From the Head of Junior School

Thank you to all the mothers, grandmothers, and special friends who were able to join us for this Monday’s liturgy celebrating Mother’s Day. A mother’s love is foundational to our sense of becoming. They see and call for the best in each one of us. Theirs is their gift of unconditional love. With coffee carts, homemade biscuits, and mother‒child ‘photo snaps’, it was wonderful to just sit and share the morning in good company with the mothers of our community. As one mother shared, “It was the best possible start to the week!”

This week the Year 5 classes all enjoyed a special visit by Georgia, from Fleet Space Technologies, the global leader in nanosatellite digital technology, right here in Adelaide. Fleet launched Australia’s first commercial satellite in 2018 but are now establishing the first hyper-factory to mass-produce small satellites that have the capacity to deliver solutions all over the world. Their work includes providing answers to the world energy crises and the need to increase critical mineral production, not just on Earth but in our solar system. With increased global communications demands, they have produced the world’s first 3-D printed metal antenna, increasing the throughput of each satellite tenfold. These satellites have huge remote Australian and global communication applications.

Georgia explained that these possibilities, once the sole domain of government-funded projects, have only come about in the past five to ten years due to increased funding and privatisation of space exploration. Their nanosatellites, which are created in Adelaide, are sent like ‘Uber’ up into space, using Space X rockets in America. This may soon change as Australia is now investing in two launch sites, one in South Australia and the other in Queensland.

The presentation was absolutely fascinating in how fast things are progressing in this line of work. Georgia spoke at length of the same design engineering process we utilise in science lessons at school as a means of rigorously testing each prototype and model. As a young female, Georgia was a great role model who spoke of her passions in Lego, maths, and science growing up, and encouraged the children in their own learning journey, as they too could work as an explorer of space. At the end of the presentation, there was a beautiful moment in which Georgia was mobbed like a rock star. All the children were getting their hands on any paper they could to collect her autograph! It was clear Georgia had inspired their thinking. It makes me wonder how many of these students will embrace new frontiers of scientific applications that are not yet created, just as she is doing now. It reminds us that teaching is essentially a human endeavour and must always aim to inspire and encourage children to reach for the stars.

A special thankyou goes to our Digital and Design teacher, Mrs Lee McNamara, for arranging this extraordinary opportunity to challenge and inspire the children in the possibility of space, which now lies right at our very own door.

Nic Boys
Head of Junior School