School Context
Kent Park Primary School is located in the outer-eastern Melbourne suburb of Ferntree Gully.
Facilities include a flexible, modern, 10 classroom main building with art room, music room, library and additional learning spaces.
A large assembly hall, full-sized BER gymnasium, STEAM and robotics room, Environment and Sustainability room, OSHC room, 3 mod-5 portables and main administration building complete the buildings.
The grounds include a separate Prep playground area, 2 sandpits, 3 basketball courts, 3 playgrounds, oval, 2 vegetable gardens, fruit trees and chicken coop in a mature native garden setting. West Gully Kinder, run by the Knox City Council, is located directly next to the school on Dobson St.
Staffing consists of a Principal, 9 classroom teachers, 2 specialist teachers, 6 integration aides, business manager, part-time office manager, social worker and trainee school therapy dog. The Leadership Structure introduced in 2018 consists of 3 School Improvement Team Leaders for Literacy, Numeracy and SWPB and 3 Year Level/PLC Leaders.
Specialist subjects include Physical Education and Auslan with semester rotations for STEAM (Science, Technology, Environment, Art, Engineering), Environment and Sustainability, Visual Art and Performing Arts. Other programs offered include swimming, grade 3-6 camps, Bike Education and school production. Technology was upgraded in 2019 with 36 iPads, 30 laptops, WebEx board added to smart TV’s in every classroom and several desktop computers.
Enrolments have stabilized recently between 210-220 students. Prior to this, enrolments had dropped significantly from 432 in 2016 and 289 in 2018. Prep enrolments for 2021 have doubled since 2020 with many being new families to the school. There has also been an increase in the number of new families moving into the area and enrolling students in upper grades as the long-established families begin selling and new families are moving in.
Prep enrolments are coming from an increasingly wide variety of locations and settings including council run and private kindergartens, early learning and child-minding facilities.
The school community demographics are mid-socio economic, predominantly Australian born, 3 students come from a non-English speaking background, 7 students are funded under the Program for students with a disability, with 3 international students and 1 refugee student enrolled in 2021.