Our school empowers students to organise themselves for daily school life by giving them the tools they need to succeed. Students are able to become independent, confident learners, which sets them up to navigate the complexity and challenges of the modern world.
This page is specifically for students currently enrolled at St John Bosco Catholic College Engadine and contains material thought useful by our student leaders and the student body, as determined via student voice initiatives. Be sure to check in regularly for college updates.
House System
St John Bosco College has a House System designed to motivate, recognise and reward the achievements of students across a variety of curricula and co-curricular areas of college life, and build teamwork and a sense of community via membership of a House group within a supportive environment.
The house system is designed to create a positive climate of healthy competition and rivalry between the four House Groups. House activities are intended to cultivate a sense of belonging and add fun, energy, enthusiasm and celebration to the daily experience of school.
Each House competes for the House Trophy. House activities of a sporting, cultural, academic and fundraising nature are organised throughout the year to promote House spirit.
Students are allocated to a House upon arrival at the college with siblings placed in the same House. Two House Captains, along with House Patrons are responsible for the general organisation of each House at the various carnivals and for developing a sense of house spirit.
Caroline Chisholm was born in England in 1808 and died in England in 1877. However, she is primarily remembered for her contribution to Australian society. She is credited with creating the beginnings of welfare for the poor in Australia.
She gave special attention to unemployed migrant women, spoke on their behalf before government bodies in Australia and England, established employment schemes and engaged in many other activities on behalf of the disadvantaged. For more than 20 years her face was on the Australian $5 note.
Her faith was her inspiration for all she did and for this reason she is renowned for the manner in which she spread the Good News of Jesus by her courageous service of the poor and the vulnerable.
Fr. Thomas Dunlea was born in 1894 and died in 1970. He was the founding parish priest of Engadine and the founder of Boys’ Town, where there is a memorial stone in his honour to this day. In response to a promise to care for the “high spirited” son of a dying mother, he began his work for the welfare of disadvantaged boys and young men.
Convinced that the boys in his care needed an education if they were to make a go of their lives, he established a Rural College on the site of the present-day Heathcote High School in order to teach the students basic agricultural skills.
This work has developed into the present-day Boys‚ Town. Fr. Dunlea was renowned amongst his parishioners as a man of practical faith, a faith which sustained him in times of trial and a faith which inspired him in his service of others.
Mary MacKillop is expected to become Australia’s first saint. She was born in Melbourne in 1842 and died in Sydney in 1909. She came from a poor family and early in her life, worked as a shopkeeper and teacher to support her family.
Later she moved to South Australia and founded the Sisters of St. Joseph, a religious order devoted to education, nursing and welfare in impoverished areas in large cities and the outback. Mary MacKillop’s life is a great example for all members of our College community. She was a woman who dedicated herself to serving God and others and a woman who lived the Gospel through her service of the poor and those in need, especially through education.
Saint Dominic Savio was born in northern Italy in 1842 and is one of the few teenage saints in the history of the Church. He attended the school of St. John Bosco, who personally guided Dominic’s human and Christian development.
Dominic’s life is a great example for all members of the College community. He was a young man whose short life was dedicated to loving and serving God by actively fulfilling his responsibilities as a Christian, a friend and a student. His dedication to his studies, his loyalty as a friend, the generosity of his service to others and his love of God have inspired generations of young people throughout the world to love.