Outdoor Education

Our outdoor education program provides experiential learning through camping trips and expeditions.  At all levels of the curriculum we value experience as an equivalent to knowledge.

Students are offered opportunities for personal growth, self awareness, compassion, insight and expansion of life experience through this important, relevant and practical learning experience.

From class three students spend time with their teachers and peers on camps, which from the very outset promote ideals of self reliance.

Through outdoor education, students grow into their own capabilities and gain a sense of themselves in relation to their community.  They see and experience their personal strengths.  Resilience is fostered.

Families often comment on the positive changes seen when students return from these expeditions.  The practical and physical skills acquired when camping in the bush or by the beach are invaluable.  Students experience self empowerment on many levels – intellectually, emotionally, physically, and even spiritually.

Camps grow progressively longer and more demanding, with different age appropriate responsibilities required over the years.  This might sound like hard work to some.  In fact, students are energized and inspired by these adventures.  Many complain that camps are way too short!

By year nine, outdoor education becomes a fully fledged subject for the year, with students spending over 36 days away from school.  This represents one fifth of the school year, and around 9 different destinations!  By this stage the ideals of self sufficiency and independence are established.  Students are required to live up to high ideals for both themselves and their community.

Time spent in the bush is an important complement to school based education. Living with peers in an unfamiliar context nurtures qualities such as independence, self sufficiency, understanding of personal differences and value in relationships.  Such qualities are often developed healthily and naturally in the bush. We provide, through a series of solo and small group experiences, an awareness of self in a variety of contexts.

We provide an experience of living as a community on a subsistence farm for 12 days.

Our Outdoor Education program seeks to develop conservation ideals and values associated with preservation of natural areas.  Through trips to a large variety of types of environments we seek to develop a range of skills necessary for safe, minimal impact travel in the bush and an appreciation of, and reverence for, natural beauty.

Class 7 –         Bike camp at Wilson’s Promontory

Class 8 –         Camp at Mutawingi, NSW

Class 9 –

  • Trip 1.  Bushwalk.  Cape Liptrap to Sandy Point.  3 days
  • Trip 2.  Bushwalk.  Cape Otway.  3 days.
  • Trip 3.  Subsistence farm in far East Gippsland.  12 days.
  • Trip 4.  Bushwalk.  Melville’s Caves Central Victoria.  3 days.
  • Trip 5.  Bushwalk/Base camp.  Raak Plain, Northwest Mallee.  4 days.
  • Trip 6.  Bushwalk.  Murray River.  4 days.
  • Trip 7.  Bushwalk.  Victorian Range.  Grampians.  5 days.
  • Trip 8.  Day at the Bay.  1 day.

Class 10 –       Canoeing on the Murray in handmade, timber canoes.  5 days.

Class 11 –       Rock climbing camp at Mt Arapiles in Western Victoria.  5 days.

End of year combined Classes 10 and 11 – Following end of year exams students choose from three options-

  • Skindiving at Bitangabee on the Southern NSW coast
  • Rafting on the Murray River
  • A combination Surf/Art experience at Waratah Bay in South Gippsland.