All students are required to have a device for use in class. The College introduced the book hire scheme to ensure that families did not have to purchase expensive texts books each year which is a saving of up to $1000 per year. A device is compulsory and required to access the curriculum.
At Catholic Regional College Sydenham we pride ourselves on the use of technology to enhance our learning environments. The move to a BYOD environment offers students choice and flexibility to suit their individual learning styles, whilst also offering them independence and autonomy to prepare them for life after their secondary school education, where technology will be at the core of day to day functioning both in the workplace environment and at home.
The College has made significant investments in infrastructure to provide campus wide network connectivity, classroom tvs, Virtual Reality tools, and technology laboratories. Teaching staff at CRC Sydenham integrate technology and Web 2.0 applications into their classrooms to engage students with the curriculum. Students use their devices to undertake research, access our Learning Management System (SEQTA), produce videos, collaborate with each other, brainstorm together and access worksheets and class tasks that may have been printed in the past. This therefore enables the College to reduce paper worksheets and in doing so benefits the environment.
The College has also appointed staff member who is the Learning Enhancement Leader of Digital Technologies to oversee the use of learning technologies amongst the College. Through mentoring and proactively supporting staff this leader works to develop a culture of innovation, collaboration and excellence. Every two years two staff members also attend the ISTE (International Society for Technology in Education) conference in the USA. This is one of the leading technology conferences in the world and attending this ensure that the College is remaining contemporary in their approach to teaching and learning.
Students are supported in their use of their devices by the IT department at the College, however it is expected to they all learning applications such as the microsoft suite are downloaded on their device. Furthermore, while we understand that families provide their children with mobile phones for a variety of reasons, we are expecting that students do not use these during class times unless advised by a staff member, as a mobile phone is not an accepted BYOD device at the College.
A comprehensive list of approved devices, and the policies regarding technology use at CRC Sydenham can be found in the ICT Acceptable Use Policy and Approved Devices List.
