedication towards not only this child but all of her 20 students.

Helen Webb, Bennett Road Public School

Helen Webb was appointed Instructional Leader in Term 4, 2012 as part of the Early Action for Success Intervention. Ongoing professional learning has equipped teachers with knowledge and pedagogical practices resulting in qualitative and quantitative improvement in literacy for students in the first three years of their schooling. The gap between expected student outcomes in literacy and past outcomes has narrowed significantly due to quality teaching shaped by evidence. Students are taught by teachers who have quality resources and expert knowledge about teaching literacy from the moment they start school. The standard of literacy has improved for students across the period of the intervention with students having a metalanguage to use when discussing their learning. As a result of Helen’s outstanding work, processes and procedures are now well established for building and sustaining a culture that is aspirational for students and their learning.

Roslyn Welling, Carramar Public School

Roslyn has demonstrated the ability to build teacher capacity to identify the literacy learning needs of students in the early years of schooling.  She leads local decision making regarding the choice of tiered intervention strategies based on student learning needs.  Kerrie works alongside teachers to both model and support teaching and assessment skills in literacy for teaching in the early years of schooling.  Her success in working with staff is driven by her outstanding communication skills which contribute to building and strengthening a collaborative learning culture at Carramar Public School.

Susan Yaghjian, Dubbo College South Campus

Susan Yaghjian is nominated for her outstanding and ongoing commitment as a highly evidenced based Science practitioner-teacher.  She has been a year advisor for over 6 years and an SRC coordinator for 5 years; is fully conversant with the implementation of the Australian Science Curriculum (Years 7 to 10). She creates a quality learning environment as shown by explicit quality criteria, student engagement and their developing capacity for self-regulation and self-direction in research tasks.  STEAM and GOMAD grants have been successfully written which incorporates collaboration with other KLA’s.  Susan coordinates Clean Up Australia, and an ecologically sustainable program, where she champions recycling at South; having established the Environmental Group.

Fiona Zammit, Bossley Park Public School

Fiona is an exemplary classroom practitioner and strong advocate for all students. In her role as co-founder of Autism Advisory and Support Service, Fiona’s reach has gone well beyond the school fence in providing support for our most vulnerable students and their families. Fiona continues to go above and beyond in all that she does for public education. She significantly demonstrates impact across the school by leading colleagues to differentiate for the specific learning needs of students, developing teacher programs that support the equitable participation of ATSI students and developing programs that support students with a disability.  She implements Multilit Reading and QuickSmart Numeracy programs and offers a safe, supportive and welcoming learning environment where the needs of all students are met.