Gosford High School

Gosford High School (abbreviated as GHS) is a government-funded co-educational academically selective secondary day school, located in Gosford, in the Central Coast region of New South Wales, Australia.

Gosford High School
Location
Gosford, Central Coast, New South Wales

Australia
Coordinates33°25′6″S 151°20′29″E
Information
TypeGovernment-funded co-educational academically selective secondary day school
MottoLatin: Spectemur agendo
(Judge me by what I do)
Established1928 (1928)
Educational authorityNew South Wales Department of Education
PrincipalMichael Smith[1]
Teaching staff71.7 FTE (2018)[2]
Years7–12
Enrolment1,068[2] (2018)
Campus typeOuter suburban
Colour(s)
  • Blue   (Juniors, Yrs 7–10)
  • White   (Seniors, Yrs 11–12)
Websitegosford-h.schools.nsw.gov.au

Established in 1928, the school enrolled approximately 1,070 students in 2018, from Year 7 to Year 12, of whom two percent identified as Indigenous Australians and forty percent were from a language background other than English.[2] The school is operated by the NSW Department of Education; the principal is Michael Smith.

History

Gosford High School, operated by the New South Wales Department of Education, was established in 1928,[3] the first secondary school in the Central Coast region, and became a selective high school in 1989. The original building was completed in 1929, and consisted of seven classrooms, one science laboratory and an assembly room. Students at the school primarily come from the Central Coast region, though students from the Sydney and Lake Macquarie regions comprise a significant portion of the population. As of 2014, Gosford High was the only fully selective school on the Central Coast, making admission very competitive.[4]

Motto

The school's Latin motto is spectemur agendo, which is conventionally translated into English as "Judge me by what I do." Other translations include Let us be judged by our acts and By our deeds may we be known (this translation is preferred by Camberwell Grammar School in Melbourne, which shares the same motto).

Staff

The principal of Gosford High School from 2006 to 2016 was Lynne Searle.[3] She was replaced in 2017 by Tony Rudd, the former principal of Manly Selective Campus.[5] Tony Rudd retired at the beginning of the 2019 academic year with previous deputy Adrienne Scalese taking over the position temporarily. The position of principal is taken by former principal of Narara Valley High School Michael Smith as of the start of term 2 of the 2019 academic year.[1]

Notable among the former staff are Dr Mark Butler (now retired), recipient of the Prime Minister's Prize for Excellence in Science Teaching in Secondary Schools in 2004, who has been elected to the National Curriculum Board,[6] and Rebecca Donoghue, Head of Visual Arts, who received the Minister's Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2013 (now retired, replaced by Wendy Mortimer)[7] and Michael Chamberlain, who was falsely convicted with wife Lindy in the death of their daughter Azaria, later exonerated.

Current staff include Brian Jackson, a former rugby league football player.

Extracurricular and co-curricular

Music

Apart from the mandatory Music course in Year 8, the school has several music groups and programmes, including a Concert Band that has toured overseas in Hong Kong, New Zealand and Singapore. A school musical is held every two years. The school also hosts an annual Kerle Comp, in which students form bands to perform the music of Bobby King.[3]

Sport

The school holds annual swimming, athletics and cross country carnivals, with achieving students competing in higher level competitions. Within the school there are four sporting houses: Kingsbury (red and white), Rowe (black and white), Wheeler (green and yellow) and OSU (brown and yellow), named after prominent members of the local community and the Old Students Union.[8]

Gosford and Orange High School have an annual school exchange program which has taken place since 1968.[3] Each year sporting teams are selected from both Orange and Gosford High Schools to compete against each other for the Malynley Shield, the name Malynley being an acronym of Dews' family members who donated the shield.[9]

Agriculture

Gosford High School shares a three-hectare agricultural farm with neighbouring Henry Kendall High School.[10]

Notable alumni

See also

References
  1. "Narara Valley High School". www.facebook.com. Retrieved 26 April 2019.
  2. "Gosford High School, Gosford, NSW: School profile". My School. Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority. 2019. Retrieved 29 July 2019.
  3. "Our school". Gosford High School.
  4. "List of selective and agricultural high schools". NSW Public Schools. Archived from the original on 13 June 2014. Retrieved 10 January 2014.
  5. "Tony Rudd (@rudd58) | Twitter". twitter.com. Retrieved 22 December 2016.
  6. "Dr Mark Butler". Archived from the original on 29 September 2007. Retrieved 14 May 2008.
  7. Priest, Pauline (13 September 2013). "Excellent Teachers Awarded". Retrieved 10 January 2014.
  8. Bennett, Phyl. "Looking Back 1929 to 1979". Archived from the original on 22 February 2014. Retrieved 18 February 2014.
  9. Bartlett, Sam (30 May 2001). "Breaking Gosford's hold Orange High's goal". Central Western Daily. Retrieved 29 September 2008.
  10. "Gosford Public School relocation". Full Day Hansard transcript, Parliament of NSW. 29 March 2012. Archived from the original on 10 January 2014. Retrieved 10 January 2014.
  11. "SportingPulse Homepage for Australian Secondary Schools Rugby League". SportingPulse. Retrieved 10 October 2008.
  12. Lax, Mark (1996). "Goldsmith, Adrian Philip (Tim) (1921–1961)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. ISSN 1833-7538. Retrieved 11 January 2009.
  13. Grahame, Emma (10 March 2014). "Jack Grahame: Law man fought for prison reform, civil liberties". The Sydney Morning Herald.
  14. "Chris Holstein". NSW Candidates 2011. Liberal Party. Archived from the original on 17 March 2011. Retrieved 3 April 2011.
  15. "Vale Donald John (Don) McGillivray" (PDF). Australian Systematic Botany Society Newsletter (154): 16–20. March 2013. Retrieved 3 February 2014.
  16. Clare Graham (17 April 2009). "Show based on local childhood". Peninsula News. Retrieved 4 February 2010.
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