Buckley Park College

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Buckley Park College
'Build your wings'
School type	Government Secondary School
Location	Essendon 3040, Victoria, Australia
Information	(03) 9331 9999
Website	http://www.buckleyparkco.vic.edu.au/.

Buckley Park College is a small, public secondary school located in Essendon, Victoria, Australia. It has around 800 students from year 7 to 12. It slogan is 'build your wings', which is on the school logo. Buckley Park College aims to prepare its students to be the creators, discoverers and inventors of the future, and encourages participating as responsible and productive citizens committed to the achievement of a just and sustainable world.

Location of Buckley Park College

1 School Grounds
2 School Staff
3 Annual Events
4 Alumni
5 External links

[edit] School Grounds

Buckley Park Secondary College is divided into five separate 'Blocks', or corridors which are parallel and are connected by a main hallway. Each Block is referred to by its assigned letter from the northern-most “A Block” through to southern-most “E Block”. Each classroom is then referred to by its block and number, for example; C3 is room 3 in C Block. The main entry, at the front of the school, leads into the main hallway where the School Office is situated, directly at the front of B Block. Also located in B Block are the Staff Rooms, the VCE common-room and the school canteen, where it is readily accessible for all students.

A Block is generally used to house the entirety of Year 7 Students’ Home Rooms, the remaining rooms generally being used to house the Year 8 students and other miscellaneous classes. Rooms of note in A Block are A1 and A9 which are generally accepted as the rooms where German and Japanese classes are held respectively.

C Block houses the remainder of the Year 8 students along with some Year 9. Rooms of note in C Block are the IT Labs, the Textiles room, the Home Economics Room, and the Secondary German Room. D Block houses the remaining Year 9 students and Year 10 students. Rooms of note are the four Science Labs and an Art Room, often used for Media Studies.

E Block is mainly based around the Arts, as it consists of six classrooms - a Music room, two Art rooms, a Computer Lab mainly used for Art designing and two rooms used for Wood Production.

Parallel to E Block, but not connected by the main hallway is the Performing Arts Centre, usually referred to as the PAC. This is where Drama classes and Drama and Musical Performances are held. It has a large room with a slightly raised stage (for performing). It also has an adjoining classroom with a wall which can be removed to allow space for an audience (this second classroom is usually referred to as PAC2).

To the north of A Block is a large Gymnasium for Sport and Physical Education. It consists of a large hall, two storerooms for sporting equipment, two changing-rooms (for male and female), an office to hold the belongings of Students, and an upstairs mezzanine with Table tennis tables and weightlifting equipment. West of A Block is the Library. Along with its relatively sparse book collection, it sports Computers, and Newspaper Archives used for research.

To fit the rapidly growing school population four Portable Classrooms have been added the west of C and D Block. These Portables, which are referred to as P1 through to P4,. The school also includes two basketball/netball courts, a hockey field and three tennis courts. Due to the condition of the hockey field students regularly choose to go to the large football field on the block north of the school during lunchtimes, named Buckley Park (which is where the school name originated) and are supervised by staff.

Right now, in the school grounds themselves, there is ground work happening to improve the quadrangles. New plants, and seats are going in and inbetween the PAC and E block, there is an ampitheatre with a 'stage' for outdoor performances.

[edit] School Staff

There are roughly 80 staff members at Buckley Park College, including teachers, canteen volunteers, office members and the staff involved in running the school and caring for students. The principal of the school is named Tony Tartaro and has been for some years since moving from his placement as Vice-principal at Williamstown Secondary College. The current Vice-Principal of the school is named Duncan Brooks. He and Mr Tartaro have their own private offices to manage the school. The staff are mainly based around 'B Block', where each teacher has his or her private compartment in their staffroom. There are four staffrooms holding at least 15 teachers each, and a social staffroom where the teachers may gather at breaktimes.

[edit] Annual Events

The students and teachers of Buckley Park are divided into four different houses. These houses are named: - Croft House (Yellow) - Hoffman House (Red) - Graves House (Green) - Buckley House (Blue)

Throughout the school year, these four houses compete in different school events, including:

Swimming Sports Students compete in different swimming events, gaining points for their house for each win and student participating.

Athletics Students compete in athletic events, including running, long jumping, shot put, etc. House Theatre Festival Students create a 10-minute play with 10 actors, and perform for parents and teachers in the PAC. A panel of judges judge the best play, also awarding Best Set, Best Costume, Best Script, Best Actor and Actress, Best Supporting Actor and Actress.