The House System at St Pius X is fundamental to the provision of pastoral care to students. The smooth running of the House System is overseen by the Assistant Principal - Wellbeing.
There are six Houses in the school. Each House contains eight Care Groups, two from each Year. Each House has a House Coordinator who has overall responsibility for the pastoral care of the students in that House. The House Coordinator is assisted in this essential responsibility by the Care Group Teachers in that House. Each Care Group contains approximately 22 students. The Houses and Care Groups (CG’s) are designated as follows:
Students are allocated to Houses and Care Groups on enrolment. All students belonging to the one family are placed in the same House. This enables the one House Coordinator to develop a good relationship with the family and to know the particular circumstances of each family in the House. This also facilitates contact with the school by parents, who only have to contact the one House Coordinator, rather than a different House Coordinator for each child.
Once allocated to a Care Group within a House, students will normally remain in that Care Group for their whole time at St Pius X. Teachers will be allocated to Care Groups and Houses by the School Executive. We will attempt to have a gender balance of teachers in each House. The policy is that teachers will remain with their Care Group for two years. So, for example, a teacher may be allocated Care Group 7.1 in 2021. That teacher will have the same group, 8.1, in 2022. Then that teacher will swap to 9.2 in 2023 and 10.2 in 2024. Likewise, another teacher would have 7.2 in 2021 and 8.2 in 2022 and then change groups to 9.1 in 2023 and 10.1 in 2024. Note, however, that in recent years most, if not all, teachers have requested to retain the Care Group with which they started in Year 7. Those teachers then stay with their group all the way through the school. This is now very much the norm.
Daily Care Group time is 8.48 - 8.58 am. There is an extended Care Group/Stage Assembly 8.48 - 9.28 am every Wednesday to enable us to run our Wellbeing Program for students.
