Trinity Christian School, Canberra

Trinity Christian School
Location
Canberra, Australian Capital Territory Australia
Information
Type	Independent, Day
Motto	Love, Nurture and Service
Established	1980
Employees	>100
Enrolment	~1144
Colour(s)	Navy blue, white and bottle green
Website	http://www.tcs.act.edu.au

Trinity Christian School, founded in 1980, is a private Christian K-12, co-educational school located in Wanniassa in the Tuggeranong Valley of Canberra ACT Australia.

Facilities

The campus of Trinity Christian School consists of a mixture of brick and corrugated iron facade standalone buildings. In addition to classrooms the school's facilities include science labs, a number of computer rooms, a music and drama studio as well as a metal and woodwork workshop and kitchen teaching space. Sporting facilities include two ovals, a large gymnasium hall as well as asphalt basketball/netball courts.

Past principals

Enrolment and staff

Trinity Christian School has approximately 1150 students^[2] and is divided into three sections: Junior (K-5),^[3] Intermediate (6-8)^[4] and Senior (9-12).^[5] The staff of the school includes 76 full-time teachers, and 32 part-time teachers.

Extracurricular activities

Extracurricular activities include a school band, ISCF, Duke of Edinburgh's Award Scheme, musical production, instrumental music program, dance festival and camps.

Mission trips

Each year students from the senior section of the school are given the opportunity to go on a mission trip. Destinations have included Uganda (via South Africa), India^[6] and Morapoi Station, WA.

F1 in Schools

Students from Trinity have competed at several F1 in Schools competitions. Team Goshawk won the amateur championship in Canberra in 2007 and took second place overall at the 2008 World Championship in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. They were presented the coveted award for "Best Engineered Design".^[7] In 2008 team Redline Racing won the national finals in Canberra.^[8][9] They placed 2nd at the 2009 World Championships in London where they won the award for the fastest car.^[10]

Contact with the International Space Station

In 2010 students from Trinity made contact with the International Space Station as part of the Wireless Institute of Australia's 100th anniversary.^[11] Students had the opportunity to ask astronauts about life in space.^[12]

Uniform

Like most Australian schools in the temperate zone, Trinity has two kinds of uniforms: the summer uniform and the winter uniform. The summer uniform is worn strictly on Terms 1 & 4 only, and the winter uniform is worn strictly in Terms 2 & 3 only. There is no changeover period. The uniforms are different from the Junior Section (K-5), Intermediate Section (6-8) and Years 9 & 10, and College (Year 11 & 12). There used to be 2 sport uniforms but now the K-5's wear the same sport uniform as 6-12's.A hat is a requirement for both the normal uniform and the sport uniform.

History

Shortly after its founding in 1980, Trinity was amongst three schools that were included in a proposal by the then Education minister, Wal Fife. The idea was that schools with falling enrolments should take in students from private schools.^[13]

See also

• List of schools in the Australian Capital Territory

Controversy

In its early days, Trinity operated in space leased out a Government school. At the time there was a significant degree of public anger in the community, centering around the controversy that a conservative religious segment of the community should be allowed to use publicly owned property to educate their children. Controversy was compounded by curricular themes that had a heavy religious focus, asserting creationism amongst other things.

The school was given the land it occupies as a compromise by the government, allowing the school to continue with its religious education agenda whilst being at arm's-length from government.

Further controversy arose around 1992/3 when the school principal at the time made the executive decision that all books mentioning or supporting evolution should be pulled from the school's library. This action resulted in outcry from many parents and an exodus of large number of families. Following sustained pressure a new principal, Neumann, was installed and the school's policy on evolution education moderated somewhat.

Originally, because Trinity was an conservative religious school, it did not have a sexual education program, and things such as contraception, teenage pregnancy and homosexuality were not included in the curriculum, neither directly (subject specific classes) nor indirectly. This caused dismay amongst many students and concern in members of the community as it did not give students the opportunity to be educated in life issues. This has since been amended.

References

Coordinates: 35°24′30″S 149°05′11″E / 35.4082°S 149.0864°E / -35.4082; 149.0864