Promotion from grade 2 to 3 at Arnold Street not only constituted educational progression but also a change of status: from ‘little school’ to ‘big school’ and a shift upstairs to the big grades. After the building of Pigdon Street in 1924, promotion involved the physical move from the ‘pleasant, new-brick-and-stucco Infants school’ to the ‘forbidding dark grey stone castle’ at Arnold Street.1 Graduation to Central School also brought new status; again students shifted upstairs where separate senior, subject teachers reigned.
Princes Hill’s elevation to Central School status was an odd side-effect of the Second World War. The military activities of the Allied Forces against the Japanese in the Pacific Ocean brought more than 119,000 American service personnel to Australia.2 In Melbourne, all available space was commandeered by American administrative, domestic and medical services to cater for some 30,000 personnel. Melbourne Hospital became the United States base hospital, and the playing fields adjoining University High School became the camp for medical orderlies. In 1942, University High’s form 1 and 2 students were sent to Princes Hill all 240 of them. When the war ended, they stayed; by this time, increased enrolments in the senior classes had filled University High to capacity.3
Wider factors, namely social and educational needs in the community and physical difficulties in the school, contributed to Princes Hill becoming a Central School. Demand for secondary education was growing rapidly. Approximately 95 per cent of the grade 6 students in 1942 continued into the secondary school class. Excluding the 240 students from Parkville, Princes Hill numbered some 510 pupils. The supplementary grades at the neighbouring schools Lee Street, Rathdowne Street, Faraday Street, College Rural and South Brunswick totalled 300. Forms 3 to 6 at University High School numbered more than 800.4 At the same time, the existing facilities were becoming overstrained, with the health centre, kindergarten, primary school, partially-sighted class, the rural school, University High School forms and the sewing, cookery and sloyd classes at three different locations Arnold Street, Pigdon Street and the Sloyd Centre. The administrative difficulties were so severe that even the school inspectors recommended that a high school be established. Instead, Princes Hill was made a Central School in 1944. The intention was that the new Central School would feed University High School. Princes Hill itself was fed by the local schools with small supplementary grades. University High School stopped accepting form 1 students in 1944.5
The promotion of Princes Hill did not bring the building improvements that had been recommended by Education Department personnel. The primary sector was not shifted to Pigdon Street; nor was a new building erected; nor were facilities consolidated in one place. There was some cursory remodelling of specialist classrooms for art, science, needlework, a projector room. But they were hardly adequate. The specialist equipment in the science rooms, for example, consisted of a single laboratory bench at the front of the room.6
Nevertheless, the parents and students of the district quickly took advantage of the newly established Central School. Suddenly, new ‘big’ faces swarmed the schoolyard. In the first year, 257 students enrolled; by 1958, the number had increased to 400. Faraday Street, Rathdowne Street, Lee Street, Errol Street, and College Rural, were the main contributors.7
Not all, however, were happy. There were irate parents who regarded the shift of their forms 1 and 2 children from University High School to Princes Hill as a demotion. Keen to soothe parental concerns, the Department assured one of the complainants, Mr Patrick, that the change was only administrative. To all outward purposes, he was informed, his child was still a student of University High School, and indeed could continue to wear that school’s uniform.8
The appearance of University High School students wearing their own school uniform must have created an uncomfortable sense of a ‘school within a school’ at Princes Hill. Despite Princes Hill School’s own rich history, University High’s established traditions of scholarship and elitism must have jarred with the newly instituted Central School, which did not yet have an identity, a school uniform or school rituals. Princes Hill students nicknamed the University High students ‘United Horse Stables’.9
This is only one example of the difficulties confronting this school that had been newly cobbled together. Another problem for students who knew no other school was the sense of transience created by the many new faces briefly passing through the Central School, which for them was a stepping stone, with a finite end.10
Form 2C at Princes Hill Central School, 1945. Some of the girls are wearing the newly introduced tunic uniform.
Princes Hill Central School was established as the principal feeder school to University High School, and this now dominated its ‘academic’ life. The students who entered form 1 came with the intention of attaining adequate marks to gain one of the limited places at University High. In 1946, eighty-eight of the 131 students who left Princes Hill entered University High School. Another 23 entered other secondary schools.11
The Central School curriculum conformed with that taught at secondary schools. By 1953, when form 3 was introduced at Princes Hill, English, science, arithmetic, art, music, physical education, needlework, cookery, woodwork and sport were compulsory for each level. French, Latin, history, geography, algebra, geometry, social studies, craft and clubs were electives. Form 3, which in its first year numbered 33 pupils, was approved by the Department as a ‘Proficiency Certificate Course’, to cater for some 30 per cent of the students who had not qualified for University High School and would not continue with secondary education.12
Despite initial disciplinary and teaching difficulties caused by inexperienced teachers and numerous staff changes, the tone, discipline and atmosphere in the school, the students’ attitudes to work, the school’s spirit, the school’s community involvement, the curricula, the skill of the majority of teachers, and the efforts of the head teachers, soon attracted praise from District Inspectors. The English Department was particularly commended for its innovative teaching methods, thorough programme and energetic staff.13
Success was not achieved easily. According to Judy, who came to Princes Hill Central from Melbourne Teachers College Practising Rural School, discipline was ‘heavy-handed’. The Latin teacher carried a strap in his dust-coat pocket and used it regularly to retain attention. Offenders were dealt with in the corridor, out of sight but within hearing distance, to influence the remainder of the class. One science teacher employed more invidious methods: besides threatening mischief-makers with ‘the treatment’ (the strap), he compelled students to serve as watchdogs over the class.
Very quickly, Princes Hill Central School adopted recognised high school features, and rituals too. These were continued and strengthened when the school was promoted to high school. A school uniform and badge were introduced in 1946 as insignia of belonging, identification and pride in the school. The girls wore blue and white gingham dresses in summer, and navy-blue box-pleated tunics, white blouses and navy-blue blazers in winter.14
Princes Hill School’s annual certificate, introduced in the 1920s by Ernest Mylrea.
The boys got the regulation grey flannels, white shirts and navy blue blazers. The school emblem, first introduced as a badge in the 1920s by Mylrea, was embroidered on the blazer pocket and cast as a badge.15 It depicted a lit torch dividing the open pages of a book, across which was the motto, Labore et Fide. The school colours of green, gold, navy blue and white had also been introduced by Mylrea in the 1920s on the Princes Hill ‘Merit Certificate’. When the high school was constituted, grey replaced the females’ royal blue tunic and the green on the badge. The emblem and motto of the Central School were retained. Hat and tie-pin badges were added to the boys’ assemblage. While Princes Hill students in 1989, accustomed to wearing street clothes to school, show little concern with the issue of compulsory uniform, past students who endured the tyranny of blue, gold and grey, recall their dislike of uniforms. As new celluloid and music heroes and new dress styles emerged in the 1950s and 1960s, rebellious youth, accommodating the dictates of fashion and individuality, challenged the school’s dress regulations with thin ties and tight, pegged trousers, winkle-picker shoes, stiletto heels, the touch of make-up and jewellery, mini-skirts, and outlandish pompadour hairstyles. Despite protestations, warnings and punishments, and financial help for those who could not afford uniforms, students still broke the rules. At one Monday morning assembly, Headmaster Gibson sent all students not in full and correct uniform home with instructions not to return until properly attired. The Truth got wind of the story, dubbing Princes Hill the ‘go home school’.16
The fire and the constant battle to police correct attire was the catalyst for the first break from uniforms. In 1971, form 6 students were permitted to attend school out of uniform. Initially, some students exhausted their wardrobe, changing outfits daily. Very quickly, a regulation uniform was readopted: jeans, sneakers and a pullover. With time, the remainder of the school was also absolved.17
The positions of male and female house captains, form captains and prefects were also instituted. The house and form captains were elected by their peers. They represented their form or house at assembly and school functions, helped teachers maintain order, and helped organise sport.
Princes Hill High School Prefects, 1959.
More solemnity and occasion surrounded the office of prefect. The first prefects were invested amidst pomp and ceremony on 19 March 1959 at Wilson Hall, University of Melbourne, by the Town Clerk of Melbourne, F. Rogan. Head Prefects that year were Marion Inglis and Chester Polglaze.18 Each prefect was selected by teachers on grounds of popularity, behaviour and scholastic attitude. Ideally, prefects were to bridge the gap between students and teachers, but more and more, they were allotted ‘policeman’ duties to help run the school and maintain discipline. Their broad authority, however, caused some conflict in the late 1960s. Prefects were accused of irresponsibility, abuse of authority, harshness, laziness and immaturity; they countered with protestations of goodwill and eagerness to help and suggested that those unwilling to accept prefects would be put into place within the school or outside it.19 In 1970, the prefect system was abolished and replaced by the Students’ Representative Council.
To all intents and purposes, the establishment of Princes. Hill High School in 1959 was an extension of the Central School. The curriculum and internal organisation were de 154 rived from standard procedures used in Victorian high schools. Without the buffer of Central School, however, high school was a difficult experience for many new form 1 students. While the Central School had allowed young scholars to become accustomed to the ‘big’ kids in uniform, the high school was a new place with new faces, young and old. Again promotion was formalised by a physical shift from primary school to high school, from little to big school. Unlike those who went from Pigdon Street to Arnold Street, not all primary school friends necessarily shifted to the same secondary school. While Central School students were marginally older and bigger, almost everyone at the high school seemed huge, mature and confident: some boys shaved; girls toyed with make-up and speculated about each other’s bra sizes; some students even drove cars. Muscular bodies filled uniforms properly. The dishevelled shirt, the partly undone tie, the carelessly draped blazer, did not seem to matter. In contrast, uniforms on juniors seemed like sacks on tiny bodies.
Suddenly, young people had become enmeshed in the business of being young ‘adults’. An unfamiliar formality and organisation engulfed them: senior masters, subject teachers, form teachers, house teachers; sports teachers; : prefects, form captains, house captains; someone for this, someone for that; timetables; periods; subject note folders; homework; organisation; regimentation; responsibility for correct uniform; responsibility for punctuality not only morning assembly but getting to every subject room on time. So much to digest and remember. And, as the new ones hurried along the cavernous, bustling corridors, the threat of a pouncing prefect loomed in the back of their minds. Equally terrifying for young boys was the rumoured ‘initiation’ ceremony of running the gauntlet.20
It was not until the late 1960s that positive efforts were made to ease the traumatic shift from primary to high school. The form 1 open classroom of the General Studies programme, introduced in 1968, served as a transition year from primary school. Specialist teaching was minimised to create a stable social situation and study was supervised by form teachers in home rooms.21 Cross-over tutoring, whereby high-school students regularly visited and helped primary-school children study, was introduced in 1979.22
Currently, a number of measures are used to alleviate some of the primary students’ inherent trepidations. They are familiarised with timetables, they visit the high school and talk with year 7 students, and their parents meet with high school teachers.23
The introduction of the General Studies curriculum epitomised the changing face of education in the late 1960s. In primary schools, emphasis on activity and spontaneous expression replaced that on the 3 Rs. ‘New English’, ‘new mathematics’, ‘new science’ and open-space areas became the norm.24 Classrooms changed appearance as tables in the round replaced the rows of desks. Instead of being glued to seats, children move about the room and the school to use the library and computers in the corridors. Parents come into the classroom to assist with teaching. In 1979, ‘Mr Jones’ and ‘Miss Smith’ became ‘Mr Bill’ and ‘Miss Mary’. Today, students refer to teachers by their given names, Sue, Bob and Anne. The imminent anarchy feared by traditionalists has not eventuated.25 Decentralisation by the Education Department and participation of School Councils in the formation of primary school curricula ensures continuing change. Decisions concerning the syllabus are school—based and are determined by local needs.26 Working within guidelines set by the Ministry of Education, each school in the state education system is required to issue a school policy, enunciating its goals, philosophy and curriculum policy. At Princes Hill Primary School, the first policy statement was issued in 1982. Because the abolition of the District Inspectorate in the early 1970s left accountability in the hands of schools, an internal review of policy was mandatory. At Princes Hill this included contributions from parents and teachers. The resulting policy statement, issued in 1988, set out the school’s goals for the coming five years.
According to the policy document, Princes Hill Primary School aimed to be a democratic school in which students, teachers and parents participate in the decision—making of the school. It aimed to develop an atmosphere of cooperative learning in which children could achieve their best. It stated that learning how to learn is central to education, and that children would be encouraged to regard questioning and negotiation as the norm. The appreciation of different languages and cultural traditions, including the culture of Aboriginal Australians, would be fostered, and gender stereotyping discouraged. The school’s five goals stressed the enriching of learning, the development of individual talents and abilities, the physical development, the individual identity, and the belief in each child that he or she can shape society. The school curriculum programmes, guided by mandatory Ministry of Education ‘Frameworks’, cover arts, language, mathematics, personal development, science and social education.
The ‘Code of Behaviour’ is an integral component of the school’s philosophy and curriculum. It evolved from a Ministry directive in 1983 that corporal punishment be abolished and that schools develop individual discipline policy. Dr Tony Knight has been helping Princes Hill develop its policy since 1984. The Code covers the rights of each individual in the school, the rules of behaviour in the classroom and safety rules in the playground. Emphasis rests on integration, rather than corporal punishment, humiliation, or sarcasm. Classroom democracy is practised and children are encouraged to ensure equal rights of expression, protection of property, participation in decision making, freedom from subservient or cruel punishment and equal encouragement to succeed.27
Changes introduced at Princes Hill over the past two decades have earned the school a reputation for progressiveness.28 The main features of its success have been the school’s willingness to experiment with educational innovations, and committed parental participation in the school’s activities, whether it be classroom assistance, curriculum development, fundraising, or working bees in the school grounds. Migrant English classes, a new reading programme, Social Studies, the controversial ‘Man: A Course of Study’ programme, preparatory English, the integration of students with impairments and disabilities in regular educational and social activities, multi-age groups and cross-age tutoring, and the trend—setting after—school programme are some of the innovations introduced in the 1970s. In the 1980s, the Italian language class, the school’s health policy, which has become a model for many other schools,29 the ‘buddy system’, the continuation of cross-age tutoring and multi-groups, Junior School Council and equal opportunity programmes continue the trend.
Ironically, Ron Reed (Director of Secondary Education, 1968) neither intended nor approved of the General Studies course that had emanated from his curriculum initiatives in the late 1960s. He wanted schools to question the purpose of secondary education and revise the curricula of forms 1 to 4 after the abolition of the Intermediate Certificate in 1966, but he believed that the General Studies course was ‘reducing knowledge to the level of triviality’.30 At Princes Hill High School, the General Studies Program was organised by Ken Fraser, who was also the Chairperson of the Schools’ Curriculum Review Committee directing the project. The programme combined 200 students of the three junior forms into a common course concentrating on visual perception, private research and extensive reading. It aimed to develop initiative and creativity and place greater emphasis on the cultural aspects of education.31
At the same time, federal and state government’s policies for higher retention rates at secondary levels were taking effect. Not all students, however, could capably handle the work,32 and education shifted emphasis away from ‘passing examinations’.33 At Princes Hill High School, a curriculum of ‘electives’, built around a core curriculum of general studies, English, history, geography, science and language, was developed to provide students with a wide variety of options. Meanwhile, year 12 external examination subjects have expanded to fifty-five subjects in 1989.
Since Reed’s initiatives and the devolution of the Education Department, Princes Hill High School has experienced change, innovation and experimentation. There have been mathematics workshops, remedial courses in English and Mathematics, computer studies and integration schemes for disabled students. Funding from the Schools’ Commission provided the school with money to purchase audio-visual, music and photographic equipment; it also funded remedial English, mathematics, drama and Mirimbah.34 The successful alternative Schools Tertiary Course for year 12 was another innovation adopted in 1985, when it was still quite rare among secondary schools. The course, negotiated within the class, between students and teacher, is centred around study areas: English, Commerce, Humanities, Mathematics, Applied Art and Human Development. Freed from external examination, assessment includes group, individual and teacher assessment. At Princes Hill, the course boasts a retention rate of between 80 and 90 per cent. In 1988, a Health and Human Relations Course was introduced to provide senior students with an understanding of better living and human relations skills.35 Princes Hill’s reputation for innovation and experimentation was rewarded in 1988 when the school was invited to participate in the ‘Sunrise’ or the ‘School of the Future’ project established by the Council of Educational Research within the Museum of Victoria.36 In 1989, Princes Hill Secondary College participated in the Victorian Certificate of Education pilot programme in anticipation of the state-wide introduction of internal year 12 assessment in 1991.