Gumleaf Primary School – Mythical Name, Real Pain!
Its not just the School Council Parents that are hurt with Bronwyn Pike’s Scape Goat School Merger Policy!
In checking out about School Mergers in Victoria, I came a cross an interesting paper that was looking back on the experiences of participants in a “Master in School Leadership” course that was developed at Monash and Melbourne University. The program was described basically about helping kick start Educators in the area of leadership:
In 2004 the Department embarked on an exciting and ambitious venture, engaging Monash University and the University of Melbourne to design a Master in School Leadership (MSL) program.
This high quality development opportunity, which leads to an accredited master qualification, was designed to enhance the leadership capacity of current and future leaders and provide an opportunity for teacher leaders to share professional learning with fellow educators from all over Victoria.
(Source: Willing to Lead – http://www.eduweb.vic.gov.au/edulibrary/public/staffdev/schlead/Willing_to_Lead/Willing_to_Lead_-_Master_in_School_Leadership.pdf)
To my surprise, Mary Verwey (right) had written a Case Study about her experiences at “Gumleaf Primary School”, a school that had went through a messy school merger. Interestingly enough, Mrs Verwey had been the Acting Principal at Oakwood Park Primary School, the school that my son had gone to for his first two years until it closed in a messy school merger process.
My Ride for Saturday 7th November 2009
November 7, 2009 by mollyfud · Leave a Comment
I am trying to get back into riding and so I just said stuff it and pushed my self hard. Here is my ride!
Feeling good!
Not Pike-ing it over picking up the bill!
July 6, 2009 by mollyfud · Leave a Comment
Not the 1300 meal! (edited)
Maybe the reason Education Minister, Bronwyn Pike won’t take ownership for the Forced closures of Victoria Schools is that she was out to lunch! In the news is word that she doesn’t mind having a nice lunch:
Documents obtained under Freedom of Information FoI show that then health minister Bronwyn Pike lunched with Victoria’s Agent-General in London David Buckingham at Covent Garden in October 2004 at a cost of more than $1300 to taxpayers.
via Taxpayers pick up tab at swanky eateries | National Breaking News | News.com.au.
Wow! Maybe she should take the School Councillors that are taking the blame for the school closures that she is over seeing, out to one of these lunches! I mean they are slightly helping her out politically. How much longer can the Victorian Government/Education Department keep hiding behind the hard working parents of Victoria on this issue?
A small win in the Fight to make (Bronwyn) Pike do whats Right
July 4, 2009 by mollyfud · Leave a Comment
Education Minister, Bronwyn Pike
Earlier in the week I wrote a little post about the fight to get the Victorian Government, Victorian Education Department, Bronwyn Pike and the Victorian Premier, Steve Bracks John Brumby to take ownership of School Closure/Merger decisions in the state due to the fact that, although they are getting school councils to vote on these decisions, they are also activily forcing many of these councils into these decisions.
Well the first victory in the campaign has been won with the Minister giving in on the fight to have them come forth with the list of schools that have merged or closed user there government. The story was broken by The Age and its Education Editor, Farrah Tomazin and Education Reporter, Miki Perkins:
MORE than 150 Victorian public schools have closed or merged since Labor has been in government, with the Education Department reaping millions of dollars from schools that have shut down.
Education Minister Bronwyn Pike yesterday bowed to pressure and released a list of schools that have closed or merged since 1999, insisting each one had been a voluntary decision by the local community.
via School closures list released in Government about-face.
So now we have them admitting that there have been a lot of schools changing structure, now its time to push on and ask that they take the ownership for these school closures instead of laying the blame squarely at the feet of the hard working Parents that give up hours of there time with no reward to sit on school councils to help not only their kids but all the other kids at the school during their time there and into the future (if the schools have a futrue depending on the will of the Government/Department!):
But with more mergers and closures to come, Ms Pike rejected Opposition claims the Government had a “hit list” of schools.
“It’s always a decision that the community themselves make,” she said.
Why can’t the Government that is elected to Govern and make the hard decisions own the decisions that they are making? Why must you blame us Minister? And it is blame and it is hiding from scrutiny! Its weak! I challenge you to stand up strong. Say bugger the political fallout (which to be honest there would be little as no one actually believes your not forcing schools to merger anyway), I am going to do what is right, what I was elected to do because it is right, not that it is popular! Because to be honest, I have been a labour voter my whole life, but this has turned me off them and the only way they can win back my vote is by being strong and doing what is right for a change!
Oh, by the way, your list is already wrong! For one, Lyndale and GreenSlopes Primary schools have agreed to merge! Do you know of any others missing off the list? Leave a comment below!
Forced School Mergers in Victoria
June 30, 2009 by mollyfud · 3 Comments
The Victorian Labour Government loves claiming that they don’t close schools, that they leave it up to the School communities (and more to the point) the School Councils to decide the fate of there schools! For those of you that have been through the process know, that although there is elements of truth to the story, the part of the story the forget to tell is that they have made the decisions behind the scenes and do everything in there power to make sure the out comes that they want are achieved and that the School Councils are the ones the when left with out any other decision, have to do the actual vote to close the school and therefor wear the blame (and thats what the government and education department do, blame the school council) for the rest of time, with the Government trying to wash their hands of the issue and remain clean so that they can bash the Liberal party and Jeff Kennett about the number of schools they closed.
Now I know some schools are probably redundant and that money can be spent better on one bigger school rather then two small schools, but my argument and goal is to have the State Government and the Education department to live up too their responsibility and own the decision to have schools close or merge (notice I didn’t say to make the decision? That’s because there already making the decision, they are just hiding behind the school councils to own the decision).
Now your school might not have been involved in a school merger and you might say, why do I care. With all the extra work and discussions that are taking place, it has to be more expensive to try to have the school councils talked/forced in to the decision then it is to just make the decision and live with the political backlash that might come!
So I will write more on the site in the coming weeks (assuming that there isn’t an about face by the government) but in the mean time, if you have been through the Building Futures program and been part of a school that has merged because of it and you have some stories to tell about the tactics and the process, either leave a comment below or email me at mollyfud@gmail.com.
Lets see if we can get the Government to come clean and be strong on an issue for once, instead of spending there time commenting on TV shows and Celebrities as they seem to be at the present time!
My USA Trip 2008 – Melbourne to Boston via LA
October 19, 2008 by mollyfud · Leave a Comment
I am sitting here in LA Airport typing this post. I am on my way to Boston, Massachusetts (well Bedford, MA actually) for work. That meant getting up early and on the way to 
Melbourne Airport at 8:30am for an 11:25am flight that arrived in LA at about 7am (on that same Saturday, yes, freaky) after about 14 hour flight.
I have about an hour to wait till my Flight to Boston boards for about a 5 hour flight which will have me in the hotel at about 10-11pm. The plan is to try to stay awake the whole time (okay, I had a couple of small sleeps on the Melb-LA flight but pretty much stayed up the whole time.
On the flight I got to watch Get Smart which I really enjoyed. I think it was an interesting twist on the original. Also watched a doco on J.K.Rowlings and that was very interest. They had the Fugitive that is one of my Favorites movies of all time and I may have to watch it again on the way back (yes, that is hinky (little Fugitive reference)). Perhaps the best of the lot was Morgan Spurlock ’s latest film (you would know him as the Super Size Me guy that ate nothing but McDonalds for a month for a Documentary), Where in the world is Osama Bin Laden. The film is setup as Morgan going out to find Osama in order to keep the world safe for his unborn child. It follows the places that are related to Osama but ends up more looking at the reason Osama’s ideas have legs and how much and why those thoughts have any impact at all.
Anyway, need to start getting ready for the flight to Boston. Will try to talk to you them.
Molly
PS. Thanks to my wife Lidia and 8 (nearly) year old son, Patrick for sending me emails. Love you guys.
Oh my god! SingStar Queen!
October 3, 2008 by mollyfud · Leave a Comment
Singstar Queen
UPDATE on the UPDATE: They are releasing SingStar Queen on the PS2!
UPDATE: Bit late for this update, but I believe that Sony/PlayStation changed their mind and only released Queen Song packs for the PS3 singstar! Boo Boo Booo
I love SingStar! Its a karaoke game that you play on your Playstation. I have a lot of titles (80’s, Rock, Rock Ballards, etc) but I can see the next one that I am going to get! They have recently announced a version featuring Queen songs! I Can’t wait. Here is an ad for it!
Fat Blogging – Stage 1
March 7, 2008 by mollyfud · Leave a Comment
So the day after the visit to see Dr Marks, the first stage of the process begins. It was a three step process:
1) Don’t change what you eat but keep a diary of what you eat
2) Get a pedometer and measure how many steps a day you are doing
3) In the same place, jot down your mood 3 times a day, at the major meal times.
This phase ended about two weeks ago. It was a bit scary/embarrassing to see how I was eating. Too many snacks, too many lunches out. The pedometer didn’t work 100% actuarially but it showed that I wasn’t doing enough exercise. The mood also showed that when I was down, I tended to eat more.
So left me at Stage 2, and will post about this again soon.
Molly
Fat Blogging – Morbidly Obese! Time to act
February 23, 2008 by mollyfud · 7 Comments
In many ways its not easy to right the above heading but its not the time to sugar coat this! Over the last year, things have busy, things have been hard and I haven’t looked after myself very well. I have always been overweight but my weight ballooned up and got out of control. It was time to act. About 2-3 months ago in conversation with our doctor she suggested it was time act on this on two fronts.
Firstly, as a result of the weight gain I started to snore. Poor Lidia (my Wife) sometimes can’t sleep the snoring is so bad. So one of the first steps was to see a sleep specialist to see if I have sleep apnoea. My snoring started and got worst as my weigh increased. The doctor said this is probably because the fat increases around the throat and as the throat naturally gets small over night, the fat causes it to get smaller again and this causes the snoring. I am now waiting to do a sleep test and the doctor said that the best thing to do for now is trying to lose weight.
Secondly, I went to see Dr Sharon Marks, from Monash University. Dr Marks is the coordinator of the Obesity Clinic at Monash Medical Centre. She weighed me and took my height and gave the verdict that I knew was coming. I was Morbidly Obese! I don’t know about you, but that term does strike a cord in your mind that isn’t pretty. It extracts an emotion like wow but the fact is that its true.
Sharon went on to explain about how it is considered a disease and that people suffering from it are always going to have trouble losing weight for a number of reasons:
1) Your Metabolism starts to slow down.
2) Seeing you weigh so much, its harder to exercise. Not only is it hard at the time but chances are that your body is going to hurt more the next day.
3) Just general moral and environment issues.
For these reason, some medical intervention is normally needed to get back on track. One option is to have surgery. The two options presented where Laparoscopic Adjustable Gastric Band (better known as Lap Band) or Intragastric Balloon. The first involves using a band filled with liquid to block the amount of food that you can eat and make you feel fuller. The Balloon goes into the stomach and again makes you feel much fuller. Both of these options where to us (Lidia and I) last resorts and but definitely not out of the question.
The other option was to use drugs or food replacement supplements. The drugs do things like make your body less likely to absorb fat or suppress your appetite. The Food replacements are thinks like bars and shakes and the likes that you take to replace normal meals. Drugs might come into in the long run but the first point of call is the Food replacement in the form of Optifast. It is a program that has bars, drinks and soups that you have to replace your meals. It sounds promising and the option that we have decide to go down. This was decided about two weeks ago so tomorrow I will follow on with what the steps where from our initial consultation.
Molly
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