Broadford Secondary College’s 2024 captaincy team officially started this term, with the six captains ready to take on their roles and support the school.
The six captains represent the school’s senior and junior levels, with Matthew Whitfield and Cassie Zolnierczyk as the school captains, while Dominik McKinlay and Eliza Dawson were voted as vice captains.
Supporting the seniors, Evie Birks and Jordan Russell are the junior captains.
Matthew said he went for the role as he ‘always loved school’, naturally wanting to lead from the front and make an impact on his school community.
“I always wanted everyone to have a positive time at school because I always did and I knew other people always didn’t necessarily, so I felt like if I had the role of school captain that I could have enough to really make a change,” he said.
One idea that is in the works at the school from the captains is the brain break program, where some of the vulnerable students will have the opportunity to step out of the classroom for 10-15 minutes with their assigned cards.
Cassie said she also had a positive schooling experience, with her initiative to bring more awareness to mental health struggles within the school.
“My kind of thoughts were just highlighting and bringing more awareness to mental health struggles within the school .. I really wanted to just let other students know that we’re struggling with that, that we’re here to support them.”
Dominik said he would use his vice captaincy role to create a space where everyone felt safe.
“I know a lot of students at the school find it hard to come to school, and I want to encourage them to be able to come to school every day,” he said.
Similar to her school captain peers, Eliza is on board to make people feel confident, and is in support of the brain break program.
“I want them to feel confidence within the school community,” she said.
“I’m sort of helping our school captains and supporting their ideas and helping them to achieve it.”
Junior captain Jordan said she would utilise her role to help the junior levels, supporting year seven transitioning from primary school to high school.
“It’s a big jump for them coming from primary school to high school, I want to be able to help them in the environment,” she said.
“So they’re not worried about coming to school or scared because they’ve gone from the biggest people in the school to the smallest.”
Following on from the senior captains and her junior colleague, Evie said she wanted to help as much to make the school environment a positive one.
“It’s more my job to work and help connect more with the junior year levels and the year 12 [captains]… helping what they want, their plans,” she said.
Principal Tania Pearson, who is excited to watch the captains flourish in their roles, said they showed great leadership skills with their ideas.
“They have really stepped up in a very short period of time already,” she said.
“Within reason of course, within budget constraints, we will help them support their goals as much as we can.”
