Inclusive Education
2025 has been a year of wonderful and expansive endeavours for Inclusive Education at Merici College. With our ever-growing team of professionals, The Hub, our central support location, has become a constant hive of activity for students across all year levels who need support. This space has hosted a variety of activities including cross-age tutoring sessions during lunch, craft club meetings, and targeted interventions for reading and Mathematics.
Welcome Our New Staff
In Semesters 1 and 2, we welcomed new Classroom Support Teachers (CSTs) to the team. In Semester 1, we welcomed Mrs. Emma Hillsdon, whose creative flair and passion for drama had been a wonderful addition to the team. In Semester 2, we welcomed Mrs. Louise Dwyer, who (with her expertise) works closely with the coordinator to further support teaching staff in planning programs for students with additional needs.
Our wonderful Classroom Support Teachers, including Mrs. Lisa Clarkson, continue to oversee the development and implementation of personalised plans and gather content-rich resources for use in classrooms.
Classroom Support Assistants
Our CSAs work tirelessly to support students and teachers in the classroom. We were excited to welcome Miss Parris Scheffler, Mr. Alex Heagney, Miss. Paige Musial, and Mr. Kynan Doney-Edwards to our ever-growing team.
This year, we also said goodbye to our longstanding CSA, Mrs. Karen Williams, who retired after more than 20 years of dedicated service at Merici. Mrs. Williams continues to work with us on a casual basis, and we are incredibly appreciative of the support and commitment she has shown to our students over the years. Her passion for supporting students with additional needs has left a lasting impact on our community.
In Semester 2, our CSAs (including Mrs. Maria Rodden, Miss Tara Blaker, Miss Charlotte Gallagher, Mr. Xavier Borgia, and Mrs. Lucia Keech) have not only been supporting students in classrooms but have also taken on roles delivering programs such as HUB support sessions and Corrective Reading sessions.
Craft Club
This year, the Craft Club, organised by students at Merici, has continued to grow in membership. Held during lunchtime in The Hub, the club offers students opportunities to meet peers from different year levels while engaging in creative activities such as crocheting, knitting, drawing, beading, and colouring. The Craft Club fosters an inclusive environment and welcomes all students into the space.
Corrective Mathematics
The Corrective Mathematics program is a targeted numeracy intervention designed to support students at risk in developing essential numeracy fluency skills. This year, Mrs. Renee Taylor and Miss. Emma Bishop (previous Numeracy Facilitator at the College) have led the program and seen great success with their students. In Semester 2, we welcomed Mrs. Milanda Roxas, who will lead the implementation of these sessions into 2026 in her new role as the College’s Numeracy Facilitator.
Overall
The Merici community continues to foster a love of learning and a shared commitment to inclusivity. Our team is dedicated to building meaningful collaboration between teachers and students, creating a culture where individuals feel a sense of belonging and acceptance. At the heart of all we do is a deep passion for empowering every student to thrive in an inclusive, supportive environment where diversity is celebrated and valued.
Miss. Emma Bishop,
Inclusive Education Coordinator
LITERACY AT MERICI
The literacy space has been very busy in 2025. Merici is a leading school in the Diocese with regards to our literacy initiatives, and we have students deeply engaging with literacy in both their classrooms and also in the various intervention programs we run.
Merici uses data purposefully so that we can consider exactly what students need support with and how we can close their gaps in learning so that they can improve. At the classroom level, teachers have been using data from PAT and NAPLAN to complete daily reviews of key spelling, punctuation and grammar skills, in addition to using programs such as Education Perfect.
For students who need more targeted assistance, we also implement several intervention programs at Merici that students attend three times a week in order to assist their growth. This year, we have 79 students from Years 7-12 involved in intervention programs. Below is an outline of the programs at Merici:
Spelling Mastery Program
Spelling Mastery was implemented in Term 1 with our Year 7 students who need extra support with their spelling. This year our Spelling Mastery class was facilitated by the wonderful Mrs. Jaime McDevitt. Spelling Mastery is an effective, research-proven spelling program that teaches students the strategies they need to become successful, life-long spellers. Merici has seen some excellent results in students spelling capabilities to date, a testament to the diligence and hard work of our Spelling Masters and Mrs. McDevitt.
Corrective Reading Program
Corrective Reading is another Direct Instruction program which encourages students to utilise reasoning, inference and grammar skills to engage with various activities of the program. These lessons were taught by some of our amazing teaching staff and Learning Support Assistants: Mrs. Evans, Ms. Pangallo, Ms. Quirk, Miss Blake, Mrs. Rodden, Miss Scheffler, Miss Gallagher, Mr. Borgia, Mr. Heagney, and Mrs. Williams. There continues to be excellent results from students using this program, who have improved their comprehension and vocabulary skills by 2-3 years according to the York Assessment for Reading and Comprehension.
MACQLIT Targeted Program
The MacqLit program aims to provide targeted reading intervention for students in Year 7 who need some development with their phonemic awareness and decoding skills. Throughout the year, based on early interventions evidentiary data and placement tests, Ms. Davis dedicated her time to working with a small group three times a week. We are particularly proud of the students increased oral reading fluency skills, who have improved an average of 35% with how many words they can read per minute.
Read Live Fluency Program
This year we introduced a new online program called ReadLive, which focuses on improving students’ fluency skills, whilst also exploring their comprehension and vocabulary skills. Facilitated by our experienced teacher, Rebekah Fuller, the program is completed online and is targeted at students specific reading level, allowing them to beat their previous reading scores and working their way through the levels.
Miss. Nicole Commins
Literacy Coordinator
