Berne Education Centre

The Berne Education Centre in Sydney is a special school for young people aged between 12-16, who have behavioural or emotional problems. The school was opened in 1998. Berne is a registered special school and founding member of the Association of Catholic Special School Services (ACSSS), it provides an education to those young people who are at risk of not completing their School Certificate (the basic level of qualification in New South Wales). Mainstream classes are unsuitable for most of the students because of behavioural, emotional, and familial reasons.

The Berne Education Centre is owned and operated by the Marist brothers, an order founded in France during the early 1800’s by St. Marcellin Champagnat. In 1820, Marcellin Champagnat adopted a young boy, aged only 9, named Jean Baptiste Berne. Marcellin brought him to live with his small yet growing congregation of Marist Brothers. The boy had known little love and no control in his short years. Jean-Baptiste resisted the efforts of the brothers to care for him, returning their love, food, clothing and education with insults and ingratitude. He could not settle into a normal routine and ran away several times, taking up life on the streets. Each time the brothers searched him out and brought him back home. Marcellin urged the brothers to be patient, to pray and to remember that he had nowhere else to go, other than to a life of crime, poverty and loneliness. Over time the efforts and perseverance of the brothers prevailed – Jean-Baptiste settled down, accepted the love and help he was offered, and, in 1825, eventually joined the brothers. Unfortunately he died at the age of 21, in the arms of Champagnat after thanking him for all he had done.

The echo of this Marist tradition resounds strongly in the practices and pedagogy of the teachers and staff, forming the corner stone on which the school is modelled. The school motto, Hope Always, is a keen reminder of this, and, that where there is life, there is hope.

A Brief History of Berne, its Culture and Climate

A small staff of 5 teachers and 2 support staff welcomed 28 new students on the 28th April, of 1998. It replaced the Benedict Community School, which, having a similar mission to Berne, had been in operation since 1976. Since 1998 the school and staff have been in a continual transition as it attempts to satisfy the growing and changing needs of young people at risk. At the present time, the founding principal, Br Michael Flanagan fms, and 2 of the original staff remain, accompanied by 13 teachers, 3 counsellors, and 5 support staff. The work of these individual members of staff is woven together to provide a holistic education, and special support structure for all students and their families.The school’s culture and climate has been designed to defuse a lot of the behavioural triggers the students were experiencing in mainstream schools (for example, there is no uniform and there is no set homework). The student-teacher relationship is unique, moulded in the Marist tradition – the teacher loves the student as if they were their own child. Students address staff by their first name, there is no “staff room” – students and staff eat lunch and recess meals together – and all staff are expected to get involved in all school activities, such as camps, excursions and personal development activities. This special involvement instantly creates a more open and considerate relationship between staff and students, but there is an expectation that students respect the positions that the adults are in and the responsibilities they have. There is also a strong focus on reducing the derailing effects of learning difficulties and disorders by having small class sizes (of about 5-6 students per class), and by streaming students based on ability. The lower ability classes are purposefully even smaller, usually having only 2-3 students per teacher.

Where is Berne?

Berne is located in Lewisham, an inner-western suburb of Sydney, Australia. Berne shares a large campus (formerly St Thomas Boys High School) with 2 other small schools, the Catholic Intensive English Centre and a small satellite school of Trinity Grammar (pre Kindergarten – year 2).

The Students

Berne is for students in years 7-10 from mainstream schools in the Sydney area. It specifically caters for students who may be experiencing problems due to physical, psychological, emotional and/or familial reasons. They may also have learning difficulties and/or disorders. Their placement at Berne could be short term, where the aim is to work on the student’s behavioural or emotional issues in order to reintegrate them back into their mainstream school, or long term, where the aim is to continue to educate them through to the School Certificate.One of the conditions of enrolment for all students is that they must want to come to Berne. As motivation is so important to the learning process, and due to the large numbers of enquiries and the relatively small number of vacancies (40 student places), the school can only accept young people who are willing to work to resolve their problems and who are committed to the processes of the school.

The Staff

As the school has evolved over the years, an appreciation of the need for a higher ratio of staff to students was recognised as one the keys to being able to supply a holistic “hands on” group of staff. There have been increases in the number of specialised staff working in areas such as counselling, youth work, school-work transition/careers, outdoor education, and personal development and health.The school is seen not only as a place of academic education and development, but as a place of emotional education, personal development, workplace education, moral and ethical development, a place to develop relationship skills, learn how to be friends, and to work together and to live as part of a community.

Behaviour Management at Berne

Expectations of appropriate behaviour are made clear from the time of enrolment at Berne. The school’s behaviour management system revolves around the ‘behaviour management card’, which the students carry with them all day. Each period the students are marked on three areas: their behaviour, their time spent on task, and their focus (which is individually assigned at the start of each week). They are marked either a 0 (unsatisfactory), a 1 (improvement needed), or a 2 (satisfactory). At the end of each week these marks are added together and plotted on a graph, so the students can visualise their behaviour as they progress through the term. Rewards are built into the management system – there are no limits to the amount of rewards a student can receive. Students can earn rewards by doing well in class, or by collecting ‘bonus points’ for using their initiative (for example, random acts of kindness), or by being noticed by a teacher for doing something for the community.

Connection through Innovation

Maintaining and building connectedness (a feeling of belonging, and of being important) is a major objective of the school’s approach to the student. Through many different innovative programs, Berne aims to keep all students connected – connected to themselves, to their families, to their community and to their future (career and/or education). These innovations are highlighted below:

Keeping the students connected to themselves: Counselling, Buddies and Friends, Outdoor education

Counselling

While the school is not seen as a therapeutic program, there is a strong emphasis on personal and behavioural change as a key to effective learning. Counselling is a strong part of the culture of the school, and whilst some students may be resistant to the process from time-to-time, it is extremely rare that a student will refuse counselling all together. The school has 3 fulltime school counsellors, whose practice revolves around a variety of different therapeutic approaches, namely Cognitive Behaviour Therapy, Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy, Reality Therapy, Motivational Interviewing and social skills based programs. All students at Berne have a counsellor whom they see once a week/fortnight. Through counselling, the students stay connected to themselves by helping to improve their self-awareness and resolving personal issues.

Buddies and Friends

Buddies and Friends is a mentoring program for the students of Berne which started in February, 2005. The program is all about forming friendships and having fun. It is a community based mentoring program which involves volunteers from the community, who participate in activities with the students outside of school hours, usually on the weekend. The mentors are all outstanding members of the community. They go through a rigorous selection process and training, and have constant support in their roles. At present Berne has six trained mentors, four of whom have been matched to students. In order to maximise success for the program, students are matched with mentors based on similarities in interests and goals – this will obviously be much more successful than a ‘blind match’ (i.e. matching two people at random). At the end of their time at Berne, the mentors and students are encouraged to continue with support from the school. It is a positive program for those students who may not have siblings, father or mother figures, or who may need or want a chance to go out and have fun on the weekends. There have been some difficulties with the program. Firstly, only a small percentage of the students express interest in the program. This coupled with the difficulty of finding appropriate mentors makes matching based on interests very difficult. Building up a pool of volunteers is one way the school is trying to get around this issue.

Outdoor Education

Outdoor education has always been an important part of the school program. All students go on one camp each school term. The aim of the camps is to stretch the students beyond their comfort zone, and place them in a totally different environment. They are encouraged to discover their personal limits, and to overcome their fears. Some of the camps the students are taken on include: white water rafting, a four day trek in the wilderness of the Blue Mountains, a winter ski camp to the Snowy Mountains and camps to farms and other places where students can discover things about themselves and the world.

Keeping the students connected to their families: Family counselling and support, Parenting Skills Program

Family counselling and support

All parents and families at the school can take advantage of the school’s family counselling service. This service may take the form of individual counselling with a parent, counselling with both parents, and/or counselling with the family. It complements work done on an individual level with the students, as issues/problems the student experiences at home can often be closely linked to issues/problems presenting at school.

Parenting Skills Program

Over the past 9 years the school has run a number of different parenting skills programs. The program addresses specific skills that may help in the day-to-day parenting of their teenagers. Parents get a chance to discover that they are not the only ones going through hard times with their teens. They also learn skills and practices from each other. This ‘cross-pollination’ is highly encouraged as part of the program.The parenting skills program runs one night a week for three weeks with a follow up session one month later. The school has recently written its own parenting skills program, which is designed specifically to target the issues and problems facing the parents of our students.

Parenting in Practice

On the 31st October, 2007 Berne launched its new resource Parenting in Practice – a small book for parents of school aged children. It was written for all parents, not just those struggling with difficult behaviours, and aims to build on the many inherent strengths in the reader. It also aims to help parents ‘objectify’ their parenting so that they can reflect on what is working and what is not. It also has a big focus on the benefits of a positive child-parent relationship and explores how parents can build on this relationship. It is for sale for $11 – order forms are downloadable from the school website (www.berneeducation.org).

Keeping the students connected to their community: Community activities

Community activities

One of the goals of The Berne Education Centre is to produce students who have a strong sense of local and global community. In order to achieve this goal, the school has an active community participation program. All students participate in one week of community work every year. This is similar to work experience, although it has to be done in a community organisation, such as a hospital, or nursing home. The students also participate in fund raising activities for different community groups, such as the Red Cross. The students are educated about these programs and are encouraged to develop a sense of empathy and understanding for people who are less fortunate than they are.

Keeping kids connected to their future: Work experience program, Changing Lanes

Work Experience Program

When the student sits the School Certificate exams at the end of the year, they are effectively at the end of their time at Berne. This final year is an important time to consider their thoughts for the future, and to organise a plan so as to prevent them from falling into doing nothing (from which they find it very difficult to get out!). Work experience is an important program which serves a number of functions for the students. Firstly, it gives them an idea of what it is like in the workforce. Secondly, it helps the students figure out what it is they are and are not interested in doing as a career. Thirdly, it helps some of them find employment – many of our students are offered apprenticeships and traineeships from their work experience placement. All students in Years Nine and Ten do one week of work experience every term. Work Experience is an excellent opportunity for the students to have a taste of different careers.There have been a number of changes to the way in which the work experience program operates. Initially, all the students would complete one day’s work experience every week. A number of problems arose with this system such as students being sick or not turning up and missing their work experience, absences due to camps, and/or absences due to family problems. To address these problems work experience was changed to a one week block every term. This has proved to be a lot more successful. Some students do additional work experience, of 1 day a week. This may act as a break for those students who may be experiencing difficulty staying in class, attending school, or for students who just want to work.

Changing Lanes

Added to the schools services in July 2004 was the changing lanes program. This is a program specifically designed to address the many needs of the ex-students of the school. In the years leading up to the introduction of the program, many ex-students had returned to Berne looking for support or assistance for a variety of different matters. Many of them were out of work, were suffering form depression, some were homeless – all of them were experiencing problems in some part of their lives. Changing Lanes addresses these needs. It also acts to try to prevent some of these things from happening by following the students in year 10 closely – encouraging them to go into something productive when they leave school. There is also follow-up done in the following year, and any who are out of work, and/or education are invited back to the school to seek help in creating resumes, writing job applications, finding housing, or finding a course that may be open to them. Changing Lanes is open to all ex-students who want to get back onto the right track.

The Learning Advancement Centre (LAC)

The LAC is a relatively new program for students at Berne. It is an intensive and individualised education program and is seen by many of the staff as the culmination of the past 10 years experience of working with young people at risk. The LAC is a separate classroom where staff work one-on-one with students, focusing first of all on building a good working relationship while conducting an intense assessment of the students learning style. The students’ educational strengths are then used as the medium through which the curriculum is made available to them. It is a quiet, independent and challenging learning environment providing plenty of educational support, while also deconstructing the negative stereotypes and cognitions the student has to learning and teachers. It is a voluntary unit and is not a place where students are sent to for punishment. The LAC has also been used as an entry class for new students – this has a number of advantages: the teachers have a fantastic opportunity to develop positive relationships with the students, the staff are able to assess the students learning and social processes closely, the students experience some early success in learning which builds their confidence and self esteem, and finally, the student has a chance to catch up on work that has been missed out on.

SWAP – Suspension, Withdrawal, and Assistance Program

An important innovation currently operating in the school is the Suspension, Withdrawal and Assistance Program, or SWAP. This is an outreach program designed to provide 3 different types of assistance to mainstream schools who have students needing extra support. It operates on the same campus as Berne but away form the main program. Firstly, Berne offers a place of learning and reflection to mainstream students who are away from their school on suspension. These students travel to Berne every day whilst on suspension to complete work that is set and marked by the mainstream school. The same expectations exist at Berne as in their home school (i.e. rules about uniform, attendance, punctuality still stand). The students also have the opportunity to resolve some of the issues or behaviours that resulted in their suspension. Secondly, A withdrawal aspect operates which serves the needs of students who may benefit from a short time away from their mainstream school for a variety of reasons (for example bullying, emotional, familial or social concerns). The aim is to give them and/or their schools a break, whilst working on their behavioural/emotional/psychological issues so that reintegration back into their mainstream classes can occur. They complete work set by their mainstream teachers, and may also take advantage of Berne’s counselling services. Thirdly, through the SWAP program, Berne also provides an assistance component within mainstream schools. Upon invitation, staff from Berne travel into schools to both observe and provide some management ideas for particular students, or provide in-services to the whole or particular staff groups.

Through these innovations, Berne attempts to make a difference in the lives of young people who are at risk of not completing an education. While the school has had successes with many of its students, the program has not suited all young people. Variety in educative experience is ultimately important for this reason. No single package will ever work for all children and adolescents. The student is an individual, struggling to find themselves in the world. And while most young people can fit into mainstream education, there will always be those who cannot. This forms the mission of Berne: to provide to these young people, through innovative programs, a chance; to provide them with an appropriate and valid experience of education, but above all to teach them that there is Hope Always.

(In 2006 The Berne Education Centre received a “Highly Commended National Achievement in School Improvement” award from the Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership (Teaching Australia)– an initiative of the Australian Government.)

References for further articles about Berne:

[http://www.berneeducation.org] Berne Website

[http://nla.gov.au/anbd.bib-an4183941] National Library of Australia

[http://www.mytalk.com.au/aspx/pages/mediaplayer.aspx?t=audio&w=4219] Radio Interview with Principal

[http://www.adf.org.au/store/article.asp?ContentID=Parentingpract747] Australian Drug Foundation - Parenting in Practice

[http://www.donations.com.au/lcharity.asp?chID=4655] Make a donation to Berne

[http://www.nlnw.nsw.edu.au/schools07/schawd07.htm#berne] Further information on Berne

[http://www.mytalk.com.au/aspx/pages/mediaplayer.aspx?t=audio&w=4218] Radio interview with former student

[http://www.maristoz.edu.au/main.php?name=%22berne%22] INformation on MaristOz website

[http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/06/12/1023864298618.html] Further article about Berne

[http://www.dest.gov.au/Ministers/Media/Farmer/2007/03/f001120307.asp] Further Article about Berne

[http://www.catholicweekly.com.au/02/dec/8/18.html] Further Article about Berne

[http://nla.gov.au/anbd.bib-an41839411] National Library of Australia listing

[http://librariesaustralia.nla.gov.au/apps/kss?action=Display&mode=fulldisplay&target=freenbd&queryid=12&startPos=1]